The daily morning journal and courier., 1900-12-06
WAYS OF WILD TURKEYS.
HABITS or THE LARGEST 4AMEBI-
 CAN GAME BIRDS,

cal Distribntion - Decided in Thcir
 Likes and DIsIikes-Peean Nuts tho
 Best Food for Them.
 When the learned and pious Fra Aga
 pida professor and historian to Cortez
 returned to Spain from his first visit
 to Mexico. he wrote a brief narrative
 of the marvellous things and the won
 ders that came to his notice during his
 memorable visit to the New World. He
 dlated upon the abundance of fine food
 fish in the American waters and spoke
 most appreciatively of the venison and
 of a variety of wild cattle" (meaning
 undoubtedly the bison) which were
 hunted for food; and their flesh is very
 good too," added the good father.
 ''There is also a bird, much greater in
 bigness than a peacock, that is found
 within the forests and vegas [meadoWsl
 all over this country. It surpasses as
 food and wild bird we have found up
 to this time. The natives do shoot
 these birds with arrows and catch
 them in various kinds of springes and
 snares. They are sometimes very large,
 being as much as thirty pounds in
 weight. They can fly, but prefer to
 run, which they can do with exceeding
 SWiftness."
 This is the first introduction of wild
 turkey to history. Fra Agapida prob
 ably had in mind the wild turkey of
 Arizona when he wrote of it. weighing
 as much as thirty pounds, There is a
 wild turkey in that country which fre- iolat ha writer once shot one in the Mogoloon mountains in Arizona that came nearer
 weighing forty pounds than thirty.
 My Apache helper and guide declared
 he had seen wild turkeys in the noun tain range mentioned that would easily have weighed forty pounds, and our party were all inclined to credit his Statements. Certainly Arizona besides its nine-foot rattlers three inches thick and it's wealth of scorpion and tarantu- Ia life, grows the largest game birds of certain kinds that are known to our continent
 The range of the widl turkey once ex- tended from Mexico to Arizona north ward as far as the present state of Michigan, and even into the Province of Ontario. Turkeys were particularly abundant and of a fine size in Tenn essee and Kentucky, and the contigu- ous states hundred years ago, and are still to be found in parts of Illinois, h. diana and Ohio in to1erable profusion, considering how they have been hunted, in season and out by Indians as well as white men, for the past hundred years. In fact, it is the highest poss- hla mi +o tbo vr,iI ;,, telligence that it exists at all.
 Did you ever sit unseen and watch flock of hundred wild turkeys devas- tate mountaineer's patch of buck wheat or corn? Strategy equal to any exhibited by two-legged animals with out feathers is developed on an occas- lon -af this sort Such raid is a mat ter for much discussion among the fath- CTS and more especially the mothers of the attacking party. A skirmish line made up of a dozen old and weary hens usually makes the first reconnaissance. 1 They approach the premises and fly up- | on the fence with the greatest circun1- spection, each holding itself in readi- ness to run for it's life, crying, Quit | quit" at every jump upon the shght- est occasion for alarm. A turkey much | prefers running to flying, and there is good reason for it. It can run with | great swiftness and to long distances without much fatigue, but flying is an unnatural method of motion and it | never resorts to it save under the ex- | treme stress of sudden emergencies. | some occasions requiring that it put as | great distance between itself and the object of it's dread or it's enemy as pos- sihle.
 The extreme northern and eastern | habitat of the wild turkey, in the coun- try's early history, has never been clearly defined. Wilson, one of the ear Hest and most accurate hunter-natural- | Ists, thinks it ranged as far east as the | western border of Connecticut but he gives no reason for his faith. The ear ly chronicles of New England do, in- deed, mention turkey, but there is no proof that it was the wild bird There were few, but never an abundance, of wild turkeys in western New York but they seem to have disappeared about he beginning of the American revolution.
 The wild turkey varies greatly in size and in other desirable qualities, according to it's geographical distribu- tion. It is never a cold weather bird and it greatly dislikes a region of con- tinued frosts and heavy snoWs; indeed, after two or three cold winters, with deep snow accompaniments the turk eys will forsake an otherwise cOngenial region where they have lived and thrived for many years. The most in- telligent sportsman and hunter-natural- ists of Michigan and Wisconsin account for the abandonment of those sections . by the wild turkey upon this theory, and it has a strong degree of plausi- bility. Heavy snows render it very diff . fcult for these huge birds to obtain l their food-and they require a great { Heal of heat-producing food. This ac- ] counts for their partiality for Indian corn and the other cerials, and in the I south for oil-producing nuts, such as hose from the beech tree; but, above | III, the wild food with which nature , furnishes it, the turkey most delights T Il the southern pecan. f In Louisiana and Texas, in particular, ind also along nearly all the river bot . oms of Arkansas, Alabama and Miss ssippi (With few in southern MissOu- . i) there are great quantitiPS of pecan l {,