The daily morning journal and courier., 1903-02-28

hundred individuals. seeking those localities where food was most abun-
 daEt; usually the rich bottom lands of large rivers like the Ohio and Mis- sissippi. Those migratiOns it is said
 began about the beginning of October.
 the males travelling in parties quite
 separate from females with their we'll
 grown young. In their travels they
 were often obliged to cross rivers a
 mile or more in width, which they did
 in a body, starting from the tops of
 the highest convenient trees. The
 strong ones would get across quite
 easily, but the weak ones often fell in-
 to the water. and were obliged to swim
 for some distance. In swimming they
 spread their tails, stretched out their
 necks and kicked vigorously with their
 feet. After reaching & land of plenty
 they split up into smaller fiocks, com-
 posed of birds of both sexes, and thus
 they lived until the middle of the fol-
 lowing February, when the females
 again separated from the males.
 In march, the commencement of the
 breeding season is heralded by the calls
 of the male or ''g0bler," who usually
 gobbles early in the morning before he
 leaves his roost; later, he comes to the ground to feed, or perhaps to answer the call of some female. In the latter
 case he acts much as a domestic gobbler does on similar occasions. putting hin- self up and strutting pompously up and down before his lady love, erect ing his tail and brushing the ground with his lowered wings. At such times he is likely to encounter another male and then bloody battle takes place, in which the birds use both bills and spurs. Frequently one of the com batants is killed outright and the vic- tor may be obliged to win several other such duels before his poIygamous ma- Jesty can make good his title sultan of the harem." After the battles have been won and lost, the hens follow the victorious gobbler until they begin to lay. The site selected for the nest is a slight depression in the ground, usually at the foot of tree or bush. Here, on a few dry leaves, the hen lays from | ten to fourteen eggs. They are buff, | finely speckled with brown. These | eggs are often discovered and devoured by crows, foxes and wild cats. and in | such cases a second clutch will some- | times be laid The hen sits very close, | especially toward the end of the period | of incubation. and will often allow one | to approach very near before jumping | up. At times several hens have been 1 known to deposit their eggs in one nest, l and Audubon once saw three turkeys | sitting on a nest containing forty-two l eggs.
 The young can run almost as soon i as they are matched and the mother 1 leads them out into the world cluck- l ing softly to keep them together. It | is said that she is careful to keep them | on ground which is high and dry, and | 1t is well known that a thorough wet l ting is fatal to young turkeys. At first 1 the downy chicks pass their nights on l the ground beneath the sheltering 1 wings of their mother, but in about two l weeks they mount to very low branches | where they still claim the protection of 1 their parents. During the day they i roam the woods and open country, hunting for wild strawberries, black l berries, grasshoppers and other soft l food. Adult turkeys are very fond of 1 pecan nuts,. and also eat corn, grass l and fruit, and beetles, pollywogs and 1 small lizards have sometimes been i found in their creps., When feeding | amongst fallen leaves or loose soil they l scratch for their food after the manner of farm poultry.
 Besides man they have many enemies, l the worst of which perhaps are the 1 larger owls, which attack them at night | on their roosts. The lynx also preys l upon them both by day and by night. l Originally they showed comparatively l little fear of man, but long and contin- uous persecution has made them very 1 wary and difficult to approach. Not l only do they fly we'll. but they run with l 8 speed equalled by. few other birds. It |