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SCIENCE ALIVE! - Turkey Talk

Added Nov 16, 2020 •

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Introduction to the TWA Turkey Trunk: 'Let's Talk Turkey'

Show Transcript

Good morning, and welcome to "SCIENCE ALIVE!". My name is Charlotte Tondre and I have with me... Peggy Gonzales. And today, we're going to be talking about the Turkey Trunk, and before we get started I want to remind you that on Thursday, December 10th will be our last Zoom training for this semester and it's called "Adaptable Me" and we are going to be discussing the TWA Adaptations Trunk. So, right now let's get started on Turkey Trunk. Due to Thanksgiving, turkeys are a Texas bird, and we would like to share some information about it. Peggy is gonna tell you all about the trunk. Thanks, Charlotte, This turkey trunk is also from an adaptation-like trunk from Texas Wildlife Association and it's a really great, fun trunk especially for November because in October and November there is a push for turkey shooting and turkey hunts as well as lots of turkey farms supplying meat for Thanksgiving in our retail stores, but with regards to turkey hunts and turkey shoots, many people get licenses for shooting turkeys and use camouflage clothing and all kinds of decoys for going out and shooting turkeys, and we have a couple examples of decoys, Charlotte do you wanna point out a couple of them that we have here? This one is I believe that the hunter themselves can put these on top of their head and the neck is supposed to stand up, or they can just, there's a hard piece in here, they can just hold it up in a bush to draw other turkeys and this one, that's this one, this one has, is inflatable, and they can put it up on a stand and set it right in the middle of the field and ...again, another decoy for turkeys makes others come out thinking that there's a flock of turkeys around. And as you can see, there's a difference in how they look. This is the "Tom" for the gobbler ,the male turkey and there's the decoy resembling the female, the "Hen" turkey. Now, also, hunters have a tool, have tools for turkey calls to attract turkeys out in the wild and Charlotte's going to demonstrate a couple of cool turkey calls this is one... that's one call this is just a plastic tubing or a  stick and this is like a slate ...chalkboard...that's what it is and you just rub it on that and hunter's use it to make a call. Here's another one you just hold this one and shake it sounds just like a real turkey. That's what I think a real turkey gobble sounds like those are just some things hunter's use to attract wild turkeys. You might ask what is the law regarding turkey shooting and the season for turkey hunting in our area, in South Texas region is November 7th through January 17th. You need a license to hunt turkeys and you have a limit of four turkeys that you can kill and those turkeys need to be banded or identified with turkey tags that include the date of the kill and your license number, whether it's male or female and so there's some protocol to actually going out and shooting a wild turkey. We have some examples of turkey parts that are in the kit that are beautiful turkey feathers and turkeys have large feathers that enable them to fly easily up to 55 miles an hour, and we were kinda laughing at the fact that 55 miles an hour is too fast for in town right, for in-town speed limit but it's too slow for highway so you know turkeys are very easily going to get turkey tickets if only policeman can catch them. And then turkeys have adaptable claws for scratching on the ground for food and very interesting kind of intimidating sharp claws absolutely, yeah very productive and efficient for finding food on the ground. Another adaptation, Charlotte is their sharp beak, strong beak for crunching shells of animals or hard seed casings. And also probably for digging into trees, the edges of trees and into the ground they could probably How do they smell? They have a keen sense of smell. Sometimes they can get it easier this way with their beaks than with their claws. My reading also says that often male turkeys can be kind of aggressive. So that beak can come in handy too when they are defending a territory or defending themselves. Now turkeys are a bird, so when they are born, how do they come into this world? Well, they come into this world through hatched eggs. This is a replica of a turkey egg, and we have a really cute picture of a little turkey. And do they just lay one egg at a time? or... I'm not, I'm not sure how many I'm not sure how many. There's a picture, how many are in there? Here is an example of one... So, where do you think they live Charlotte? I would think in thicket in wooded areas where it's kinda thick, brushy like area Especially the "Hen" likes that kind of area for nesting. They actually live like you said, in thickets and woodlands in grassland prairies. But also sometimes in marshes where the grass is tall? Um hmm. Do you imagine that they like to live in town? No. (laughter) I don't think they would. They would end up, unless they are contained they would actually end up in the streets and with the traffic and everything I don't think they'd live very long in town. Well, you would think not, but actually they are pretty adaptable and research has shown that they are very easily adapted to suburbs or towns as long as they have trees to roost in at night and of course they can fly to different trees or areas. I remember in San Antonio here, there a place off of FM 78, there's a Lutheran church and there were a flock of probably about 6 turkeys that were walking on the roof. So, obviously they flew up there, and they were happy to be there surveying the area from the rooftop. What are some of their defense besides the claws and the beaks? Another great adaptation is because they are birds of prey, they have eyes on the side of their head, that when they move their head slightly, they can have a 360 degree range of vision similar to predators. This is not unlike other birds of prey also, so a great defense mechanism and adaptation for protection against predators. Have you every thought of having a turkey as a pet? No... Me neither. (laughter) However, apparently they make good pets especially a female turkey because they are very amiable and loyal and docile, and they like following their people around and stay close to them, they will sit for a long time just in bliss as they are petted. One testimony that I read about said that they make better dogs than dogs. Another testimony says that they are very entertaining because they are rather clumsy and fun to watch. So, back to our decoys, and you said one was a male and one was a female well, how do you tell these apart? How do you tell the males from the females? Good question. As you can see.. And what are they called? Okay. The females are called "Hens" and as you can see, they are not very colorful they are pretty mundane in their coloring in order to be camouflaged in brush because they're on the ground nesting, so they need to be protected by camouflage. The males on the other hand tend to have feathers that are darker and more colorful. And as you noticed, their heads are very colorful. They have a snood that comes down, and they also have beards that come off their neck and hang down and their heads tend to be white with coloring of red or blue depending on their emotion that they are feeling. And uh, that made me smile, red, white & blue. They are very patriotic birds and of course these beautiful tail feathers that you might imagine with other species of animals too the coloration is to attract females when they fan their feathers and spread around in front of the females it's like doing an attractive dance to attract the mates. So, that kind of gives meaning to the song, The Turkey Trot? (laughter) The Turkey Trot. The Turkey Trot has a reason and a rhyme to it. I can see why the teachers want these trunks so badly, especially during... I knew why they needed them during Thanksgiving, but these trunks would be fun any time of the year. Yes. They would definitely be a lot of fun. And for the teachers' information because we have a limited amount of these trunks it is a great idea to order them other than November. In order to study adaptation Inside the trunk is the curriculum binder a DVD and CD of turkey information, and then we have turkey parts of course with feathers the claw the turkey head replica and the egg replica turkey calls, and we have a variety of posters There's a turkey in roost. This is the male turkey, due to the coloring of head you can see. And I'm going to change places with you to open up the trunk because there are, uh, we have one more poster down here Charlotte with a lot of print information on it. Here is a big turkey. Usually the male turkeys, they call them "Toms". Know your turkey information, it shows the parts of the male head and the female and then the difference parts of the turkey in general. The last thing we want to show you that comes in the trunk is a "Stewarding Texas" binder that has all the information you would need about stewarding our Texas Wildlife as well as the land and that is a gift from the Texas Wildlife Association. Also, there are consumable magazines for the kids that they can use for valuable reading materials for all kinds of wildlife,  not just turkeys and those are for the students to keep of it's your choosing and these are produced by Texas Wildlife Association And these trunks, besides from us, you can also go online from Texas Wildlife Association and order one from there if someone reserves ours well in advance when you need it. But you will also have to contact them early also cause again because it's a popular item between October and November, and they go quick either ours or TWA's TWA has more of them than we do so thank you for joining us for a turkey talk. Bye

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SCIENCE ALIVE! - Turkey Talk

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