There are perhaps instances, extremely rare ones though, when a gobbler will fly instantly to a hen on hearing her call, or even at sight of her. Only in two instances in my life have I witnessed it, and on both occasions the gobblers were young birds two years old, and acted a good deal like a schoolboy with his first sweetheart—who smiles and laughs at everything she says and does. With the young turkey it may be his first gobble on hearing the quaver of the hen. He is made crazy, and may unceremoniously rush to any sound that in the least resembles the cry of the hen, without a thought of what he is about or of the possible consequences. This is generally the kind of gobbler the novice in calling bags as his first, a two-year-old with a five-inch beard.
In the early morning, during the spring, a gobbler will fly from his roost to the ground, strutting and gobbling, whether a hen is in sight or not; this is done to attract the hens, and it is then you will hear the puffs to which Audubon refers. This sound is produced by the gobbler in expelling the air from its lungs, at the beginning of the strut, the sounds and motions of which have never been satisfactorily described. While going through the strut the gobbler produces a number of notes and motions that are of interest; first, the wings are drooped until the first six or eight feathers at the end of the wings touch the ground; at the same time the tail is spread until like an open fan and erected at right angles to the body; the neck is drawn down and back until the head rests against the shoulder feathers, and the body feathers are all thrown forward until they stand about at right angles to their normal place. At the same time the body is inflated with air, which, with the drooping wings, spread tail, and ruffled feathers, gives the bird the appearance of a big ball. Having blown himself up to the full capacity of his skin, the gobbler suddenly releases the air, making a puff exactly as if a person, having inflated the cheeks to their full capacity, suddenly opens the mouth. As the puff is given, the bird steps quickly forward four or five paces, dragging the ends of the stiff wing feathers along the ground, making a rasping sound; he throws forward his chest, and, gradually contracting the muscles, forces the air from his body with a low, rumbling boom, the feathers resuming their normal position as the air is expelled. Three distinct sounds are produced: "Puff, cluck, b-o-o-r-r-r-m-i." At the termination of the gobbling season the primaries of the wings, which are used to produce the cluck, are badly worn by the continued dragging on the ground.
"While thus occupied," continues Audubon, "the males often encounter each other, and desperate battles take place, ending in bloodshed and often in the loss of many lives, the weaker falling under repeated blows inflicted upon their heads by the stronger. I have often been much diverted while watching two males in fierce conflict by seeing them move alternately back and forth as either had obtained a better hold, their wings dropping, tails partly raised, body feathers ruffled, and heads covered with blood. If in their struggle and gasps for breath one of them should lose his hold, his chance is over, for the other, still holding fast, hits him violently with his spurs and wings and in a few moments brings him to the ground. The moment he is dead the conqueror treads him underfoot; but what is stranger, not with hatred, but with all the emotions he employed in caressing the female."
I differ with Audubon, not in the case of the conqueror using affectionate conduct upon a fallen foe, should he get him down, as that is truly a freak with them; but I have not seen such a performance with wild birds, although I have noticed the domestic gobbler act similarly toward the body of a dead wild gobbler that I had placed before him on the ground. I have very often brought such a bird into the presence of a tame one, when, at the very sight of the dead bird on my back, the tame one would begin to droop his wings, purr, bow his neck, and bristle for a fight, and at once pounce upon the dead bird, even pounding me until I laid it down and allowed him to vent his rage by pounding it. After this he would begin to strut and gobble, and the red of his head becoming intense he would go through the caressing motions. More often though, under the circumstances, the tame bird would, at the sight of the dead wild gobbler, retire a little way and strut in a furious manner for an hour or two. This does not apply to one instance or individual, but many times in many places. I must differ with Audubon as to the results of these conflicts ever being fatal. I have seen many encounters as he describes, but have never in all my life seen one gobbler killed by another, or even crippled, although I have seen two or three birds fight together for hours at a time. Nor have I ever found a gobbler dead in the woods as a result of such an encounter, or even in a worried condition. I have killed many old gobblers and found their heads and necks covered with blood, with spur punctures all over their breasts; but this never stopped them from gobbling, nor are these wounds deep, as the spur, which is an inch and a quarter long in the oldest of them, can only penetrate the skin of the body after passing through the heavy mail of thick, tough feathers.
Another proof that the gobblers in my hunting grounds were not killed this way is that I should have missed them. How would you know? you might ask. In the same way that a stock owner knows when he misses a yearling from his herd. Being constantly in the woods, I knew every gobbler and his age (at least the length of his beard) within a radius of several miles, although there be three in one locality and five in another. During the time they were in flocks or bands, if one were missing, surely I would find it out ere long; and it has never yet happened that, when one was missing, I could not trace it to a gunshot and not to turkey homicide. I will not flatly dispute that there have been such incidents as cited by Audubon, met with by others; but I do claim that murder is not common among turkeys, and such incidents must be extremely rare, or I would have witnessed them. I can see no way by which one turkey can kill another; for, as I have said before, the spur is not long enough except to barely penetrate the thick feathers, and the biting and pinching of the tough skin on the neck and head could not cause contusion sufficient to produce death, nor are the blows from the wings sufficiently severe to break bones.
[CHAPTER VIII]
ITS ENEMIES AND FOOD
No bird on earth can boast of more or a greater variety of enemies than the wild turkey. The chief of them all is the genus Homo, with his sundry and sure methods of destruction. After man comes a host of wild beasts and birds, including the lynx, coyote, wolf, fox, mink, coon, skunk, opossum, rat, both golden and white-headed eagles, goshawk, Cooper's and other hawks, horned owl, crow, etc., all of whom prey more or less upon the poor birds from the egg to maturity. There is never a moment in the poor turkey's life that eternal vigilance is not the price of its existence. Still, many pass the gauntlet and live to a great age, the limit of which no man has discovered. I have been a lifelong hunter of all sorts of game indigenous to the Southern States, and I have never seen or heard of a wild turkey dying a natural death, nor have I heard of any disease or epidemic among them; and were it not for the eternal war upon this fast-diminishing species, especially by man, they would be as plentiful now as fifty years ago.
The first in the list of natural enemies of the turkey, if we admit the testimony and belief of nearly every turkey hunter, is the common lynx or wildcat, often known as bobcat. Many hunters believe that of all the enemies of the wild turkey the wildcat is the chief. In all my experience I have never seen a turkey attacked by a cat, nor have I ever seen the skeleton of a turkey which had been killed and eaten by cats. I have never seen a cat crouching and creeping up on a turkey, nor have I had one of them come to me while calling, and I have had more than fifty years' experience in turkey hunting in all the Gulf States where the cat is common. Numerous persons of undoubted veracity, however, have assured me that they have seen cats creep up near them while calling turkeys, and in some instances the evidence seems conclusive that the cat had no other business than to steal up and pounce upon the turkey. Like any other carnivorous beast, the lynx may partake of turkey as an occasional repast, if they are thrown in his way, but this is an exception and not the rule.