The Turkey's Roost
The Wild Turkey (Meleagris gallopavo) is an upland game bird native to North America, and it's a species many of you are familiar with whether through geocaching, hunting, or simply Thanksgiving dinner. Wild Turkey (and other Galliformes in general) have always been an interest of mine, especially as a photography subject. They're also the Order I've worked the most with, having traveled to multiple states to work on various studies. In 2022, I spent nine months in North Carolina working on a Wild Turkey population dynamics study. My job in the winter was to capture as many Wild Turkey as possible with a small crew. We spent three months baiting a few dozen sites across three counties and then deploying rocket traps when they arrived. I spent many early mornings and late nights either sitting in a blind for hours or setting up the rockets in the cold and dark. Our efforts paid off, and we captured 96 turkeys, all of which we attached a GPS-enabled VHF transmitter. In the spring and summer, my job switched to monitoring those turkeys, locating nests, investigating mortalities, and then surveying poults for survival. Oh, and I ended up doing nearly all of the monitoring alone. Fun times.
Attaching a Transmitter to Male Turkey
Anyway, I guess this can be seen as a tribute to those 96 Wild Turkey I captured. Maybe I'll make a series for all the critters I worked with. I don't know. We'll see. But at the posted coordinates, you WON'T see the cache, so don't bother looking there. You'll want to search at N40° 10.ABC W074° 18.DEF. To get those coordinates, answer some Turkey Trivia.
Turkey Trivia:
A=Merriam's Wild Turkey, the subspecies native to the Rocky Mountains, was named in 1_00 after Clinton Hart Merriam, the first chief of the U.S. Biological Survey (later U.S. Fish & Wildlife).
B= How many subspecies of Wild Turkey (Meleagris gallopavo) exist?
C= The Eastern Wild Turkey (our local birds) is the heaviest of the non-domesticated Wild Turkey subspecies. The heaviest recorded one weighted how many pounds? Subtract 30.6 from this number.
D= Poult mortality is greatest during the first __ days of life. Subtract 6 from this number.
E= The most measurable beards ever recorded on a Wild Turkey? Subtract 10 from this number.
F= The Ocellated Turkey, which is the only other extant species of turkey, is native to the Yucatán Peninsula and the surrounding area. How many Mexican States is the Ocellated Turkey native to?
There you go! Not a long walk either! The cache is one of those big bisons that can hold small TBs and items. Due note the attributes and terrain rating. Originally, there was another twenty to thirty feet of tree to climb, but unfortunately, that plan didn't work out. So now it doesn't require climbing, though, for most people, a stepstool, ladder, or other similar tool will be required to reach the cache, though some of the taller folks out there might be able to reach without. Know your limits. Good luck and Gobble Gobble!
