This short clip features two male Rio Grande Wild Turkeys who were trying to intimidate us. Apparently they felt we were a bit too close to their women (there were two males and about twenty females in this group).
Their display of bravado included puffing up their feathers to appear bigger, loud clucking, and stalking towards us menacingly. It was a bit scary to have them come at us, we weren’t sure how much it would hurt to be attacked by two turkeys and we didn’t want to find out.
The turkey is one of only two domesticated birds that originated in North America—all other domesticated fowl come from Europe and elsewhere. The birds in this video are of course Wild Turkeys, but they are very similar to the Domestic Turkey, which has white tip and tail feathers and is the main dish each year at Thanksgiving dinners across the USA.
Read more about the Wild Turkey on Cornell’s All About Birds.
[UPDATE: Fixed the video link. Sorry guys!]
