Democratic Sentinel, Volume 2, Number 43, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 December 1878 — The Turkey. [ARTICLE]

The Turkey.

■ Bishop Butler has said of the strawberry: “Doubtless God could have made a better berry, but doubtless God never did.” Substitute the word “bird” for berry, and we have the American turkey. “My Lord of Norfolk ”is a stately fowl, weighing his fifty-odd pounds, and fit to grace the baronial hall in Merrie England at Yuletide; but, although his flesh is white, his flavor is but poor and insipid when compared with that of the “ gobbler” which comes into the market all over the length and breadth of this fair land at the close of the month of November. The flavor of the American turkey is a delicious speciality. Although the turkey was exclusively an inhabitant of North America in its wild state, the earlier naturalists supposed it to be a native of Africa and the East Indies, while its common name is said to have arisen from the belief that it originated in Turkey. It was carried to England in the early part of the sixteenth century by William Strickland, Lieutenant to Sebastian Cabot, and since that time it has been acclimated in most parts of the world. The progenitor of the present race of domesticated turkeys is not known with certainty ; some naturalists incline to the belief that it is the Meleagris gallopavo, while others consider it to be an allied speeies now extinct. Domesticated turkeys thrive best on high, dry, and sandy soil, and when grasshoppers are plentiful can pick up their own living. In temperate climates they generally lay twice a year, fifteen eggs or less, white, with small spots of reddish yellow. The female is prolific for five years, though those of two or three years are the best hatchers. Incubation lasts twenty-seven or twenty-eight days, and they are such close sitters that food must be placed within their reach. The males utter singular notes resembling the word “ gobble” several times repeated ; hence, in the language of the farmyard, the male is spoken of as the gobbler.