My morning routine usually involves rising about 6:45 a.m. I prepare a pot of coffee and some toast to accompany my juice-and-banana-augmented Wheaties. I usually check the bird feeders out the back window during the preparations. Mostly I see finches and chickadees flitting about.

Not so the morning I got my first close-up of turkeys feeding. Not just one but 10 of the wild variety. Actually, they weren't as wild as I had originally thought. Available food seems to have a calming effect on them. Either that or they feel more confident as their numbers increase.

As they tired of grazing under the feeders, they took a leisurely stroll around the end of the house where our bedroom is located. My wife let out a yelp and called to me to come and look. Leaving my Wheaties to soak, I went in to see where the turkeys were going next. There seemed to be a definite leader. He (I assumed at first it was a he) stopped, they all stopped and began scuffing the ground, pulling out little divots of grass and pecking where it had been removed. I presumed they were seeking insects.

The parade proceeded up-slope into the front yard with the leader in the front and a scattered V of nine bringing up the rear. As I watched, I saw a definite pattern in the organization of the group.

There seemed to be a pecking order. Any challenge to position seemed to bring an aggressive response. Some birds bringing up the rear seemed a little less plump, and I assumed that survival of the most aggressive was the rule.
I have since been informed (by my editor, who consulted the state turkey biologist, Ted Walski) that what I'd considered a pecking order led by a dominant tom was more likely a hen or two and a few juveniles from last season's brood. That led me to believe that lead hen might be meting out discipline or perhaps training her offspring.

As they proceeded up the driveway toward the road, the leader looked to the left and then the right, as if she knew to watch out for road traffic. Satisfied there was no danger, she quickly got the troops across the road to the neighbor's front-yard feeder, where they re-established the pecking order and proceeded to clean up around that location.

They ended up under the giant oak tree at the edge of my neighbor's yard. Since there was no shortage of fat acorns, they seemed to forget the pecking order, and the assembly became less organized. After the acorn fest, they disappeared into the adjacent woods.

During the past month, the turkeys have staged several repeats of the show. The only difference is that they all seemed to have gained weight. Maybe they will take up residence in the adjacent woods for the winter so I can continue my observations and become more skilled in interpreting what I observe.

I've noticed that turkeys don't make a lot of noise as they feed and move about. I lived on a farm as a youth and raised chickens and guineas, both of which made a lot of noise while they were feeding. I guess being wild makes turkeys more cautious about making a lot of noise when they enter the areas of human habitation.

Recently, I was discussing the turkeys I had seen with my son-in-law. He proceeded to take out the turkey call that he uses during the hunting season and demonstrated his full repertoire of call sounds. He mentioned that the call came with a compact disc of instructions that allowed him to practice before he got out to where the turkeys are. He said you have to think like a mature tom and listen for sounds that hens make.

First he did the "cluck-and-purr" sounds of the hens. Then he did the kee-dee sound of the young turkey lost from the flock. He moved along to what he called the "fly-down cackle" and an "adult-assembly" call, both of which are used by the hens to make sure the poults follow her lead.

Last, he demonstrated the call you hear only if you're close to the roosting tree because it's used to communicate with the other turkeys on the roost. I was amazed. Such a variety of calls from birds I'd observed as largely silent. Maybe I'll borrow my son-in-law's call to see if I can learn to talk to my flock.

By Bill Dawson, Community Tree Steward