The male is substantially larger than the female, and his feathers have areas of red, purple, green, copper, bronze, and gold iridescence.

[16][4] Wild turkeys prefer hardwood and mixed conifer-hardwood forests with scattered openings such as pastures, fields, orchards and seasonal marshes.

In the Northeast of North America, turkeys are most profuse in hardwood timber of oak-hickory (Quercus-Carya) and forests of red oak (Quercus rubra), beech (Fagus grandifolia), cherry (Prunus serotina) and white ash (Fraxinus americana).

Best ranges for turkeys in the Coastal Plain and Piedmont sections have an interspersion of clearings, farms, and plantations with preferred habitat along principal rivers and in cypress (Taxodium distichum) and tupelo (Nyssa sylvatica) swamps.

Lykes Fisheating Creek area of south Florida has up to 51% cypress, 12% hardwood hammocks, 17% glades of short grasses with isolated live oak (Quercus virginiana); nesting in neighboring prairies.

In San Diego County, turkeys tend to be found farther from the coast, usually a minimum of 30–50 miles inland, at reasonably higher elevation; there is a healthy turkey population inhabiting the montane conifer woods and open oak forest habitats of the Cleveland National Forest, a region which borders on high desert and generally receives very minimal annual precipitation.

Turkeys in these areas can be found in dense thickets of manzanita (Arctostaphylos), often growing on arid hillsides, for shelter and nesting sites, as well as rocky and boulder-strewn chaparral foothills.

In ideal habitat of open woodland or wooded grasslands,[17] they may fly beneath the canopy top and find perches.

At twilight most turkeys will head for the trees and roost well off the ground: it is safer to sleep there in numbers than to risk being victim to predators who hunt by night.

Because wild turkeys do not migrate, in snowier parts of the species's habitat like the Northeast, Rockies, much of Canada, and the Midwest, it is very important for this bird to learn to select large conifer trees where they can fly onto the branches and shelter from blizzards.

[citation needed] Wild turkeys are omnivorous, foraging on the ground or climbing shrubs and small trees to feed.

They prefer eating acorns, nuts, and other hard mast of various trees, including hazel, chestnut, hickory, and pinyon pine, as well as various seeds, berries such as juniper and bearberry, buds, leaves, fern fronds, roots, and insects.

Wild turkeys often feed in cow pastures, sometimes visit backyard bird feeders, and favor croplands after harvest to scavenge seeds on the ground.

[28][29][30][31][32][33] Mortality of poults is greatest in the first 14 days of life, especially of those roosting on the ground, decreasing most notably after half a year, when they attain near adult sizes.

In addition to poults, hens and adult-sized fledglings (but not, as far as is known, adult male toms) are vulnerable to predation by great horned owls (Bubo virginianus),[35] American goshawk (Accipiter atricapillus),[36] domestic dogs (Canis familiaris), domestic cats (Felis catus), and red foxes (Vulpes vulpes).

Another alternative behaviour, common in Galliformes, is that when surprised with no time to flee, the poulets hide under the wings and body of the hen while she sits tight and still.

Male toms occasionally will attack parked cars and reflective surfaces, thinking they see another turkey and must defend their territory.

[citation needed] Game managers estimate that the entire population of wild turkeys in the United States was as low as 30,000 by the late 1930s.

[51] By the 1940s, it was almost totally extirpated from Canada and had become localized in pockets in the United States, in the north-east effectively restricted to the Appalachians, only as far north as central Pennsylvania.

They would wait for numbers to grow, catch the surplus birds with a device that would have a projectile net that would ensnare the creature, move it to another unoccupied territory, and repeat the cycle.

Several other populations, introduced or escaped, have survived for periods elsewhere in Britain and Ireland, but seem to have died out, perhaps from a combination of lack of winter feed and poaching.

Its range is one of the largest of all subspecies, covering the entire eastern half of the United States from Maine in the north to northern Florida and extending as far west as Minnesota, Illinois, and into Missouri.

The Rio Grande wild turkey ranges through Texas to Oklahoma, Kansas, New Mexico, Colorado, Oregon, Utah, and was introduced to central and western California, as well as parts of a few northeastern states.

The Merriam's wild turkey ranges through the Rocky Mountains and the neighboring prairies of Wyoming, Montana and South Dakota, as well as much of the high mesa country of New Mexico, Arizona, southern Utah and the Navajo Nation, with number from 334,460 to 344,460 birds.

[57] The Spaniards brought this tamed subspecies back to Europe with them in the mid-16th century; from Spain it spread to France and later Britain as a farmyard animal, usually becoming the centerpiece of a feast for the well-to-do.

The idea that Benjamin Franklin preferred the turkey as the national bird of the United States comes from a letter he wrote to his daughter Sarah Bache on 26 January 1784.

[58] The main subject of the letter is a criticism of the Society of the Cincinnati, which he likened to a chivalric order, which contradicted the ideals of the newly founded American republic.

[59][60] The wild turkey, throughout its range, plays a significant role in the cultures of many Native American tribes all over North America.

Eastern Native American tribes consumed both the eggs and meat, sometimes turning the latter into a type of jerky to preserve it and make it last through cold weather.

They provided habitat by burning down portions of forests to create meadows which would attract mating birds, and thus give a clear shot to hunters.