Wild Turkey downtown... What to do?

Birds of a feather flock together... except for this lonely one...

Have you seen the wild turkey trotting around downtown?

I am out of ideas on what to do and how to help it
I've called the following....
Parks and Rec- "Call Fish and Wildlife"
Called Fish and Wildlife - "Can't help as its not a native species"
Bird Rescue - same as above
Wild Animal Rescue - same as above

Sebastopol Police Department- We know about it as several people have called. Its
been there for a few weeks as its partner was killed by a car. Were not able to
do anything as it is wildlife. It will probably eventually get hit by a car .

Also tried the Humane Society .. They called the Sebastopol PD and got the same response. They can't
take it as it could carry diseases..

If you have any other ideas please post them.
Thank you!!
Jody Tucker

I've had them nest in my backyard. The raccoon kill most of the babies shortly after they are hatched. I used to have many of them, but they seem to have just gone away. They would roost in the trees of the neighbors across the street and come across to my place in the morning and eat. No idea why they went away; probably found some better territory.

I agree there's nothing to do for the one in Sebastopol. You could try to capture it and relocate it, but it wouldn't let you close in the first place, and if you did get hold of it, it would fight you..

there may be someone in the community or neighboring community
who has skills to catch it, non-violently, and place it in an appropriate setting~

I have 30 wild turkeys on my 1.3 acre property right now. They are mating. In my experience, once they do that, they will fly elsewhere. They are strong flyers, so if the one downtown wanted to fly elsewhere it could. I don't know if my flock would accept this bird (probably not), but it is worth finding out from the folks you have been calling. Or UC Davis Avian department might know if the bird can be "re-flocked." If so, and someone can trap the downtown turkey, they can release it here. Another one doesn't matter to me. But sending her to her slaughter in another flock doesn't make any sense if that is what will happen. Ah, we live in their habitat and we kill them with our cars.

Here is some turkey flock info:

https://wildturkeyzone.com/wildturkey/species2.htm

"Spring brings about some different flocking behavior. In March or early April, the groups of bachelor gobblers will rejoin up with all of the hens and form large groups as the mating season begins. After 2 or 3 weeks, the breeding season is beginning and the birds will break up again into mating flocks consisting of 2 or 3 adult gobblers and 5 - 15 hens. Each of these breeding flocks has the 1 dominant gobbler who does all of the mating and 1 or 2 subdominant birds who help fight off other gobblers. The amount of hens will vary depending the hen population in the area and the number of other dominant gobblers. During this time, there are also the same bunches of young males (or jakes) who generally stay separate from the more dominant gobblers during the mating season.


As the breeding season winds down and the hens are sitting on their nests, the gobblers will do considerable roaming in search of willing hens and/or hens who have lost their nest and are ready to be bred again. The gobblers will eventually lose interest entirely and begin flocking together in bachelor groups once again while the hens go about the business of raising the poults..


Within a flock there is a hierarchy or pecking order in which a rank of dominance is established. Generally, older birds are more dominant than are younger birds, and larger turkeys dominate smaller turkeys. Males usually dominate females."

Question: is the turkey in question a male or female?

You would have to see where it roosts at night and then you could possibly catch it and put it in a large dog cage and release it in the woods or someone's property in the country. They are like any bird and cannot see at night so easy to catch. It would take a strong person because of its wings, or maybe two people. Try a big net. It is possible. If roosting in a tree a net is a good idea.

Turkeys are very common on all the roads near my house near South Sebastopol. They are just like pigeons. They are part of the landscape and they go where they want,

Turkeys are native to Eastern North America, but not California. There are a LOT of turkeys living in the Sebastopol area. When I first saw this one, she had a companion. They, and now she by herself, seems to move around the area between Mary's Pizza and Brook Haven School.

:tiphat: :Turkey02:

If she evades a traffic death long enough, she will sooner or later encounter other turkeys, even a whole flock. Meanwhile, she's an independent resident of our community who doesn't need police or wildlife control or other intervention. Enjoy her presence, tip your hat, say "good day, Madam, nice to see you."

I think it's sweet how everyone is so concerned about this, but my advice is to leave it alone and let nature take it's course. They are not an endangered species, and this turkey probably knows what she's doing more than we understand. We often mistakenly cause problems when we interfere with wild animals that we come across, even though our intentions are good. Such as "rescuing" fawns or baby bunnies that we find hidden in bushes, without realizing that their mothers are away foraging for food and will return to where their babies are waiting. Trying to capture this bird might injure it or you, and cause more problems if you try to relocate it.

If you look around HWY 12 just east of us you will see flocks of wild turkeys. This could be a young turkey who got separated from his flock. Or, his flock is nearby. In anther post the writer shared how turkeys nest and their behavior after. Perhaps the best approach is to leave the bird alone for the time being. If it is still wandering a week from now, that could signal it is lost. Keep in mind that it has many available food sources and is not going to starve,
My 2 cents...:2cents:

The adults spend the night high in the trees. A big redwood across the street, and some full size valley oaks in my locale. Except the hen with her nest on the ground. The hen doesn't move off the nest if she can help it, and it is well concealed. I had 2 nests in my backyard one year well hidden in 4-foot plus tall grass. Each had 10+ eggs. I didn't know they were there. But I got extremely close to one once, within about a foot, disturbed the grass, the hen suddenly took off startling me. i went away hoping I didn't scare her off the nest for good. That evening I looked and she was back on it, hard to see her through the grass and her feathers are about the color of the dry grass.

Knowing where it was I'd peek usually every day. One day they were there, all eggs hatched, hen and all these little peepers near the nest. I looked at the nest, all eggs had hatched, no in-tact eggs left.

Hen stays on the ground with the chicks until they can fly into the trees of course. they grow fast. She lost some to predators fast too though. I think after a couple weeks she was down to only three. And then finally she had only one. I know we have lots of raccoon. They can't deal with an adult turkey but I suppose they scare them and separate off a chick.

I see turkeys everywhere, and I'm not in Sebastapol. I've seen them in Cotati, RPk, Penngrove, Petaluma and Santa Rosa. And of course, there's the always present Cotati hens and roosters at Walgreens.

The turkeys we see are actually a domestic offshoot of the original wild turkeys. Turkeys were first domesticated by native people before europeans arrived. These turkeys were imported and released as game park birds about 100 years ago. They became ecocompetators with true native birds like California quail after going feral.

The turkey flocks round where I live have diminished since coyotes came up the laguna bout 15 years ago. Bobcats probably take out big ones too before they roost for the nite. Maybe downtown is the safest place for turkey nowadays, as long as they stay in the bikelanes!

"The turkey flocks round where I live have diminished since coyotes came up the laguna bout 15 years ago."

I hear coyote yipping at night sometimes, and it sounds like a lot of them. It's off in the distance, but somewhere east side of the laguna and south of hwy 12.

As much as I love animals, as an organic farmer I do my best to have dogs that run them off. They were initiated by Fish and Game to deal with another predator, after which they became a primary predator here. They do much more damage that coyotes, bobcats, mountain lions and other animals who are indigenous to this area.

thanks for all this info about the local turkeys. Learned a bunch. Are there very many coyotes in the Laguna now? Just curious. Happy New Year. Lilith

They seem to have moved back north, on the laguna wildlife corridor mostly in the last few years. Lots of reports of coyotes eating feral and domestic housecats in graton and forestville. I no longer see the little cats on laguna walks. Hear the coyotes much less often now. Hear about big cats eating livestock more and more. Are they coyote predators? Maybe big cats are eating housecats? Waiting for wolf's, now back in the Sierra. Talk about bringing grizzlies back to cali. Need to build catproof barn for goats.

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Posted in reply to the post by Lilith Rogers:

...Are there very many coyotes in the Laguna now? Just curious. ...

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Oh yeah, the last bear who tried to live locally less than a year ago got run over by a car. Bears are very powerful predators but are more obvious than cats and canines.

They follow their food sources, as all animals do. And big cats don't eat domestic cats. The coyotes are very good rodent control, they hunt for rats and gophers. They will take a small cat if they see it as easy prey. They are an important part of our natural ecosystem and should be appreciated. We need to do our best to protect our domesticated animals which are not a natural part of our ecosystem, and realize that the feral cats are killing our native songbirds. The most dangerous predator on earth is humans. Other animal species don't eat their own species and they only kill for food, not for fun.

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Posted in reply to the post by rossmen:

They seem to have moved back north, on the laguna wildlife corridor mostly in the last few years. Lots of reports of coyotes eating feral and domestic housecats in graton and forestville. I no longer see the little cats on laguna walks. Hear the coyotes much less often now. Hear about big cats eating livestock more and more. Are they coyote predators? Maybe big cats are eating housecats? Waiting for wolf's, now back in the Sierra. Talk about bringing grizzlies back to cali. Need to build catproof barn for goats.

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Heard the coyotes last nite, drove the dogs crazy at 3am. Big cats eating little cats was a joke? I appreciate coyotes eating north African domesticated/feral cats, however, we define them. Though they are more on the rats and gophers than coyotes in my experience. The coyotes seem to concentrate on hares, chickens, turkeys, cats, lambs round where I live. A good field fence stops the coyotes, not lions or bears. Guess we will find out about wolf's and grizzlies as they come back.

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Posted in reply to the post by BEE KIND:

They follow their food sources, as all animals do. And big cats don't eat domestic cats. The coyotes are very good rodent control, they hunt for rats and gophers. They will take a small cat if they see it as easy prey. ...

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