Our true national bird taking to the streets of DC to inflict terror on lawmakers.
We have turkeys all over urban Minneapolis. It is easy to get them irritated. I keep my distance and steer clear of them because once they go into fight mode they do not back down.
A while back fair number of turkeys were living around TCF Bank (well I guess it Huntington Bank now) Stadium in Minneapolis for a gopher football game. Urban area, 40k+ people attending a football game. And the turkeys had picked out a plot of grass next to the tailgaters and just happily hanging out like they were tailgating. Compared to rural turkeys I've encountered they were very used to / comfortable around people.
I was impressed how well they adapted. Compared to rural turkeys I've encountered they were quite calm.
I had to learn turkey psychology to fight off a gang of toms who had claimed my rural property as their turf.
Luckily, turkey psychology is easy - if the tom perceives you as a manly turkey, you're another tom, and we need to fight to establish who is the bigger turkey. If you're perceived as a lady turkey, you're a potential date, so I'm going to inflate my gross head penis (aka snood) at you to impress you.
So all I had to do was whack them in the wings with a putter when they tried to hit me with them, until they admitted I was indeed the biggest turkey.
Although they still kept showing their obscene snood to my wife for a bit, until I convinced them that she was my lady turkey, and off limits.
I had literally never heard about this until I saw a high school friend of mine posting on Facebook yesterday about the urban turkeys in S.E. Minneapolis. I moved away from Mpls in 2003, so I assume this must have become a thing sometime in the last 19 years. Any idea about the backstory?
I used to live at 1st and Hennepin overlooking the Hennepin Ave bridge. During the lockdowns there were at least 4 times I remember either lone turkeys or small groups coming over the bridge in the middle of the day.
And just yesterday, driving through the tangle of 35/94/55, my wife pointed out a dead turkey on the side of the road.
Hiking through some of the wooded trails here in the Twin Cities, you can get a rafter (?) of these cruising hidden in the darkness. They certainly give off velociraptor vibes. :)
My 14 pound dog regularly chases flocks of turkeys in our yard and forces them to fly up in to the trees.
Most people - especially in cities - aren’t used to wildlife and are easily scared, just as those turkeys aren’t used to a dog chasing after them.
The first time I was in NYC there was a raccoon in the center of a trail in Central Park, just kind of chilling. Everyone was giving it a ridiculously wide berth and people looked at me like I was crazy for walking right by it. It’s just a raccoon. As long as it’s not rabid it’s less potentially dangerous than many dogs.
Of course, there’s the flip side of the coin where people think it’s OK to approach large wildlife in national parks…
Anywhere other than an extremely busy city park, sure. I've put down animals I thought might be rabid before, and in my experience they usually act a bit more odd than "I'm extremely used to people."
Animals that are habituated to humans are also dangerous though.
People feed squirrels and raccoons, and then some random passerby ends up getting attacked by the habituated animal who wants food. Squirrels can easily draw blood.
terrified? I've never seen a racoon being even slightly afraid of people. I mean yes, they may give you a way, yet it would be demonstratively very slow and with a look of total annoyance. Actually seeing racoons first time here in CA - there are a lot of them everywhere on Peninsula - that was the first time when i questioned the mantra that the humans are the top of creation as i saw that at least racoons are definitely not aware about that, and judging by the pretty contemptful look in their eyes they have a pretty different opinion about that.
thats probably because collectively we stopped using even elementary technology like atlatl, bow+arrow or slingshot, and we lost the need to hunt for the most part. A relatively primitive human could kill racoons with the standard tools they had then. If you needed to you could figure it out.
Where did you punch this goose? I should think the head/bill area would be hard to hit and painful. The breast would be hard to get to on account of wings and neck. Punching a goose in the back doesn't seem sporting, but maybe it was attacking someone.
Do you pick the duck-sized horses or the horse-sized duck?
>> I should think the head/bill area would be hard to hit and painful.
Significantly harder to hit but significantly less painful than a human head.
Plus geese lead with their heads. Classic boxing mistake.
I didn't hurt the bird, but a good pop did make him and his two buddies rethink trying to attack me for daring to come within 200yrds of them on the fairway. I've seen some people get upset about pace of play, but this was the first time I saw the forward group come after the back one.
I went with a punch instead of the golf club I had in my hand because I didn't want to kill the bird.
Sure. A grown adult can take on a turkey, but that adult will definitely take some blows from the turkey's spurs. Like someone else mentioned, it's not worth it over a public space in the city.
Also the bavarian (or southern german in general, it seems) Wolpertinger https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolpertinger. Interesting that this is such a widespread thing :)
Once on a kayaking trip, I experienced an angry bird encounter. It was a swan, not a turkey.
The lake was small and really muddy. The only viable path through it was through the small patches of reasonably clear water by the east side, but not having noticed that, I and my partner rowed ourselves into the mud.
The swan was large, female and obviously protective of her herd of cygnets, squeaking somewhere from within the reeds. She got real close and made angry noises at the kayak, waving her wings at us. She would swim away and then start an aggressive run at us, literally running on the mud, braking just inches away of our bow. We protected ourselves, the person in the front holding the row as a weapon, the one in the rear trying to frantically row ourselves back to clearer water.
In the end, we were towed out to safety by another, more experienced duo of our group. But I learned to never underestimate a swan.
On the C&O Canal towpath once around Great Falls, I encountered a bunch of geese, with goslings. One or more started to hiss as I got closer. I was wearing thin running shorts, socks, and shoes, and I really did not want to take on an enraged goose. I also did not care to take a detour through brush I knew to be full of poison ivy, so I turned around, I suppose a couple of miles earlier than I had meant to.
One of the friends I encountered turning back had been bitten by a goose, and said that it was as if somebody had grabbed his flesh with pliers. He thought I had been wise to turn around.
I have been bitten by Canadian Geese several times at a popular waterfowl feeding spot at a nearby river (yes, I know feeding them is not ideal). It really isn't that bad, not much worse than a duck bite. They really excel at appearing threatening
They are totally fearless. I remember my dad was driving his 1974 Impala past a park and 2 geese game running up in front of the car and hissed at us. This was a big ass 70s land boat of a car, and the geese had no qualms about making us stop.
I had one bite my hand once. It wouldn’t let go, so I grabbed its neck and pulled it away. Those things have seriously thick, meaty necks. It was like grabbing someone’s arm around the biceps.
Yeah, this doesn't even pass the sniff test. Swans weigh less than 30 pounds and have hollow bones. If they managed to impact you had enough to break your arm, all of their bones would shatter.
In general, birds have high intimidation stats but super low damage stats. Geese and swans are aggressive and mean, but they can't do anything to actually hurt you.
Australia and New zealand have black swans. They're capable of breaking limbs by hitting you with their wings (edit: this is a myth, but they still effing hurt).
I used to go sailing on a lake, and sometimes the males would assume having sails out was a territorial display and attack a dinghy.
I am a small farmer that raises turkeys periodically, when there aren’t any more in the freezer.
I would not hesitate to grab an attacking wild turkey by the neck and tearing its head clean off. Hold it upside down to drain the carcass, and you’re halfway home to roasting it for an excellent meal. No joke.
I’m guessing that the local Fish and Wildlife Department might frown on that approach to solving the problem, but I would argue that they should have gotten off their asses and dealt with it.
> I’m guessing that the local Fish and Wildlife Department might frown on that approach to solving the problem
I may be mistaken, but I think you are allowed to defend yourself regardless of season. Think about it, boars and bear, equally lethal in or out of season, some might argue bear are worse during off season due to cubs and such.
Now if they catch you red handed with a bottle of tabasco, your goose may be cooked so to speak.
I expect you would be in trouble taking a turkey in this manner, because these birds are hardly a lethal threat. Sure, you might get a few cuts, but you can easily avoid or evade their attacks.
If you engage when not strictly necessary, you are likely to be portrayed as the aggressor. The consequences may not be as severe as you might expect from a similar encounter and use of lethal force on a human, but I think in both cases you are expected to walk away from the situation if that option is available to you.
I believe in standing your ground, but I don’t live in a state with such laws. Even if I did, you can still expect a lengthy legal process to resolve the dispute. I would expect this to be true regardless of whether you proactively kill a human or a turkey in self defense. You had better be prepared to make a compelling defense of your actions, unless the circumstances are clearly beyond reproach. And they never are anymore, since the lawyers stand to profit by arguing the case.
Is it that easy to grab one that's coming after you by the neck without risking getting spurred? I agree that the idea that in an urban setting you couldn't deal with the problem without involving half a dozen agencies is rather ridiculous though.
Yes, there's some risk of getting beat up a bit, so it would be ideal to be wearing gloves and coveralls. I would not let that slow me down though, but I have experience with catching them in midair while they are coming at me.
Mostly, it's a matter of being confident and moving quickly. You can expect to get hurt if your movements and reactions are slower than the bird; above all, do not let it gain the initiative or advantage.
The same approach will help you to avoid running into any issues with the relevant government agencies. They won't charge you if they don't catch you. Wear an orange vest over the coveralls, and it's likely no one will even question your actions.
In Oakland we had a turkey named Gerald who became more agitated during covid and would attack people in the rose garden. An animal trapper had to dress up as a feeble old woman to capture it. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/nov/25/oakland-turk...
I've never seen a turkey live (yes, I grew up in cities) - is this really such a strong animal? Wouldn't grabbing it and kicking/strangling not be enough?
A dog that weights the same has teeth that are designed to bite and cut, so the have an advantage in hand to paw combat - but a turkey?
Birds have claws which are designed to cut and tear. They can also move them very quickly, scoring down your face/belly multiple times.
Birds have beaks which are designed to inflict harm. Think: woodpecker. Think: parrot (beak can cut open metal cans).
So you grab the turkey by the neck, now it is raking your entire front with claws while flapping wings which effectively blinds you by overwhelming your vision.
Or you grab it by the legs -- need to get both in one grab, by the way, and it pecks you.
And you might be assuming a fair fight. What if you are walking down the street, and the turkey jumps you from behind?
A solid kick would likely dissuade a turkey, but then you'd be on rather low moral ground for harming a relatively harmless bird. This turkey seems like quite the outlier, most birds just put on a show of hissing and flapping wings and it's sufficient to just walk away from them. Not to mention the risk that someone gets the incident on camera and posts it on Twitter, accusing you of animal cruelty.
One of my cousins dealt with a Canada goose that way and it seemed to work. Sample size of one though I guess, and he wound up and gave it a very robust kick. In my cousin's defense, the goose was chasing a small child at the time. A solid kick gave him time to grab the kid and get him out of pecking range.
> you'd be on rather low moral ground for harming a relatively harmless bird
It's one the most threatening in that set of animals who are widely perceived to be too cute or helpless to physically assault. Sort of the inverse of city pigeons?
Birds are deceptively big for their weight (or rather, the other way around). Male turkeys are quite large and, like many males in nature, are geared to fight off threats. Take a look at these:
I'm in California farm land, and we get flocks of wild turkeys passing through the neighborhood from time to time. They even came over the fence into the yard once.
They can be aggressive, that's for sure. I'm not sure a kick would make them back off. Are they a lethal threat? No. But they could hurt you. Who wants a bunch of cuts from fighting a wild animal? Best to avoid them if possible.
They're roughly the same size as Canadian Geese, but they tend to run in larger groups. I've never had problems with them being aggressive though, unlike geese. An angry goose once knocked my bike into a ditch when I didn't swerve far enough away for his liking.
Here in South East Queensland we have Brush Turkeys, which are megapodes. Males who can't get a mound travel in mobs and gang rape chickens. My good friend Shane the vetinarian treats traumatised chickens every year.
Australia. Where a bird that _doesn't_ want to kill you is a sex pest.
In NSW, our area suddenly had 4 turkeys turn up and then 4 more smaller ones appeared later. They've been digging everyone's gardens up, walking around on peoples' roofs (second story).
Manditory youtube on the cobra chicken. Leads down a fun rabbit hole of people in nice suits being attacked by birds that weigh less than thier briefcases.
My wife works for the local Board of Elections. Two years ago one of the polling places she manages had a wild turkey menacing the parking lot. Apparently, people had been feeding it and it had become used to getting handouts and was driving voters away with its aggressive behavior. They called the cops who came and lured it away with food. It wasn't the first time they'd been called there and they came prepared.
Turkeys are right up there with swans, geese and deer as nuisance animals I can do without. The birds'll chase you for no reason, and they'll all fly right into your car and leave a nice-sized dent or smash your window.
It would make quite the banquet stuffed and cooked up for homeless in DC. Just sayin'.
Absolutely I did! That episode was a delight. Also the article in the Guardian about the turkey menacing Oakland had a number of the turkey trivia facts sprinkled through "Thanksploitation Spectacular:" https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/nov/25/oakland-turk...
Side note, one thing I enjoyed about that episode was that, under the layers of cynicism and absurdity, there was a kernel of patriotism and national pride.
When I was little my Dad had an aggressive turkey (well it would let my Dad pet it but no one else) I generally kept our Rottweiler between me and the turkey when I was anywhere near it
What is legal situation with self defense here? This thing can run faster than any human. What happens if it gets hurt or slaughtered while attacking a person? Is there an obligation to call a police or vet?
Wild Turkeys are not a protected species. I don't know squat about local laws in DC and IANAL, so I could be wrong, but I'm thinking about what happens if you kill a bird in general. For example, if you hit one with your car, you typically just keep on driving and feel bad about it - you don't report it to law enforcement or anything. This would seem to be the same scenario.
I'm only 10% joking. This isn't the kind of thing that gets a lot of case law built up (because 99% of the time it happens it happens in a jurisdiction that DGAF, not downtown DC) so it's really a gray area. And in the case of gray areas courts tend to default to just whatever the local norms of "how things ought to be" are.
This being the DC area if someone in a suit jacket decides to punt the turkey into traffic for being a twat nothing will probably happen but some college kid from the panhandle or Mexican service worker cracks its neck and then takes it home to cook/freeze (because that's what any sensible person on a Busch Lite budget would do) they'll probably get the book thrown at them. They're real big on those sorts of "the law is relative based on your station in life" type things down their.
What's a goose going to do to you? A turkey at least has sharp nails - not enough to injure you, but enough to be unpleasant. A goose can't do anything to hurt you, it just honks and flaps it's wings to try and scare you.
