Solving the ‘Case of the Missing Turkeys’ — well, sort of
“The Case of the Missing Turkeys” continues as I have found that I was not imagining things and a flock of wild turkeys had been living in Wheaton but had mysteriously disappeared.
I couldn’t find anyone in any government agency who would admit to having a part in the mystery. I kept probing.
I contacted John Burk, senior regional biologist at the National Wild Turkey Federation. I was sure he’d be the guy to help me bring the mysterious turkey murderers to justice. Burk blew my mind when he explained that he believed that the entire flock of wild turkeys had just died off from natural causes.
What? No turkey killers? How could this be?
It was simple, Burk explained. The average life span of a wild turkey is only 3-5 years. The coyote population in the area was exploding. He explained that coyotes were very good at finding prey by using scent to locate it.
He told me that a turkey nest that housed eggs carried a strong odor, especially when wet, and the last two years had very damp weather during the nesting season. Burk thought that coyotes could have ravaged the population to extinction.
I could not question John Burk’s opinion. He was an expert and I am just an outdoor writer. That said, I couldn’t shake the thought that my turkey flock was eliminated by human interlopers.
I made contact with Jeff Reiter, who writes the “Words on Birds” column for the Daily Herald. Reiter had recently retired from his position as senior manager of communications for Cantigny.
Aha, I struck gold. I had found the guy who could confirm my conspiracy theories. I just knew it.
Not so. Jeff Reiter was aware of the existence of the turkey flock at Cantigny, and he knew that it had disappeared, but he did not know why, at least not without certainty. He said that Cantigny had nothing to do with the disappearance of the birds. He said that Cantigny enjoyed having them around and missed seeing them on the property. He explained that Cantigny was an Audubon Society certified establishment and would never do anything to harm a bird.
Reiter explained that until a few years ago, Cantigny held classes about wild turkeys that were available for school-aged children to learn about the birds. He told me that visitors could purchase wild turkey lapel pins in the Cantigny gift shop, but they probably would be taken off the shelves now that the birds had gone missing.
I asked Reiter why he thought the birds were gone. He agreed with John Burk’s theory about the coyotes but added other reasons. He said Cantigny had done some construction on the grounds in areas that the turkeys had previously used for habitat. He said that hurt the nesting habits of the birds.
Reiter explained that Cantigny stopped its practice of not feeding birds of any kind. He told me that you can’t find hummingbirds on the grounds anymore because of this. Although Cantigny didn’t specifically feed the turkeys, the population was hurt by other species not being fed.
I knew that Jeff Reiter was a certified expert on the subject and his opinion on the disappearance of the wild turkeys was correct.
On one hand, it was good to know that there was no evil entity that killed my turkeys but I was still sad. It made me morose to realize that it was just a cruel trick played by Mother Nature that made the wild turkeys of Cantigny disappear.
Oh well, I guess I will just have to find another mystery to solve.
• Daily Herald Outdoors columnist Steve Sarley can be reached at sarfishing@yahoo.com.