a turkey with black head

[eastbank]

a friend killed this turkey on wed 1st of may in huntington county pa. called it in to 30 yards and shot it with his shotgun. it seemed and acted normal. my friend called it black head and the groths will grow and cover the birds eyes and cause it to lose its eye sight and be easy prey for fox-coyotes.

 

[Armored farmer]

Yikes.
That looks nasty.
Congrats on the bird.

 

[troy fairweather]

it licked a toad lol. that could be from ticks,maybe scare tissue made the growths.

 

[JeffG]

Nature is cruel. Looks like an old injury...fighting?

 

[FL-NC]

Glad it became a trophy instead of coyote bait.

 

[22250Rem]

Give my congrats to your friend... I've never heard of or seen that before on a turkey but all sorts of nasty things can occur in the wild. That one would have been removed from the gene pool by a fox or coyote in the near future anyway, most likely. Anyone here ever see something like that?

 

[troy fairweather]

Give my congrats to your friend... I've never heard of or seen that before on a turkey but all sorts of nasty things can occur in the wild. That one would have been removed from the gene pool by a fox or coyote in the near future anyway, most likely. Anyone here ever see something like that?

i've seen similar on deer and bear there old tick bites.

 

[Bwana John]

Histomoniasis

 

[eastbank]

winner-winner, chicken dinner.

 

[Bwana John]

winner-winner, chicken dinner.

Ummm... that's OK, I think I might skip poultry for a couple days.