{"id":1086,"date":"2023-04-23T06:30:41","date_gmt":"2023-04-23T06:30:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/americangunpeople.com\/?p=1086"},"modified":"2023-04-23T06:30:41","modified_gmt":"2023-04-23T06:30:41","slug":"white-turkey-legs-and-curly-toenails-whats-with-these-toms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/americangunpeople.com\/?p=1086","title":{"rendered":"White Turkey Legs and Curly Toenails. What&#8217;s with These Toms?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p class=\"has-drop-cap\">As turkey season gets into full swing, a few oddball birds are starting to show up on our newsfeeds. From <a href=\"https:\/\/www.outdoorlife.com\/hunting\/youth-tags-white-gobbler-missouri\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">leucistic toms<\/a> to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.outdoorlife.com\/hunting\/tennessee-seven-bearded-gobbler\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">turkeys with seven beards<\/a>, these out-of-the-norm gobblers are making hunters do a double take. We asked a turkey biologist to explain what\u2019s going on with the feet and legs of two separate turkeys: one with unusually pale legs and stumpy spurs, and one that\u2019s been walking around on long, corkscrewed toenails.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"h-light-legs-and-short-spurs\">Light Legs and Short Spurs<\/h2>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full is-style-default\" data-dimension=\"landscape\"><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Robert Krebs\u2019 turkey had oddly light-colored legs, leading one biologist to theorize it had a pigmentation disorder. <i>Natalie Krebs<\/i><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Missouri turkey hunter Robert Krebs tagged this mature tom in Missouri on April 17. But after taking in the turkey\u2019s 11 1\/2-inch beard, he and his buddies noticed something strange about the turkey\u2019s legs. They were extremely pale, especially when compared to the normal reddish legs of the other turkeys hanging in camp. The spurs were also short and somewhat decrepit (\u201crotted,\u201d as one hunter put it). The longbeard weighed 19 pounds, or 3 to 4 pounds less than the longbeards tagged on nearby farms.<\/p>\n<p>Is this turkey just an old man falling apart at the seams? Or is something else amiss? <\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https:\/\/playlist.megaphone.fm\/?e=RECU4280060540\" width=\"100%\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt appears that there\u2019s probably a pigment issue,\u201d says Cody Cedotal, the wild turkey program manager for the Louisiana Department of Fish and Wildlife. \u201cThey\u2019re definitely a lighter color. You see a lot of color variations in critters, whether they\u2019re melanistic phases or other [oddities].\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Turkeys can inherit <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nwtf.org\/content-hub\/wild-turkey-appearances\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">albinism<\/a> or <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fieldandstream.com\/hunting\/hunter-kills-white-turkey-north-carolina\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">leucism<\/a>. Albinism is a complete lack of pigment in the body, which causes the bird to have shock-white feathers, white legs, and a white-pink head. Leucism means the turkey has a partial loss of pigment, so it might have white feathers with a blue and red head, or only partially white feathers. In this case, the turkey\u2019s feathers were normal, but the legs were really light in color.<\/p>\n<p>With the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.outdoorlife.com\/hunting\/minnesota-record-turkey\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">long beard<\/a> this turkey was sporting, it\u2019s safe to say this tom was on the older side. But both spurs were less than an inch long, and one looks like it has seen better days. Cedotal explains that most variations in spurs are injury-related, whether they occur during a fight or from accidentally kicking a rock. Spurs are comprised of a keratin sheath atop a bony structure, so the sheath, the bone, or both could be damaged. Such trauma could result in the spurs being stunted for the remainder of a turkey\u2019s life, he says, but even long, healthy spurs aren\u2019t a good indicator of age.<\/p>\n<h2>The Turkey with the Curly Toenails<\/h2>\n<p>Another gnarly-looking set of turkey feet hit the Internet on April 19 when the National Wild Turkey Federation reposted a photo from turkey hunter Joe Harvey. (Harvey indicated in a comment on the post that his son, Guy, actually tagged the bird and is the one in the photo. It was not clear where the bird was killed in the country.)<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/plugins\/post.php?href=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2FTHENWTF%2Fposts%2Fpfbid0272Aydk5UBn1ryJZ2vog5CN6ozrfaGpaAaHpvMkvRrPLKhxA1vxZP3gZdkaQw62oLl&amp;show_text=true&amp;width=500\" width=\"500\" height=\"610\" style=\"border:none;overflow:hidden\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" allow=\"autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; picture-in-picture; web-share\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The bird\u2019s legs are a normal color, and the spurs are long and healthy looking, but the toenails are something else entirely. They vary in length, but five of the six toenails are clearly abnormal: four are long and curly and the middle right toenail appears entirely absent. Even the far-left toe, the most normal of them all, is a bit on the long side.<\/p>\n<p>Cedotal chalks this up to the turkey\u2019s nails not growing in a natural direction.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cJust like a dog, or anything else, animals wear their toenails down just by walking, moving, and scratching. But for whatever reason, this particular bird just never did that,\u201d he says. \u201cYou see how the toenails curve up immediately? That\u2019s probably why they haven\u2019t worn down like a normal bird\u2019s would. They usually come straight out the foot and curl downwards, where they wear off. You can see how the middle toe without the toenail is actually curled upwards itself. That\u2019s probably just the [result] of it not wearing off and [the turkey] having to walk like that.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>And while logic might say that the impressive spurs on this tom mean the bird is on the older side, Cedotal reminds us that spur length is not a reliable indicator of age.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Read Next<\/strong>: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.outdoorlife.com\/conservation\/turkey-population-decline\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Why Are Turkey Populations Declining?<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cDifferent birds grow spurs differently,\u201d he says. \u201cSometimes what people would call a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.outdoorlife.com\/articles\/hunting\/2012\/04\/gift-god-2-year-old-toms\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">two-year-old turkey<\/a> would have a 3\/4-inch spur. But other times I\u2019ve seen turkeys [with] maybe an inch-long, sharp, pointy spur that we would call a three- or four-year-old turkey, but we have banding data that says that turkey is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.outdoorlife.com\/hunting\/charlie-elliot-turkey-hunt\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">eight or nine years old<\/a>. The older the turkeys get, the spurs become much less reliable. I\u2019ve seen adults killed with little half-inch bumps.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><script type=\"text\/javascript\" async=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/sdk.js#xfbml=1&amp;version=v3.2\" id=\"facebook-js-js\"><\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.outdoorlife.com\/hunting\/white-turkey-legs-curly-toes\/\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As turkey season gets into full swing, a few oddball birds are starting to show up on our newsfeeds. From leucistic toms to turkeys with seven beards, these out-of-the-norm gobblers are making hunters do a double take. We asked a turkey biologist to explain what\u2019s going on with the feet and legs of two separate [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1087,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1086","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-gun-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/americangunpeople.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1086","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/americangunpeople.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/americangunpeople.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/americangunpeople.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/americangunpeople.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1086"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/americangunpeople.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1086\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/americangunpeople.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1087"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/americangunpeople.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1086"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/americangunpeople.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1086"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/americangunpeople.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1086"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}