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A turkey is either of two species of large birds in the gamebird family with fan-shaped tails and wattled necks. As with many galliform species, the female is smaller than the male, and less colourful. With their wingspans of 1.5-1.8 metres, the turkeys are by far the largest birds in the open forests in which they live, and are rarely mistaken for any other birds.
The species are the North American Wild Turkey (Meleagris gallopavo) and the Central American Ocellated Turkey (Meleagris ocellata).
This group is related to other members of the gamebird family as follows.
They are commonly domesticated and used for poultry. The modern domesticated turkey was developed from the Wild Turkey. The Ocellated Turkey was probably also domesticated by the Mayans. It has been speculated that this species is more tractable than its northern counterpart, and was the source of the present domesticated stock, but there is no morphological evidence to support this theory. In particular, the chest tuft of domestic turkeys is a clear indicator of descent from the Wild Turkey (the Ocellated Turkey does not have this tuft).
When Europeans first encountered the turkey in the Americas, they incorrectly identified it with the African Helmeted Guineafowl (Numida meleagris), also known as the turkey-cock from its importation to Europe through Turkey, and the name stuck. It remains also in the scientific name: meleagris is Greek for guinea-fowl.
Turkey hunting is a popular sport in North America. Although often deemed foolish and easily confused, the turkey is a game animal of considerable cunning.
The name of the game
Several other birds which are sometimes called turkeys are not particularly closely related: the Australian Brush-turkey is a megapode, and the bird sometimes known as the Australian Turkey is in fact the Australian Bustard, a gruiform.
In English, "turkey" is spelled and pronounced exactly like Turkey (the country of Turkish people), in Turkish it is called "hindi" which means coming from India. Similarly in the Hebrew language the turkey is called "Tarnegol Hodu", which literally means "Indian chicken" and in Catalan, the turkey is called "gall dindi", which literally means "Indian cock". In Portuguese the word for turkey is "peru" which also referrs to the country Peru. In Arabic it is called "Ethiopian bird" and in Greek it is "gallapoula" which means "French girl."
In Japan the turkey is called "shichimencho", in Korea "chilmencho" which is translated as "seven-faced bird" because of the ability of the bird, especially the male one, to change the form of the face depending on its mood.
See also - Turkey (domesticated)
- turkey (food)
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