Wild turkey in flight

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Wild turkey in flight

January 4, 2020 by Mike Powell

I accidentally spooked a small flock of wild turkeys (Meleagris gallopavo) on Thursday at Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge and one of them flew up into a tree in the middle of a field. I waited patiently and captured these shots when the turkey finally flew out of the tree. As you probably have noticed, the images are not in chronological order—I decided to lead with the two shots in which the turkey is in the air, which I think are the most dramatic images, and finish with the shot in which the turkey was starting to take off.

I was shooting almost straight into the sun, which is why the turkey is mostly a silhouette and the images seem like they were shot in black and white.

Posted in Birds, Nature, Photography, wildlife, Winter | Tagged Canon 50D, Meleagris gallopavo, Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge, Tamron 150-600mm, turkey, Wild Turkey, Woodbridge VA | 9 Comments

9 Responses

on January 4, 2020 at 6:34 am | Reply mitzybricker

Great shots! I startled a flock on my dog walk the other morning, didn’t get any photos.

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on January 4, 2020 at 7:40 am | Reply Dan Antion

Wow! Great captures, Mike. Those guys are big!
on January 4, 2020 at 8:54 am | Reply Reed Andariese

Nice images Mike! It is fun to see Wild Turkeys flying! You usually only see them on the ground. Nice!!
on January 4, 2020 at 11:33 am | Reply Michael Scandling

I have never seen wild turkeys fly. Frankly, I didn’t know they could. These are amazing captures. I love the silhouette.
- on January 4, 2020 at 11:52 am | Reply Mike Powell
  
  Thanks, Michael. I had heard that wild turkeys roost in trees, but all of the ones that I had seen previously were on the ground. I suspect that the heavier domesticated turkeys that we eat at Thanksgiving would not be able to lift off from the ground.
  - on January 4, 2020 at 11:53 am Michael Scandling
    
    Wild turkeys are a very frequent sight here in California. But I have never seen one fly.
on January 4, 2020 at 6:57 pm | Reply Eliza Waters

They are so large, they seem to defy gravity, but are quite agile fliers. Amazing birds.
on January 5, 2020 at 7:26 am | Reply Molly Lin Dutina

It is SO difficult around here to get a shot of turkeys in flight! Wonderful!!
- on January 5, 2020 at 7:57 am | Reply Mike Powell
  
  Thanks, Molly. My usual approach with something unusual like this is to get any shot that I can. Now my goal is to get some better shots of a turkey in flight.