wild turkey

American  

noun

1. the ancestral species of the domesticated turkey.

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Etymology

Origin of wild turkey

An Americanism dating back to 1605–15

Example Sentences

Texas: Wild turkey, passenger pigeon, ivory-billed woodpecker, flamingo, roseate spoonbill, American egret, whooping crane, wood-duck; bison, elk, mountain sheep, antelope, "a small, dark deer that lived 40 years ago."

From Our Vanishing Wild Life Its Extermination and Preservation by Hornaday, William Temple

Wild turkey, one of the wariest fowls in the area, could be found only on the islands far interior, they learned.

From Swamp Island by Wirt, Mildred A. (Mildred Augustine)

New Hampshire: Wild turkey, heath hen, pigeon, whooping crane, Eskimo curlew, upland plover, Labrador duck; woodland caribou, moose.

From Our Vanishing Wild Life Its Extermination and Preservation by Hornaday, William Temple

Wild turkey, quail, wild duck, wild geese, the latter already beginning their southward migration, were as abundant, one might say, as leaves on the trees or on the ground.

From The Story of Old Fort Loudon by Murfree, Mary Noailles

Wild turkey gobblin' would scare me most out of my senses, an', as for the birds, there are jest about a fourth what there used to be, an' the crops eaten to pay for it.

From The Song of the Cardinal by Stratton-Porter, Gene