~~Turkey Facts~~

1. Turkeys can have heart attacks: turkeys in fields near the Air Force test areas over which the sound barrier was broken were known to drop dead from the shock of passing jets.
 
2. Turkeys have great hearing, but no external ears. They can also see in color, and have excellent visual acuity and a wide field of vision (about 270 degrees), which makes sneaking up on them difficult. However, turkeys have a poor sense of smell (what's cooking?), but an excellent sense of taste.

3. Ben Franklin thought that the turkey should have been our national bird instead of the eagle.

4. There is fossil evidence that turkeys have been around the Americas for 10 million years!

5. Some people think the turkey got its name from the Indian word for the bird--"furkee". Other people think its name came from the sound that the bird makes--"turk, turk."

6. Turkeys are the only breed of poultry native to the Western Hemisphere.

7. Age is a determining factor in taste. Old, large males are preferable to young toms (males) as tom meat is stringy. The opposite is true for females: old hens are tougher birds.

8. Turkeys sometimes spend the night in trees.