Harvard’s thriving wild turkey population
It seems as if they’re everywhere these days. And while they’re perhaps not as plentiful as they were back when English settlers first piled off the Mayflower, they’ve made a major comeback across the country and enjoy a certain measure of celebrity, at least locally. We’re talking turkeys. Wild turkeys. On a recent cool fall morning, one such fowl strutted casually down Massachusetts Avenue at rush hour just outside of Harvard Square, seemingly oblivious to the speeding traffic. To its credit, it crossed in the crosswalk, lending credence to the claim that the wild ones possess more street smarts than their domesticated cousins. Cars slowed to a stop, and amused passersby pulled out smartphones to record the moment. At Harvard, the turkeys and their eager paparazzi are a familiar sight. The birds are regularly seen around campus, where they like to roost high in trees (yes, they fly). Their local numbers have spiked...