White turkey?

[Keith Scanlon]

Has anyone ever seen a white wild turkey? It was a young hen, mostly white in color had some brown feathers too. If you look at the two other turkeys near the bottom of the photo you can see the difference in color. I was just wondering if anyone had ever seen anything like that? My first though was a hybrid, wild and farm raised turkey.

[turkeyfeathers]

Saw one last year on the way home from turkey hunting. Believe someone said it was a hybrid or farm raised bird. Very cool to see

[Keith Scanlon]

I was very taken back by it. The thing is it wasn't as white as a normal farm bird, but it had a clear difference than the other birds. Wouldn't mind seeing a few more of them around and maybe a tom some day haha.

[Doewhacker]

It could be one of a few different types of heritage breed. Who knows? 

The one in my avatar is a Narangasette. 

[Curmudgeon]

Domestic influencese are the most likely reason. However, many species of wild birds have varying degrees of leucistism - a lack of pigment but not albino. 

Edited September 25, 2017 by Curmudgeon
Typo

[E J]

I saw a smoke phase wild turkey quite a few years ago. I saw it while spring turkey hunting once and then once later in the year while bow hunting. I wish I had gotten a picture, it was pretty cool.

[airedale]

White phases in animals happens, like the white squirrel thread on the board now, the white phase animal will just pop up every now and again. It is all about genetics a subject my feeble brain has a hard time understanding. Having a small farm raising all kinds of various livestock and poultry in addition to breeding hunting dogs for many years I have seen some pretty weird stuff happen. In game birds it does happen quite frequently especially when raised domestically, white quail, chukar partridge and pheasants are common. In the wild they are the more than likely first to be picked off by varmints because of lack of natural camouflage and being easily seen

Once upon a time I had a flock of Merriam's wild turkeys here on the farm I started from a pure Merriam's pair of adults I purchased. Merriam's look pretty much the same as our native Eastern wild turkeys except their feather tips on their tails and backs are white. Anyhow as the years went by I  got a couple birds that hatched out with a bit of white on them, I mated the birds that had white back to each other and started getting birds with a lot of white to the point after several generations they were almost 3/4s white similar to the one in the OP's photo even though they were pure Merriam's. I was told by someone that knows genetics a lot better than me that is how we basically got white chickens cows, horses and turkeys etc. generation after generation of breeding like to like will set the color but the oddball throwback will still turn up from time to time.

Al

[Keith Scanlon]

Thanks for all the knowledge everyone! This photo was taken on shelter island which is on long island. It is probably one of the last places in ny to get a stable turkey population (due to the fact it is only accessable by ferry and on the very eastern tip of long island). Very cool to not only see turkey numbers growing here but also a genetic rarity. 

[Pygmy]

Cool picture....There was a very similar bird  in a local flock several years back..I saw it a couple of times myself and numerous other people saw it because the flock often fed in a field adjacent to a local highway...

[Doc]

I saw one in Potter County, PA back in the mid-80's

[mlammerhirt]

A couple years ago bow hunting in Perrysburg NY my bow texts me and says he thought a plastic bag was blowing around the woods....as it got closer he realized it was a turkey.
My dad thought he was nuts and didn't believe it actually a thing until he calls me a week later after a morning bow hunt and said that white turkey wandered past him as well...haven't seen it in a few years....but a pretty cool experience for those guys

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[Hock3y24]

a few years ago i stopped and was snapping photos of a white turkey because i couldn't believe my eyes, found out a few days later it was a domestic one!