Eastern wild turkey tom

This is my oldest eastern-wild turkey tom. He's a really beautiful bird and pretty much fends for himself most of the time. I love his plumage and he takes meticulous care of his feathers. He's also pretty convinced he's top turkey, and has spent most of his time making sure all of the other turkey toms know that, too.

Now that I've penned the turkeys for the laying season, he's decided that each pen must be something special -- and the hens in it are his, too. So recently he's spent every daylight hour staring down the other turkey toms in each pen.

Here he's staring down the blue slate tom in the pen -- you can see the blue slate's head through the calf domes' bottle port. Hours and hours, pen to pen, every single day. This tom is a dedicated bird.

So tomorrow he'll go into a pen of his own for the laying season, with four beautiful hens and all the food he can eat. It'll probably be a relief from this constant staring.