The wild turkey (Meleagris gallopavo) thrives across diverse habitats, including areas dominated by human agriculture. As omnivorous ground feeders, turkeys consume a wide variety of seeds, nuts, insects, and fruits, making them highly adaptable. Their proximity to farming operations raises questions about their dietary habits, especially concerning high-value commercial crops like soybeans. Understanding this interaction is important for both wildlife management and agricultural producers.
The Role of Soybeans in a Turkey’s Diet
Wild turkeys consume soybeans, but consumption depends heavily on the bean’s form and availability. The primary source is typically not the standing, growing crop, but the waste grain left behind after mechanized harvesting. In agricultural landscapes, especially in late fall and winter, turkeys forage on these residual seeds, corn, and soybeans, which provide a readily accessible food source.
Eating soybeans from a standing crop is less common than feeding on waste grain. Turkeys may occasionally eat freshly planted seeds or find germinating soybeans while foraging. However, when observed in soybean fields during the growing season, turkeys are usually searching for insects or eating waste grain from a previous harvest.
The mature, dried bean is the most attractive component, especially when natural food sources become scarce in colder months. This positions the soybean as an opportunistic, seasonal supplement to their varied diet, rather than a year-round staple. Soybeans are also sometimes intentionally provided as supplemental food by landowners or wildlife managers, reinforcing the turkey’s familiarity with the seed.
Nutritional Factors and Digestibility
Soybeans are nutritionally dense, containing high percentages of protein and fat, making them an appealing energy source. Raw, full-fat soybeans typically contain about 20% fat and up to 40% crude protein, beneficial for high-energy demands like the breeding season or harsh winters. However, the nutritional benefit of the raw bean is limited by the presence of antinutritional factors.
The most notable antinutritional factor is the trypsin inhibitor, a compound that interferes with the proteolytic enzyme trypsin in the bird’s digestive tract. This inhibition reduces the digestibility of proteins and amino acids. Consuming raw soybeans in large quantities can also cause the bird’s pancreas to enlarge as the organ works harder to produce digestive enzymes.
For domestic poultry, soybeans must undergo heat treatment, such as roasting, steaming, or extrusion, to deactivate these inhibitors before being incorporated into feed. Processed soybean meal, with deactivated inhibitors, is a highly digestible protein source. Therefore, a wild turkey consuming raw beans from a field gains less nutritional value and faces more digestive stress than a bird consuming processed feed.
Minimizing Conflict in Agricultural Settings
Damage caused by wild turkeys to soybean crops is often minimal compared to other wildlife, but it can be managed through several strategies. Farmers should focus on reducing attractants that draw birds into the fields. Eliminating spilled grain from transport or storage areas removes an easily accessed food source that can habituate turkeys to the location.
Management efforts can focus on exclusion, although this is challenging since turkeys can fly over most fences. For smaller, high-value areas, physical barriers like netting or fencing can be effective.
Turkeys often inadvertently damage crops by scratching the soil to look for insects or dust-bathing, rather than eating the plants directly. Covering mulched areas can help mitigate this indirect damage.
Harassment techniques, such as using pyrotechnics like screamers and bangers, can temporarily deter flocks from vulnerable fields. Turkeys are intelligent and quickly become accustomed to these methods, necessitating a combination of techniques and frequent changes to remain effective. When significant conflict occurs, consulting with state wildlife agencies for localized recommendations is the most productive approach.