Australian brush turkey

Australian brush turkey
Australian Brush Turkey
Domain: Eukaryota Kingdom: Animalia Phylum: Chordata Class: Aves Order: Galliformes Family: Megapodiidae Genus: Alectura Species: Alectura lathami
Binomial Name
Alectura lathami
Brush Turkey nest

The Australian Brush turkey, is scientifically known as Alectura lathami, is a featured bird group known for "Birds that behave badly".

Australian Brush turkeys are one of Australia's three largest birds known as megapodes. The Australian brush Turkey is one of about 22 species of megapode, which means ‘big feet’. The birds from the Megapodes family are a distinct group of fowl-like birds from the Order, Galliformes; they include other birds such as turkeys, quails, junglefowl, and peafowl.

Appearance

The Australian Brush Turkey is considered as "a large gallinaceous bird" with a head-body length of 60 - 70 cm. This turkey's body consists mainly of a black coloring with plumage. Its head is generally bare and red with a yellow throat wattle (however, the wattle is pale blue in the birds of the north). It's tail is described as "laterally flattened". Males have a more brilliant red head, neck, and yellow wattle (which is extra prominent during the breeding season). Females have less distinct colors and characteristics without a neck wattle. Males weigh on average of 2450 grams, females 2210 grams. Due to its large size, brightly colored bare skin and mostly black plumage with whitish scaling on most of the underparts, it's an unmistakable bird within its range.

This species of turkey generally are 60-70cm overall with an average weight of 2,274 grams.

Behavior

Brush turkeys are generally cautious and shy of humans. The Australian Brush turkey is considered a generally quiet bird however, occasionally making soft grunts. Males are known for their deep three-noted booming calls. But they can become very tame around homes, camping areas, and picnic grounds; especially if they are fed. They are also known for their stubbornness and once a male Brush Turkey has started to build its nesting pile or mound, it is nearly impossible to stop it from continuing its efforts. No specific method of deterrence has been found effective in all situations, such that communities have special wildlife officers that help catch and relocate these birds.

Food

Australian Brush Turkeys feed on seeds,fallen native fruits, and insects, which are exposed by raking the leaf litter or breaking open rotten logs with their large feet. Most of their food is acquired from the ground, occasional observations of them feeding on ripening fruits among tree branches are made90. Adult birds feed all day long, but young birds forage in the early dawn light and at dusk to avoid predators.

Breeding and Reproduction

Reproduction in the Australian Brush Turkey is unusual, making them unique. This kind of Brush turkey does not form a lifelong "pair bond" unlike other birds. During the breeding season, a male is considered successful, if he is able to create a good nest location, and mates with many different females. These birds don’t sit on their eggs to incubate them, instead, place them in very large piles of decaying vegetation, which heats up quickly and maintains a fairly consistent temperature. Most breeding is done during September to December but they tend to breed at any of the year.

Pile/Mound building This Turkey is known as one of Australia's three "mound builders". It builds a nesting mound or pile of soil and plant litter predominantly between August and December that is ginormous and doesn't resemble a nest. The male Brush Turkey scratches up decaying leaf matter and earth with its mighty legs, building huge incubation piles that generate heat through the decay of moist organic material. Commonly a pile is approximately 1 meter high and 5 meters in diameter (around 15 feet high). The "nest-pile" is maintained for around 9 months by the male bird every breeding and nesting season. These piles (aka mounds)are repurposed every year with the dominant male keeping the best location. The male spends a long time building and defending the nesting mound; it only allows the female to access it once the temperature is correct for successful egg incubation.

After the male mates with a female, he allows her to place her eggs in the pile/mound, which is known as a "clutch" that he unearths. Afterwards, he drives her away and cautiously covers the newly deposited eggs with humus. Often the eggs that he cares for in his pile(mound)have actually been fertilized by a different male. The pile or mound incubation temperature stays approximately 33 degrees (or 91 degrees Fahrenheit). The number of females that lay eggs in the mound and the number of times they visit depends on the male Brush Turkey's skill at keeping the pile at the right temperature. If the pile or mound is the right temperature, females will return several times to mate and lay eggs.

Pile/Mound Temperature control A male brush-turkey will take a large mouthful of the debris pile to check whether it's at the correct temperature. Apparently they have very accurate heat sensors inside their upper bill. When the temperature climbs too high, the male will move material off the top layer to allow heat to escape. If the temperature is too low, the male will pile more material over the mound to build up thermal energy. Up to 24 eggs are put into holes about half a meter deep in the pile and then covered. The chicks hatch in approximately 50 days.

Hatching After the egg is broken, it takes the chicks approximately 40 hours to reach the pile/mound surface. The chicks only move enough to create a small cavity in the soil where they rest nearly motionless for about 16 hours. During this time, they lost the chorioallantoic (internal egg) membrane, aerated their lungs and air sacs, and dried their plumage. After resting approximately 21 hours they dig upwards in short bursts only moving upwards about 8 centimeters. During this time, still buried within the earth's mound, they make a small space around themselves, where they can continue to rest, preen, and peck at debris in the soil. Chicks moved the greatest distances of approximately 23 centimeters, within the last 1 to 2 hours before coming out of the mound, while digging and pushing vigorously towards the surface, nearly non-stop.

Survival and Predators Frequently feral pigs, large monitors, Goanna, and various snakes, raid the piles (mounds) pilfering the eggs and destabilizing the incubation temperature. Once the eggs are placed in the pile and buried, the male keeps watch, adjusting the temperature as necessary and defending the nest from poachers. While the Brush turkey appears slow moving when foraging or scratching among plant material and soil for food, they become rapidly quick when bothered. Despite this protection, the mortality rate is extremely high, with only about 1 in 200 chicks surviving to adulthood. One of the reasons their survival rate is so low may be due to the fact that when the eggs are hatched, the baby brush turkey chicks are left alone and are considered independent and able to take care of themselves. The eggs are fairly large, weighing approximately 180 grams; this helps enable the hatching of a fairly advanced chick. Brush turkeys are now prevalent in urban areas but in order for them to survive, humans must respect its their natural behavior. With specific precautions, the Brush Turkeys can live and thrive in urban areas with people keeping a backyard garden.

Geographical location/Habitat

The Australian Brush Turkey can live just about anywhere in Australia. it is Commonly found in Cape York Peninsula from far north Queensland to the south of Wollongong in the North Southwest. Its distribution has expanded south in the last several decades. Commonly it thrives and lives in rainforests near the coast and in some of the drier parts further inland. These Megapodes are also found in the East Indies, Australasia and Polynesia.

Brush Turkeys spend most of their time on the ground but occasionally roost in the trees during the night. They prefer a closed canopy habitat such as a rainforest, but also inhabit dense scrubs and moist gullies in parks and suburban backyards. It is considered naturally shy in the "bush", where it spends the majority of it's time alone, but in the suburbs the species has acclimated and can regularly be seen around people and in groups of other Brush Turkeys.

Defies Evolutionary Rules

The Australian Brush Turkey defies the basic evolutionary rules. First which came first, the bird or the egg? If the egg came first, how fertilized? How could it survive as the species would fail and die without parents to tend to it? If only one egg occurred, then how would another gender come to be? If only an egg was present, who would make the incubator nest? Since most species of birds naturally have the female sit on a nest to warm the egg with its body heat, why would it be necessary for a pile/mound to be created? If evolution is about improving to be stronger, why would it be necessary for a bird to grow a thermometer in its beak as other bird species don't require this as they sit on a regular nest? At what point would it be an advantage to go from having a female sit on nest for incubation to having a male build a pile/mound and have only him tend the nest? How could this be superior to having incubation in a nest with parents tending to the birds?

If the bird was created, why would it be necessary for it to have big feet when it was going to use an ordinary nest? Also, these birds and birds like them who are indigenous to the Pacific island chains are placed in different environments with different materials available to them. How would they know to adapt and change for those environments because evolution suggests they would just die off? If the egg was placed in a pile/mound how would the primitive bird know to adjust the temperature of the mound given the different materials to build it to keep the offspring alive? Why would evolution say that having a male build, and tend the pile/mound was better than a female just using her body heat to keep the egg incubated until it was ready to hatch? How would it come to pass that the offspring would evolve into a fully developed bird who could fend for itself once it hatched? Why would that be better than parents tending to it and feeding it until it matured. Especially since the survival for this bird is 1 in 200? Doesn't this suggest regression verses evolving to be stronger? It would seem that their defense mechanisms was lessened in this way.

Video

The Giant Nest of the Australian Brush-Turkey.