Some wild turkeys have started to ruffle feathers in Janesville, Wisconsin, by causing a whole lot of issues – blocking traffic, chasing postal workers and scaring children.<\/p>\n
Neighbors said, at first, they thought the turkeys brought life to the neighborhood. But that has changed recently.<\/p>\n
“As it’s developed, they’ve become a nuisance,” resident Lawrence Meyer said. “They block traffic. they’ve caused accidents. They, you know, went after my mailman.”<\/p>\n
The wild turkeys have chased down a postal worker, a rental truck and a second mail carrier.<\/p>\n
Others have also become targets.<\/p>\n
“We have heard of flocks in urban areas, obviously around the state, but these particular birds in Janesville have been seemingly causing a stir with folks getting in and out of cars, mailmen, children going to school,” Jason Cotter with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources said.<\/p>\n
Cotter said birds naturally gravitate toward urban areas because it’s easier for them to get food, and aggressive behavior is how they assert their dominance.<\/p>\n
The best way to combat that? Become the bigger bully.<\/p>\n
“So, you know, making yourself look bigger, either using your coat, having an umbrella on hand, a plastic black garbage bag that, you know, you can look like you’re a giant turkey,” Cotter said.<\/p>\n
Walking backwards so you face the turkeys as you get away can also help.<\/p>\n
Cotter said with enough persistence from residents, the turkeys should move on.<\/p>\n
Meyer is hoping the birds will get the hint.<\/p>\n
“I want to see them thrive in their natural habitat, and I want to see these children be able to thrive in their habitat or neighborhood, if you will, and enjoy themselves without fear of being chased by turkeys,” he said.<\/p>\n
The Department of Natural Resources said they have contacted the USDA’s Wildlife Services about the situation.<\/p>\n
If it doesn’t improve, they can remove the birds and relocate them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Some wild turkeys have started to ruffle feathers in Janesville, Wisconsin, by causing a whole lot of issues…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":440424,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[79,201,1745],"class_list":{"0":"post-440423","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-science","9":"tag-wildlife","10":"tag-wisconsin"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440423","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=440423"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440423\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/440424"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=440423"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=440423"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=440423"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}