Why Do Turkeys Gobble? Turkey Sounds and Calls Explained

What does a turkey gobble mean?

The gobble is a male wild turkey’s advertising call. It works a little like a songbird’s song: one loud message aimed at two audiences. For hens, it says that a mature male is nearby and ready to mate. For other toms, it is a statement of presence and status.

Hens that hear a gobble may answer with yelps and walk toward the sound. The tom, in turn, often gobbles again when a hen calls, and the two can call back and forth until they meet. Once the hen is close, the male usually stops gobbling and switches to a silent display.

Dominant males tend to gobble the most. In flocks where several toms live together, lower-ranking males often gobble less, especially when a dominant bird is close by.

When do turkeys gobble?

Gobbling follows the breeding calendar. Toms start gobbling in late winter as days lengthen, gobble most intensely in early spring, and gradually go quiet as the hens begin incubating their eggs. A second, smaller burst of gobbling sometimes follows when hens that lost their first nests seek mates again. In autumn, some males gobble a little, but much less than in spring.

The time of day matters too. Toms gobble most at dawn, often before flying down from the roost. This early chorus lets hens on nearby roosts know where the males are. Gobbling usually tails off later in the morning, and some birds gobble again from the roost in the evening.

Weather affects gobbling as well. Strong wind, heavy rain and big changes in air pressure and temperature tend to reduce it, while calm, clear spring mornings bring the most calls.

What is a shock gobble?

Toms are so primed to gobble in spring that a sudden loud noise can set them off. Thunder, a hooting owl, a cawing crow, a coyote’s howl, a car horn, a slammed door or another tom’s gobble can all trigger a reflexive gobble, known as a shock gobble.

Shock gobbling probably helps males keep track of one another, and it reveals their position to hens. Biologists who survey turkey populations in spring sometimes use owl or crow calls to prompt shock gobbles, so they can count males that would otherwise stay silent.

Strutting, drumming and spitting

Gobbling is only part of a tom’s courtship. When a hen comes near, he switches to a strut: he puffs out his body feathers, fans his tail into a wide half-circle, drops his wingtips to drag on the ground and turns slowly to show off his iridescent plumage. His bare head and neck flush bright red, white and blue, and his snood swells and hangs over his bill, as explained in what is the red thing on a turkey?.

While strutting, the tom makes two sounds that are hard to hear unless you are close. The “spit” is a short, sharp puff of air, and the “drum” is a deep, humming boom made by air moving in an air sac in the chest. Together they are often called “spit and drum”. These displays are similar to the way peacocks show off their trains, as described in why do peacocks spread their tails?.

Other turkey sounds and what they mean

Turkeys have a large vocabulary, and both sexes use most of the calls. Some of the best known are:

Hens also use an assembly call, a long series of loud yelps, to gather scattered poults. Poults peep and whistle to stay in contact with their mother.

Do female turkeys gobble?

Hens almost never gobble. Gobbling is controlled by male hormones and is part of the tom’s breeding behavior. Hens instead use yelps, clucks, cutts and purrs to communicate with toms, poults and the rest of the flock. Young males, called jakes, can gobble, but their gobbles tend to be shorter and less polished than those of adult toms, and many jakes gobble little in their first spring.

Domestic toms gobble too, often in noisy group choruses. The sound is so typical of turkeys that it gave the male one of its common names: gobbler.