Turkeys are large birds that can be either be domesticated or wild. Wild turkeys eat by foraging on the ground and in low shrubs and trees. Their preferred foods are the nuts and mast of deciduous trees, such as acorns, hickory nuts, chestnuts and hazelnuts. They also eat berries like huckleberries, blackberries, juniper berries, blueberries and bearberries, along with seeds and grasses.
Wild turkeys are omnivorous, meaning they will also consume insects, worms, mice, small lizards and snakes if they can find and catch them. In farm country, flocks of turkeys can often be found picking over fields after a harvest, collecting all of the dropped seeds.
Domesticated turkeys are raised for their meat, and so need to be more than double the weight of most wild turkeys when they are slaughtered. To accomplish this, they are fed a fattening mix of corn, soybeans and various vitamin mixes.
Turkeys on smaller farms are usually allowed to free range and forage like their wild cousins, but also eat a special turkey diet in pellet or crumble form.
