Wounded Bird Harvested?

[lohaus]

Hey all, I just wanted people's opinion.  A week or two back my buddy and I scored a double.  Mine was 20 lbs, 9.5 inch beard with hair under an inch spurs.  His had a 10+ inch beard, easily inch spurs, and weighed only 15 lbs.  When he picked it up he wondered 'wtf?'  Anyway, when we loaded it in the truck I noticed some green crap all over the wing.  I thought maybe because he dropped it good.  Being the nice guy that I am, I cleaned both the birds.  When I got to his, the left breast had about a half inch hole with some dried blood, the breast looked infected, the left leg looked yellowish and infected also with pus.  When I detached the wing at least a half dozen feathers were clipped off about half way up with the greenish crap all over.  When we took those Toms they were in a group of 3 with this one lagging behind.  Mine was loaded with acorns and grass.  His, not so much.

I thought perhaps that the bird got the breast injury from fighting.  Would the wing feather be that damaged that about a half dozen were clipped off half way up?  Is it typical that the leg is that damaged?  The other thought was that someone nailed this bird without knowing where to aim or perhaps patterning their gun.

I'm just looking for people's thoughts, opinions, experiences with such injuries.  Myself, I don't think the bird was going to make it much longer as it obviously lost weight and was quite infected.

[Struttin Spurs]

Maybe he had been shot before. I killed one a few falls ago that was acting funny, and when I went to clean him, just like your friend's his breast was filled with a greenish brownish looking slime. You could see a few spots where shot had hit him. I later learned that my uncle had shot and "knocked one down" that had gotten away.

[Hognutz]

Probably a good thing that you killed him. I hope he didn't burn a tag on him. I shot a pheasant in Iowa one year that was green in the breast when I cleaned him. Needless to say, he went in the garbage. I have another story that I not real proud of, but it is cool. I was about 16 years old, and at a gravel pit sighting in my Dad's 30-30 for deer hunting. A drake mallard was in the water in the pit. I took aim and missed. He then flew up and I popped him out of the air with the rifle. Very good shot, not a good move. I cleaned him, and when we ate him, he was full of shotgun pellets. So he was shot before. That was the last duck that I plucked. They got skinned after that, so I could see what they looked like under the skin. Sorry about the rambling on, but those are my stories about wounded birds..Mike

[trkehunr93]

Sounds like someone took a rifle shot at him and clipped him or poor aim or tried shooting thru thick brush.  Glad your friend was able to put him out of his misery, sounds like he was at deaths door.  

[barry]

I killed one years ago that had about 30 pellets spread over both breasts.
Was turning greeen and had to throw the whole thing away.
He came in gobbling though.

[mnturkey]

Most likely wounded bird, I shot one a few years back that had half of the Tail fan shot off.

[WyoHunter]

Sounds like he was wounded by someone. With the injury and infection he had he would probably have died in the near future. You did that bird a favor. Better to be shot than eaten by a coyote, fox or bobcat!

[Trevor2]

Good question. Bird I killed Saturday had a lil green like that not much though

[2labs]

I am the KING of Gang Green!!LOL I have killed 2 turkeys and several deer with gang green and waterfowl also!! Nasty stuff, our state(ny) will give new tags for unfitt critters. Both turkeys were from fighting spured in back!!

[200racing]

with no shot present could he have got taggedby a car?

[DeWayne Knight]

I've killed two gobblers in my time of hunting turkeys that had spur wounds.  One had a puncture wound in the lower breast and one had a puncture wound to the thigh.  In both cases the muscle around the wound was infected and turning green around the edges of the hole.

[gobbler74]

I would throw in possible injury from a branch or a stob During flight. I've seen birds killed impaled by sticks, pine stobs with nasty wounds.

[spitndrum]

When I had my 1 3/8 spurs bird from 07 mounted he had a simialr spot we assumed fighting he weighed 21.6 though