There is little doubt that Native Americans at a Utah site appropriately called Turkey Pen Ruins raised turkeys, but new research concludes that they rarely ate them, and instead raised the large birds for their coveted feathers.
During what is known as the Basketmaker II period (late B.C. to early A.D.), “the people began to make warm blankets by wrapping turkey feathers around cords made of yucca fiber, and then joining these ‘fuzzy ropes’ together to make a blanket,” said William Lipe, professor emeritus in the Department of Anthropology at Washington State University.
He continued, “Turkeys molt several times a year so it would not have been necessary to kill the turkeys to harvest their feathers. It would also not have been necessary to keep and feed large numbers of turkeys in order to supply the demand for feathers.”