It's not easy being a turkey. First there's the chopping block - which is busier than ever this time of year - and then there's that big risk of heart attack.
Gobblers are being hooked up to heart monitors and getting turkey EKGs in an effort by scientists at Pennsylvania State University to learn why about 843,000 of the birds die annually of heart attacks.The electrocardiograms are similar to the ones given to people but don't include the treadmill tests that humans are put through.
In the case of the turkeys, their problem appears not to be the fear of winding up on someone's Thanksgiving table, but a condition called round heart syndrome. The affliction can be as deadly to the turkey grower's business as it is to the turkey.
"The incidence of round heart syndrome can be devastating to a producer, and because it increases the cost of production, it can increase the price for consumers," said poultry scientist Andrew G. Yersin.
Penn State launched its study last year after the state's turkey growers complained that round heart syndrome was gobbling up their profits. Yersin said the disease costs U.S. turkey producers as much as $1.6 million a year.
Researcher Robert Wideman said the scientists hope to learn why so many turkeys develop the syndrome and to see if changing breeding patterns might eliminate the problem.
Researchers are also looking at ways to keep afflicted birds alive long enough to get them to market.
When a turkey defrightening to healthy turkeys that they, too, die of heart attacks.
"It is not uncommon to go into a bird house and see the afflicted bird lying dead, surrounded by three or four other birds that died because of the hysteria caused," Yersin said.