JUST ANOTHER QUIET MORNING ON THE FARM. I drove down into Sequim to deliver eggs to the Alder Wood Bistro and got back up the hill a little after 9:00. As I was approaching the house (it’s about half a mile in from our gate), I noticed one of our turkeys standing by the roadside at the edge of the canyon. I didn’t think much of it until I got into the yard and parked the car. That’s when I realized that something was wrong. Usually when we, or anyone else, drive up, the whole flock of turkeys comes running up to greet us, surrounding the car and making loads of noise. Did I say it was a quiet morning? It was a bit too quiet!
Part of our property is a canyon. As you drive in from the gate, on the right it drops off three hundred feet to Canyon Creek. Much it is very steep, for instance in the area where I saw that turkey. As we had lost a number of birds (mostly chickens) earlier this year to bobcats and cougars, it really made me nervous to think of nineteen turkeys down in the canyon, where the wild cats hang out during the day. You’d think someone had put a neon sign out there advertising an all-you-can-eat turkey buffet, and our turkeys had invited themselves.
And of course this had to happen on a day when David was in Seattle.
I went inside, dropped the mail on the kitchen table, put the teakettle on to boil and went back out to look for the turkeys. I headed over to the spot where the turkey was when I drove in, but it was no longer in sight. I walked to the edge of the canyon, looked down, and sure enough, there was the whole flock of silly birds, roosting in the low-hanging branches of cedar trees. Did I say silly? Suicidal is more like it! Feeling silly myself, I called to them, informing them of the certain doom that awaited them if they didn’t get back up into the yard post-haste. Some of the toms gobbled enthusiastically at me, the hens simply ignored me, but none of them showed any interest in being obedient. Fine, I thought. I’ll just go have my cup of tea.
Then, about fifteen minutes later, the turkeys all showed up at once in the front yard, with not a bit of remorse among the lot of them for all the anxiety they had caused. The good thing about turkeys is they seem to do everything as a group; once one of them decided to leave the canyon, they all did.
So what if my tea is cold? I’m just glad I didn’t have to hike down into the canyon to retrieve a bunch of wayward turkeys. Especially ungrateful ones.
Turkeys love roosting in trees.