Turkeys

Did I say I was going to cook TURKEY POT PIE for Thanksgiving this year? What could be better? The turkeys have come to me for deployment!


Click the center above for a short slideshow of what the dogs and I just witnessed in the front garden. Kip was the one who alerted me to them. Good going, Kippie!


No, really. I couldn't kill a turkey. In fact, I really like these guys. They were born and raised right up behind our house and they can be seen almost daily, roaming the neighborhood. You really have to watch out when driving up here because you could encounter the whole rafter of them moseying down the street, at their own speed, and totally unwilling to scoot out of the way at the sign of a vehicle of any kind. They are fearless. And still alive after growing to full size, apparently.

Almost every night we hear them being threatened from who-knows-what type of critter. I think it's a fox or a coyote. Both have been spotted in this area quite a bit lately. We do live very near to the Salem Woods, which goes quite a ways back from our neighborhood, and I'm sure there are all kinds of creatures living in there. Occasionally, they wander out into the streets of this neighborhood and are spotted. They have been reported in the newspapers, too, now and then. So when I hear the warning call of the turkeys all of a sudden gobble-gobbling at the tops of their voices at night, at all hours of the night or early morning, I just know some unsuspecting coyote or fox has wandered too close for comfort and is quickly told, in no uncertain terms, to vamoose! By the turkeys!

Each year they seem to have little ones and in past years, the group has dwindled down. Some years you will see only one or two left walking around the streets, probably wondering where the whole family has gone. That has been sad. Not too far away is the Main Drag that goes down into the City and I'm sure some have made it down there to an untimely end at the hands of our illustrious Salem Crazy Drivers.

I stop for turkeys in the road, and I stop for squirrels, too. I'll stop for a bird if he can't fly out of the way in time. But most drivers don't. Sadly.

So, this local family of turkeys has grown full size and still seems to be all intact in number. Good for them. I wonder if they realize Thanksgiving is only 19 days away?

I won't tell them.

I've ordered a turkey breast from the supermarket that I will cook for my turkey pot pie, and I've got plenty of chicken stockpiled in the freezer for the chicken pot pie. I just can't use local friendly turkeys for my table - it wouldn't be right somehow!

Cheers,


Bex