Turkey Tales

Here are two turkey (or turkel, as we call them) sightings around my house.

Turkey in the Snow

In December 2007, a big storm dropped a good foot and a half of snow. By late afternoon, the sky was clearing and two tom turkeys (all that chest hair) slogged to the bird feeder. We have several large pines in our yard which shelter the feeder. The snow wasn't as deep there and the turkeys pecked at the seeds.

The next time I looked, only one turkey was left. He turned toward the hill to climb up to the woods, stepping into snow that was up to his belly. He stopped. For several minutes, he struggled and strained against the snow, but couldn't make any progress. The light was fading, and I expected him to return along the path he and his friend had broken.

Instead, Mr. Turkey unfurled his wings (BIG wings) and flew up to a branch. Huge bird that he is, he made quite a sight, perched on that limb. As the night progressed, I looked out several times to check on him, but I couldn't see him in the darkness. I worried about him, even as I told myself turkeys are professional wild animals and can survive outside.

The next morning, I heard "Gobble, gobble, gobble," and sure enough, there he was, still sitting on that tree limb. He flapped his wings and flew down to the ground. A crust had formed on the snow overnight, so he was able to walk away, slipping and sliding and using his wings for balance.

A happy ending.

A Spring Turkey

Last May, as I sat in my front room, I heard clucking outside the open window. I jumped up to see the turkey (seeing a turkey is still a big deal) and sure enough, a hen stood on the front lawn.

She clucked again, and six tiny brown-and-yellow chicks (poults) ran out from under the rhododendron beside the house. From their small size, they must have hatched only a few days earlier.

Mama turkey clucked again and walked around the side of the house, her poults trailing in her wake. A resplendent tom, tail flaring in full courtship regalia, followed. The entire group climbed the hill behind my house and disappeared into the woods. I wonder where mama turkey built her nest. I hoped she used our woods, but I have no idea.

My husband took these two pictures from inside the house. Click on the images to see the poults better.

I never saw the poults again, but I do see the turkeys from time to time. They have no schedule, but they wander from yard to yard, climb the hill behind my house to the woods, and then climb down again, cross the street and head into the woods lower on the hill.

I'm glad we have turkels. And I hope they come around for a good many more years.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Thank you all,
Linda

Turkeys I Have Known

I'm talking about the ones with feathers, not the non-feathered variety that plague us all everyday.

I live in a New England suburb. The area is mainly houses and lawns, with an occasional patch of woods like the one on the hill behind my house. We have the usual wildlife: squirrels, chipmunks, songbirds, rabbits, deer, raccoons and the occasional fox, opossum and groundhog. Up until a few years ago, we never had wild turkeys. Once, long ago, a domestic turkey, probably an escapee from someone's yard, wandered through for a few days, and for a year or two we had ring-necked pheasants, but no wild turkeys.

One day I looked out at my back yard, and there the turkeys were, pecking at the spilled seed under the bird feeder. They usually arrive in groups of females (hens) or males (toms) but not the two together. The only time we'll see them together is in the spring, when the toms display themselves for the hens. The traditional picture of a Thanksgiving turkey with his feathers fluffed up is a tom in courtship display. He'll ruffle his feathers that way in the spring to attract the hens' attention, but not in November. The hens also fan their tails, but their display is not nearly as striking.

How do you tell the sexes apart? Turkeys are all large brown birds with sharp beaks and big, spurred feet. The toms are generally larger than the hens and have bright, iridescent feathers. These distinctions are apparent in a mixed sex group, but for most of the year, the birds segregate into male or female only groups.

An undeniable difference is what my husband calls the tom's "chest hair"--a bundle of long coarse feathers that hangs loose from the tom's neck and swings as he walks. I would have called the feather bundle neckties, but chest hair works, too.

As for the noises they make, in most ways they sound like chickens. They all cackle and squawk. But the toms gobble, a rapid "gobble-gobble-gobble", which is why they're called gobblers.

I enjoy the turkeys. We call them turkels, to distinguish them from the turkey that will grace our dinner table on Thanksgiving. Watching them is still a treat. Most of the time all they do is stop for a snack at the bird feeder and a drink from the bird bath. But I do have two special stories about the turkeys that have visited my yard.

Next time: Turkey Tales.

Thank you all,
Linda
Top two pictures from Wikipedia, "chest hair" by my husband

"Pumpkinnapper" is up for Best Book at LASR- please vote for me!

Pumpkinnapper, my Regency Halloween comedy, is up for Best Book at LASR this weekend. Voting is Saturday, November 21 and Sunday, November 22 ONLY.

Here's the voting link: http://www.longandshortreviews.com/LASR/recentrev.htm

and here's the 4 1/2 book review:

"It's a Regency era All Hallows Eve tale full of hilarity, a dashing hero and a darling heroine, a nuisance of a goose and possibly a spirit or two. What's not to like?"

http://longandshortreviews.blogspot.com/2009/11/pumpkinnapper-by-linda-banche.html

Thank you all,
Linda

"Lady of the Stars" is a EPPIE Finalist!

Lady of the Stars, my Regency time travel, is a finalist in the Science Fiction Romance category in the EPIC (Electronically Published Internet Connection) 2010 EBook Competition. Complete finalist listing here.

The email arrived very early this morning. I just saw it. I'm bouncing around, and I'll probably bounce all day.

I've never finaled in a contest before. While I would love to win, I can be very happy with finaling.

Maybe I have a future in this business. Time for more bouncing!

Lady of the Stars blurb and excerpt here.

Thank you all,
Linda

My Titles

I can think up some weird titles.

The title of Lady of the Stars, my Regency time travel novella, is not too crazy. But what about Pumpkinnapper, my Regency Halloween comedy?

What's a pumpkinnapper, you ask? Here's the one line blurb: Pumpkin thieves, a youthful love rekindled and a jealous goose. Oh, my!

As further examples of my penchant for weird titles, here are some of the titles of my posts:

Oh, No, Not Another Author Blog!-- My very first post. Probably shows it.
How I Started--Writing, That Is--My beginnings as a writer. Yawn.
To Blog Or Not To Blog, That Is The Question (My Apologies to the Bard)-- Blogging takes a lot of time. Does it help sell books? You got me.
And How Did You Become An Author? Success out of failure. Or maybe I'm just too stupid to give up.

And then we have my blog's Shameless Promotion series--subtitled Linda's Adventures in Promotion Land:
Shameless Promotion
Shameless Promotion II
Shameless Promotion, Again
More Shameless Promotion (Does She Ever Stop?)
Shameless Promotion. Again??!!!
Shameless Promotion - It Never Ends

And the titles I like the best, from my group blog, Happily Ever After:

Gorgeous Men in Tight Breeches & Ruffled Shirts
Gorgeous Men in Tight Breeches and Ruffled Shirts II

This series is my ode to Regency gentlemen's clothing. (What did you think it was?) I have to write a few more posts in the same vein. We can never have too many gorgeous men in our lives. **grins**

Do titles catch your interest? What do you like in a title?

Thank you all,
Linda