During this past summer I heard a story about our wild turkeys that reside here alongside with our wild rabbits, blue Scrub Jays, Robins with red breasts, Hummingbirds, Corvines and Doves; a story that made me think twice about those wild turkeys.
Our neighbor from across the street, Les, goes for his daily, long walk on our rural street as part of his exercise routine, and sometimes like most people who live here, he walks on the golf course. Every single day, rain or shine you will see Les out on his walk. One day last summer it happened that my husband and I were outside in our front yard checking on our sprinkler system right at the time Les was returning from his daily walk.
He stopped to talk with us, as neighbors do sometimes, and he told us a story about those wild turkeys that live here on the golf courses. We actually have two courses here in Ridgemark; the turkeys have to cross the street to get to the other course, which is Diablo, while the course we live on is Gabilan.
Les told us that he accidentally startled the flock, the whole 15 of them, when he ventured down a path leading from the street to Gabilan Golf Course.
The startled turkeys scattered in mayhem talking to each other;
“gobble, gobble”.
A really nice very nice, polished new car was parked in a driveway adjacent to where all of this transpired with those turkeys running back and forth, and calling to each other;
“gobble, gobble”.
One of the wild turkeys, it most likely was a male, ran up to the beautiful, polished new car, and this rather large bird, which had it’s wings intact because it is wild, used it's wings to elevate itself and jumped on top of the car’s roof, scratching the holy smolie out of the paint job.
Holy Flying Turkeys; can you image the owners damage report to the insurance company?
“Hello Turkey Weenie Insurance Company, you see there was this turkey, a really big one, wild, and he jumped on top of my car. Yes, yes he had a blue and red face and rather large turkey feet with long claws. You see all of the trouble came to being from those feet with the big claws. Mr. turkey did the ‘turkey trot’ all over my roof, trunk and back to my roof again then he did a number on my car’s hood. Honest, this is how the damage happened!”
Well, today my husband called to me a little after five in the afternoon to come out into our backyard to witness those turkeys again, the ones that walk around on the golf course grazing on whatever wild turkeys graze on when they walk around on a golf course. He did this because they were just outside of our yard, again!
It’s been a while since we saw the flock of turkeys ourselves, last winter we saw the flock walking in the rain, and this time the ‘flock of fifteen’ (15) from last winter had dwindled down to a flock of seven (7). We witnessed six females and one male today. I thought to myself that perhaps this past summer’s event of the beautiful, new car that was attacked by one of the males could be behind the fact that we were witnessing only seven wild turkeys walking on Gabilan today? This I cannot be sure of. Perhaps someone who lives in a house at the other end of Gabilan has eight wild turkeys, plucked and gutted sitting neatly in their freezer right now all ready for holiday dinners?
Perhaps…perhaps?
When I was a youngster living on the East Coast, I belonged to the Audubon Society for a couple of years. I still carry within myself a love of watching, an appreciation of wild birds, all wild birds, because of my past experience with this group.
My husband went into the house this afternoon after he got me to go outside, and I stayed in our backyard watching our flock of turkeys; I stood on a retaining wall to elevate myself to see over the low hill on the golf course so I could watch them. They were grazing on something; what do wild turkeys graze on when they are out for a walk on a golf course?
Because I got into the habit of learning and using bird calls to attract wild birds back when I a youngster on the East Coast it came naturally to me to let out with a
“gobble, gobble.”
I watched as the six females turned their long necks topped with smaller female heads towards me. The larger male with the larger head and a clump of feathers hanging away from his chest left the group of females, and proudly walked away from the females to where he could see me; as he got to within twelve feet of where I was standing, this rather large turkey turned slightly, and directed himself to our neighbor's yard instead of up to where I was standing watching him.
All the while he kept turning his head towards me watching me with curiosity.
My “gobble, gobble” must have sounded authentic!
Mr. turkey walked all the way up to the flowers and short shrubs surrounding our neighbor’s, Ryan and Beverly's patio. He proceeded to dip his blue and red turkey head into my neighbor’s plants, and as I watched these proceedings I realized that my neighbor’s cat, Shelby, was huddled down on the side of one of the bushes, and the turkey, which was very large compared to Shelby, couldn't see Shelby where she was hiding.
This turkey was one 'big bird' for a wild turkey.
Shelby is a small, multi-colored, female cat.
This scene unfolded just fifteen feet away from me. I was ready to get myself over to my neighbor’s backyard to come to the aid of their cat if it became an issue. Poor Shelby looked like she was terrified; she was staring at me, I could almost hear her plea to me for help!
I let out with another
“gobble, gobble”with 'big bird' looking directly at me, and he could see plainly that I wasn’t a big turkey like him, not at all!
Without ever seeing Shelby he turned away from the neighbor's yard, and hustled himself over to his small flock of hens. The last I saw of this group was they were walking down Gabilan golf course, grazing on whatever turkeys graze on, when they walk on a golf course.
Thanksgiving is coming…
“Gobble, Gobble.”
This has been another of my true-life stories telling what goes on here in ‘Paradise’ just outside of Hollister, California.
Carol Garnier Dutra
Copyright © 2010 by Carol Garnier Dutra
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Very funny. As a good Audoboner I think you really should have that freezer checked out. And you may want trouble make sure there is a "wild turkey" clause in your insurance policiess!
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