Saturday, February 21, 2009

Wild Visitations

Wild visitors to the eastern field on a damp gray day in February when the north wind was rampaging across the Two Hundred Acre Wood and the air was full of blowing snow.

These are not (to put it mildly) good images, and I apologize for them, but when the wild turkeys come to call, the occasion has to be marked. In spite of the weather and my lingering pneumonia, I made a mad dash for parka, boots, spectacles and camera.

I adore these magnificent birds with their iridescent black and bronze plumage, their self-assurance and their regal deportment. They haunt the old beech, oak and hickory groves all year long, and they strut about as if they owned the forest. They build their nests wherever they please and raise their madcap wayward children in sunlit clearings a mile or so back from our main gate. In springtime, there are always three or four nests in the woods, and at twilight on warm autumn evenings, one can hear turkey clans clucking and gobbling and purring to each other beyond the hill. The conversations are cordial, companionable and contented.

Seeing turkeys on a winter day is a fine and uplifting thing.

3 comments:

Cynthia Pittmann said...

What lovely birds...I can just hear them in the field...thanks for sharing. <3

Anonymous said...

These are beautiful, are they a sign of spring as are Canadian Geese? I saw 4 geese flying overhead as we were coming home one night this week, and I said to Marc, this is Spring! And, we also saw the first road kill of the year, a poor raccoon. These are beautiful, I am glad you got your camera.
Louise

Wholly Jeanne said...

there you are covered in snow, here we are covered in sunshine and on the same day, we both enjoyed a visit from wild turkeys. (you should see what they did to our yard whilst playing!).