Turkey fight!

I realized this morning that I’ve kept you hanging about the chipping sparrow chicks in the dwarf Alberta spruce. Terry called me probably two weeks ago to tell me they had fledged. They were “all wings” splayed out on the ground. By the time I got out there with my camera, they were gone. I heard them chipping everywhere up in the trees but could not spot even one. 

When we finally got measurable rainfall, Terry said, “Maybe this will break the seal.” That seems to have been the case, as we had several more substantial showers through the week, and not all at once. Over We’ve had about 3”, but never more than 1.3” in a day. We are truly grateful for the moisture. It is amazing how fast the grass greens up. 

Heavy rain on June 25

The orioles usually leave around the end of June. It is hard to know how much more grape jelly to buy. We have seen quite a few juvenile orioles, both Baltimore and orchard. This is a juvenile orchard oriole. It has the yellow color of an adult female, but the black chin means it’s a first-year male. 

A male juvenile orchard oriole

 On June 19, Terry and I put up the chick fence. It always looks so nice, straight and taut until the first wind. It is amazing how much wind a fence catches. You would think it would just blow through the holes. 

The lovely taught chick fence when we first put it up

The chicks were a little nervous about going outside at first. I kicked everyone out of the coop on Sunday (note that the inside door is shut) so I could change the wood chips. It was a stinky mess after two weeks of 21 chicks in confinement. Many of the chicks seemed intent on digging an escape tunnel under the coop. 

Everyone go play outside while I clean!

In this video, you can see the digging in addition to one chick who preferred to run around in circles.

 

It was not long before the chicks dug a dust bath inside the windbreak outside the door. 

Vying for space in the dust bath

The high tunnel looks like a jungle at the moment. The watermelon vines are everywhere. I’m training them as much as possible to not interfere with the growth of other plants. So far, this experiment has not been all that successful. For all that foliage, there are but two developing watermelons. Most of the flowers are male, and of those that are female, most are aborting. Not enough pollinators? Not enough resources? I don’t know what the problem is. 

A watermelon jungle

 Here’s the harvest from June 24. We have plenty of zucchini, far too many cucumbers, not quite enough beans, and scallions rapidly turning into onions. 

June 24 harvest

The meat chickens are, as usual, outgrowing the pullets. Some of the meat chickens like to sit in the doorway. This photo shows the comparison in size between the meat chickens and one of the Dominques. 

Hanging around in the doorway

Here’s a close-up of a Dominique. It is starting to get its characteristic black and white Big Girl feathers. 

A Dominique getting its adult feathers

The Americaunas are also getting their adult plumage. 

One of the Americauna

When I was taking these photos yesterday, it began to sprinkle. This caused the chicks to flee to the shelter of the coop, not that the ones sitting in the doorway were willing to move. 

Climbing over the chick in the doorway to get out of the rain

A short time later, Terry called to tell me there were two tom turkeys fighting in the high tunnel. He chased them out before they did any damage, but otherwise they paid him no mind. I got my camera and carefully crept outside. I’ve spooked turkeys so many times that I used an abundance of caution, moving slowly and not quite closing the door behind me. 

 It wouldn’t have made any difference if I’d slammed the door. These two were truly oblivious. Tom A had Tom B’s upper beak in his mouth while Tom B had Tom A’s lower beak in his. In this position, they pushed at each other. It was like how one might arm wrestle if one didn’t have arms.

Face off

Beak lock

Video clip

 Sometimes they curled their long necks around each other in a creepy snake-like manner. 

Entwined snake-necks

At one point, it looked like one turkey was trying to flip the other onto its back. That didn’t happen.

Attempted back flip

Meanwhile, a third turkey came up to see what was going on, but kept his distance. 

A third tom coming up to investigaate

The fighting turkeys pushed each other all over the place, include right up to where I was standing. No kidding, I could have touched them. They were behaving so brutally, however, that I just backed up to give them space. 

Yeah, this close to me

They headed for the patio. Shit! I left the door open! The last thing I wanted was two wrestling turkeys in the living room. I sidled around to put my body between them and the door, only to discover that I had latched the door after all. Whew. I went inside to watch the rest of the fight. One turkey seemed to have the upper hand, or head as the case may be. He pushed the other turkey under the deck, up against the compost bin, over the watering can, and eventually between the wheels of my bicycle (yes, we do use the space under the deck for overflow storage). And after that, it was apparently over. I lost sight of them, and Terry said he hadn’t seen them when he came in for lunch. The point of the fight seemed to be humiliation rather than bodily injury. Typical male posturing. I had no idea they fought like that. I suppose this is how they decide who gets the babes and who acts as wing man.