One of my favorite memories of Brandy was the time she
adopted four baby turkeys. Ever the
pragmatist, Carmon had named the turkeys Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, and 4th of July. He brought them home one April morning, fresh
from the feed store, in a little cardboard box with holes in it. He made them an incubator out of a number
three metal washtub by hanging a light bulb in one corner and providing a
partial cover. The turkey chicks lived
there in the corner of the kitchen for about a week. When they had gained some weight and didn’t
seem to need the heat of the light, Carmon moved them outside. He didn’t want to put them in the chicken
coop with the other fowl, so he made them a little pen of their own.
From the
beginning, Brandy was enthralled with the turkey chicks and they with her. We got the turkey chicks when they were
already a few days old, so it is hard to believe that they would have imprinted
on the dog, but if that’s not what happened, I don’t know how else to explain
it. As soon as they were outside, those
chicks followed Brandy everywhere she went.
Far from being snappy with them, the dog protected her little brood as if they were her pups. When they were still just a few weeks old, Brandy would lie down and the chicks would hop up on her back. Safely aboard, they could view the world from a dog’s eye view as Brandy strolled her babies around the yard. If any of the larger or more aggressive birds even looked as if they were going after the turkeys, Brandy would be there to literally nip things in the bud.
While this bond of affection
provided some Kodak moments when the chicks were two, three, or four weeks old,
it soon became apparent that things could not go on this way forever. The turkey chicks grew (as most young things
are wont to do) and soon they were almost as tall as their surrogate
mother. Still, they flew to her back
whenever she appeared in the yard, loudly squawking their request for the
Brandy Buntin Transit Authority to chauffeur them around the yard. The children came from the surrounding neighborhoods
to watch Brandy and her adopted babies taking the morning air.
More time passed. Soon the chicks were taller than the dog and
there was no longer room for all four of them on Brandy’s back at one
time. That began what we called The
Gobble Wars. The usual scenario played
itself out this way: As soon as Brandy would come out of her doghouse in the
morning, the race would be on. Four almost
full-grown turkeys would gallop across the yard to see who could get to mama
first. Chests puffed out. Wattles grew deep red. Feathers flew. Raucous gobbles broke the morning
silence. Once the winner was safely
perched on Brandy’s back, he would stay there as long as he could. Poor Brandy would puff
around the yard, playing horsey, with a load weighing almost as much as
she did. [The photo to the left will show you the relative size of grown turkey to a dog Brandy's size.]I was really beginning to get worried about Brandy’s health and said so to Carmon. He wasn’t worried. He said the problem would work itself out if I would just go and look at the calendar. I did, and saw that April had long since passed. It was the third week of November, followed quickly by the third week of December, and two of the turkeys lived up to their functional, if not creative, names. The other two, without their brothers to compete, soon gave up the game. And April and July were coming!
The only problem with that arrangement is that my sister, Janae, refused to eat dinner at our home that Thanksgiving (since our main course was Thanksgiving!). She made my father take her to McDonald’s. Since then, I’ve often wondered from whence she thought the hamburger came!
© Gebara Education,
2001. No portion of this book may be
copied by any method without the express written permission of the author
Photo of turkey chicks from www.cacklehatchery.com
Photo of turkey from www.flyingdogpress.com
Photo of turkey with dogs from www.turkeydog.org
Photo of turkey with tail fanned from www.turkeyunderthetablewithjen.com
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