The turkeys arrived for their Thanksgiving dinner

I took this picture of deer and wild turkeys feasting in my back yard at dawn yesterday. A couple of turkeys flew into the vegetable garden, eating who knows what in the garden paths. When it was time for the turkeys to move on, one of birds in the garden was stymied. He/she had no idea how to get out and instead paced up and down along the fence, inevitably ending up in the corner. The turkey’s family briefly showed some concern but then abandoned the dullard. I finally went out to open gates, hoping that this might prove an avenue of escape. Obviously my presence and the clanging of metal was frightening enough to inspire the turkey to “get wings.”

Benjamin Franklin might have called wild turkeys “birds of courage” and proposed that the wild turkey, not the bald eagle, be the official animal of the United States, but this particular wild turkey exhibited neither courage nor any problem solving skills.