Wild Turkeys

        It was probably in the late 1990's that I first heard that there was an effort being made to reintroduce wild turkeys into areas where they had once lived, but had disappeared. The wild turkeys had been reduced to isolated areas and their population in the US had dropped to a paltry 30,000.  I was really excited to hear about the re-population effort and hoped that someone would do something in the area of Southern Indiana, where I grew up.

      Evidently someone must have, because over the years since, I began to hear reports of sightings around my old neighborhood from my sister. Every time I traveled back there I hoped to see some wild turkeys, but never did.  This summer my sister reported that my uncle had seen a family of turkeys grazing in his back yard--eighteen of them, so my hopes were high that I might see them on my Fall trip to Indiana. 

      Yesterday my dreams were realized.  As I sat with my cousin and uncle on my uncle's front porch, I happened to catch a movement of a dark object in the field, then some more--it was a flock of turkeys feeding on seeds in the tall grass. I grabbed the camera, crouched beside the garage, and took lots of photos.

      It was a gradifying sight to see wild turkeys in the neighborhood, where as a boy, I could have never imagined such a thing.  Thank you to whoever made this possible.