Relaxed Farming - our farm in your classroom

The turkeys are an absolute joy to have on the smallholding at the moment. As well as being incredibly attractive now, they are fabulously inquisitive and constantly noisy and so watching them is always most entertaining.
As soon as we enter their paddock, they come running over, especially if we are carrying something or even wearing something that is dangling or flapping or bright. If we put anything down on the ground, they rush over to inspect it. If we make any kind of noise, their heads go up to listen (just like in the second image). If we sit on the ground (as we did to take these photos) they will circle us to make sure they have given us a full inspection and not missed any part.
They have a fabulous number of sounds ranging from the classic 'gobbling' made by the male to the quieter clucking that Katherine (not pictured) constantly made to her brood of seven chicks at the start of the summer. In keeping with many other animals on our smallholding, each bird has a slightly different sound allowing individual birds, including parent and chicks, to recognise each other by sound as well as by sight. Turkeys don't however appear to remember birds with whom they once lived - either that or they do remember them but choose not to be very welcoming when they see them again. Hence the racket this morning when Katherine wandered down to the main paddock and began an I-can-squawk-louder-than-you competition with Victoria - a fence separating them thank goodness!! You may remember Elizabeth and the original Victoria behaving similarly last year (see 10th September).
Katherine is very vocal at the moment as she is looking (we think) to start laying eggs again (after a recent but brief second period of being broody). A turkey's laying season can be anything from February through to August. It is now getting quite late for her to be thinking of starting again but Camilla and Victoria are still laying and so Katherine may well have a few eggs left to lay this year. We are allowing her to wander where she likes to see if she will settle somewhere to nest.... Will keep you posted on that one.
And talking of broody poultry, our light golden bantam is broody no more (see 5th August): the removal of the nestbox she was in has done the trick - hooray!!