What's the Attraction?

With a warm, light breeze blowing, I stood on the deck and watched Bessie Anne bravely go walkabout by herself.  She did not, however, look both ways before crossing the drive into the south pasture and narrowly escaped being run over by the tribe of turkeys on the march.  I was astonished when the leaders made a hard right turn and the train followed Bess into the field.  Then the entire troop came after her as she came back up the hill.  What in the world?

It was cause for concern when the toms fluffed up, but maybe that was just for show.  It could be that the hens are the warriors.  I honestly didn't know if the turkeys were only curious or angry that their territory had been breached.  My little dog was seriously outweighed and outnumbered if a battle were in the offing.  The turkeys continued to trail Bess down and back up the slope.  I also didn't know if Bessie didn't see or hear the big birds, or if ignoring them was a self-preservation technique.  The event passed without incident.  Bess came back up on the deck and the turkeys paraded on to the feeding station.  I wish I knew what the attraction had been.

Beautiful, but dumb.  The almond tree has the worst sense of timing in the arboreal world.  That pleasant breeze turned into a big wind later in the day and four days of rain are predicted.  (The wind is howling even as we speak this morning, and something I overlooked yesterday is banging around on the deck.)  All those lovely pink blossoms will litter the orchard today, and who knows if the tree will set fruit after that.

Beside moving deck furniture, etc., into safety, one thing I definitely needed to do was bring firewood up to the porch before the rains come.  However, in a wind storm one risks getting a beating by the tarp covering the woodpile.  Luckily, the wind died down long enough in late afternoon and I was able to replenish the rack without getting whipped.

There were definitely storm clouds on the horizon last evening.  If the weather guys are right, we'll be getting a deluge in several waves into next week.  We need the rain, but one worries when heavy rain and strong winds come in combination.  The hatches are battened to the best of my ability.  Now it's wait and see.