Turkey Time

As a kid with a 22 rifle, hunting and trapping the fields and woods of my youth, I never saw a turkey, despite my imagined prowess as Deerslayer, Bowie, Crockett, Straight Arrow, and sundry heroes to many rural Berkshire Boys then.
A bit after my moment of bagging just chipmunk, squirrel, and woodchucks on after-school jaunts, conservationists imported pairs of turkey from perhaps Kentucky, with spectacular results as local vegetable and milk farms reverted to forests not seen in 150 years.
This autumn morning, typical of the past two decades, we drifted along roads between remaining fields to find this lot of prime turkeys hunting along the wooded edges for sand, toad, cricket, seed -- whatever would fit down the gullet. Running before us, this flock of more than a dozen birds simply vanished back into the littoral edge, perhaps anticipating our anticipation for Thanksgiving Day.