The Decoy That Worked... for 30 Minutes...
Many sleepless nights later, buyer's remorse has kicked in. Sleeping in 10-minute intervals may be well and good for Doodle, but it makes for very grumpy, very sick-of-it humans. Sick-of-it humans can make very unfortunate noises, noises that go along the lines of, "ARGHH!! I CAN'T TAKE IT ANYMORE! NO MORE TURKEYS! BRING DOODLE BACK TO THE STORE!!"
Especially when Doodle starts to insist that a hand, head, or other human limb must be in sight at all times. Voices are not enough any more. She doesn't believe us when we say, "No worries, Doodle, we're still here!" Doodle must see a human, or Doodle will launch into panic mode. Yes. That means that now we must not only babysit a turkey 24/7, but we must bow over said turkey's brooder so she can see some sort of limb to assure her that yes, we are here, yes, we are alive, and yes, we still love her.
So, we got wise. We got some vinyl gloves, stuffed 'em with stuffing and some wires for optimal "pose-a-bility", and placed these over the brooder for Doodle to see at all times.
In spite of the fact that our gloves were blue, which you may be surprised to learn is nowhere near our natural skin tone, this seemed to work. Doodle made her happy princess-bird-fairyland noises and got back to doing normal turkey stuffs when she saw them. We could even leave the room for more than two minutes. Euphoria set in and renewed pacts to see Doodle through to adulthood were made.
Especially when Doodle starts to insist that a hand, head, or other human limb must be in sight at all times. Voices are not enough any more. She doesn't believe us when we say, "No worries, Doodle, we're still here!" Doodle must see a human, or Doodle will launch into panic mode. Yes. That means that now we must not only babysit a turkey 24/7, but we must bow over said turkey's brooder so she can see some sort of limb to assure her that yes, we are here, yes, we are alive, and yes, we still love her.
So, we got wise. We got some vinyl gloves, stuffed 'em with stuffing and some wires for optimal "pose-a-bility", and placed these over the brooder for Doodle to see at all times.
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| Vinyl gloves of this sort. Very convincing. |
In spite of the fact that our gloves were blue, which you may be surprised to learn is nowhere near our natural skin tone, this seemed to work. Doodle made her happy princess-bird-fairyland noises and got back to doing normal turkey stuffs when she saw them. We could even leave the room for more than two minutes. Euphoria set in and renewed pacts to see Doodle through to adulthood were made.
Then we made a fatal error.
The exuberance of freedom dulled the wisdom we humans displayed so tactfully earlier. Or maybe we just took turkey wisdom for granted. They're supposed to be dum-dums that drown themselves looking up in the rain, right? Ho ho. Doodle. Ho ho.
So what was this mistake we made?
Well, Mom started lovingly talking to Doodle and put her hand over Doodle's brooder. Innocent enough. Then Doodle started doing something strange. Doodle would look up at Mom's hand. Then Doodle would walk over to the decoy hand and stare at it long and hard. Then she would walk over to Mom's hand, and stare at that long and hard. We saw the wheels turning in our baby bird's brain and realized our folly too late.
So what was this mistake we made?
Well, Mom started lovingly talking to Doodle and put her hand over Doodle's brooder. Innocent enough. Then Doodle started doing something strange. Doodle would look up at Mom's hand. Then Doodle would walk over to the decoy hand and stare at it long and hard. Then she would walk over to Mom's hand, and stare at that long and hard. We saw the wheels turning in our baby bird's brain and realized our folly too late.
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| Hmmm, let's have a look-see here... |
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| Ah HA! It is as I suspected...! |
Doodle had determined that human hands are not blue.
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