RIP Turk Lurk

It is with sadness that I report the passing of Turklurk, the one remaining turkey on Goat Rope Farm due to natural causes...as in a predator. I found him this afternoon on returning from a long day. Not sure when the crime took place or who the culprit was. Whether coyote or raccoon or whatever it didn't eat much, which is to say a lot went to waste.

This never would have happened when Arpad the Magnificent, protector of poultry, was alive.

The life lesson here, apropos of nothing is that when the good guys go away the predators move in.

Urgent baby bird picture edition (including green herons)

OK, so 2016 has been a downer year for humanity so far. No arguing that. On the other hand, it's been a pretty good year for baby birds at Goat Rope Farm. Earlier this sprint, a baby great horned owl was hatched up on our hill.

Last week, five baby phoebes who had nested in our goat barn fledged. This took some intervention by the Spousal Unit, who had to intervene to persuade a black snake to seek meals elsewhere.

Even better, we've noticed for a good while that a green heron was hanging around our pond a lot. How cool was it to see that she hatched four babies (big uns at that!):

On top of that, we discovered that a broody hen managed to hatch two baby turkeys, one of which is shown below. The other didn't recognize a photo op when it had one.

So there's that anyhow.

Animal friends

It has been documented many times that animals sometimes form friendships with others of different species. Some of that is happening this holiday season at Goat Rope Farm, where two young guineas (center) have been basically adopted by TurkLurk, an adult male turkey (the big guy in the middle doing the tail feather display). TurkLurk is acting downright maternal with these guys. During a rainstorm a few days ago, he could be seen sheltering both of them under his wings. It was downright sweet.

A HOLIDAY DOWNER. Here's a great op-ed by a friend of mine about how inequality is undermining good cheer for many people this year.

SPEAKING OF INEQUALITY, Nobel economics laureate Joseph Stiglitz argues here that inequality is undermining social trust in America.

ARE THEY PAYING ATTENTION? Republicans in the US House don't want to extend unemployment insurance benefits, but a new poll shows overwhelming support for the measure. Unless something happens, around 7,000 West Virginians will lose benefits.

SPEAKING OF WEST VIRGINIA, here's another report from WV Public Broadcasting about a recent study of land ownership here.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

Okay...

I admit it. Some of the turkey boys on our farm may not be the brightest crayons in the box.

 Here are our two oldest males again chasing each other around a grill and posturing to try to impress each other and their own reflections. Round and round and round.

They seem more obsessed with each other than with the females. Not that there's anything wrong with that. The whole grill thing, however, is kind of sad.

THE ANTI-WAL-MART. Here's a comparison between wages and benefits at Costco, Wal-Mart, and Wendy's.

MORE GOOD TIMES from the WV Attorney General's office.

REAL APES don't dog paddle.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

Boys will be boys

A romantic comedy is playing itself out every day at Goat Rope Farm. We have two mature...well, fully grown anyway...male turkeys known as Fauntleroy and Turk Lurk Jr.  There are slightly more females. One might think this would be a cause of joy for the boys, but no.

Instead, each one is consumed with the thought that the other one might have access to a female. That thought gives them no peace of mind. For that reason, they are constantly together and never let the other out of sight. They eat together. They sleep together. They display for each other. One might even suspect that they are more interested in each other than in the females, not that there's anything wrong with that. 

One time, the Spousal Unit found them chasing each other around a grill and pecking at their own reflections in it.

I guess it's just an extreme case of male bonding.

This is what happens...

...when 20 odd turkeys sleep in a redbud tree.

(In case the picture is unclear, the horizontal tree used to be a good bit more vertical, no thanks to this guy and his buddies.)

CHILDREN IN AMERICA fare worse than those in most Western nations.

ON THIS DATE 101 YEARS AGO, members of the United Mine Workers began their historic Paint Creek/Cabin Creek strike that marked the beginning of the Mine Wars--and eventually inspired the writing of the song Solidarity Forever, which has become the international anthem of the labor movement. Too bad people don't know the verses better than the chorus...

CALLING OUT THE SENATE. This op-ed by Gabrielle Giffords is getting a lot of attention.

AND AGAIN, this time by WV native Michael Tomasky.

AYN RAND WOULD NOT BE AMUSED. According to a new poll, most Americans think the distribution of wealth is unfair and that the federal government should do something about it.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

Good turkeys gone bad

I think the free range turkeys of Goat Rope Farm may have committed a federal crime this week by blocking the road in such a way as to prevent a mail carrier from discharging her duty. The Spousal Unit was able to intervene and chase the flock off the road before too much damage was done so I'm hoping they avoid prosecution. Previously, they did the same to an electric company truck (gas trucks are fair game). They have also chased away dogs and deer.

I'm not sure they're very smart but they have great self esteem and are living proof of the power of acting in solidarity.

Road fever

Sorry about the irregular posts, but El Cabrero has been and will be on the road a lot these days. If you are on the road yourself, remember that there are a lot of turkeys out there.

LAST WORD goes to Ken Ward at Coal Tattoo.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

Turkeys on vacation

Turkeys like to hang out poolside, just like some humans.

MUST READ. Natural wealth can be a social and economic curse unless positive steps are taken.

Turkeys meet world

I may have mentioned a while back that we have something on the order of 22 baby turkeys on Goat Rope Farm. They've spent the first few weeks of their lives in a little enclosure.
Now that they're bigger, we decided it was time to let them out in the bigger world. They filed out like a bunch of schoolkids.

Their first action as free birds was to start chowing down on ragweed.

Who would have thought that this plant would turn out to be turkey crack?

THINGS PEOPLE LIKE ABOUT HEALTH CARE REFORM. The problem is, they have to know about it first.

BLACK LUNG never really went away, but now it's back with a vengeance.

THIS PERSON MUST HATE FREEDOM. He's writing about climate change.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

R.I.P. Turk Lurk

It is with sorrow that I must report the passing of The Turkey Formerly Known As Diego, aka Turk Lurk. He has been a resident of Goat Rope Farm for about four years now. He died of apparently natural causes, although romantic rivalry may have had something to do with it.

There was never a more ardent suitor when it came to the ladies, although he seemed to have trouble sealing the reproductive deal. It does appear, however, that at least two of the baby turkeys now bopping around the farm have his genetic imprint.

He was a really sweet, gentle, genial and tame bird. For years now, I have amused myself (and torment co-workers on conference calls) by exchanging endless verbal greetings with him.

May he be reborn in the Pure Land of Amida Buddha, where he can work towards ultimate enlightenment under the most favorable of circumstances.

BY WAY OF LINKS, here are two on the politics and reality of coal from Ken Ward's Coal Tattoo.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

The blessed event(s)

We are pleased to announce the arrival of 19 baby turkeys, more or less, to Goat Rope Farm. We say more or less because they are hard to count at the moment and some may yet hatch and some that have hatched may not make it. They are pretty cute at this point however.

The proud mothers are Josephine and Hortense, who seem to have adopted a cooperative childcare system. I don't think either one knows or cares whose is whose.

This lack of respect for individual property, inheritance and personal responsibility suggests that these females may be socialistic freedom haters.

Almost here

There's the old saying "Don't count your chickens before they're hatched." That applies to turkeys as well. At this point, however, it looks like at least some of the 20+ turkey eggs the two females have laid here are going to hatch. Several are in the pipping stage now and at least one little guy has pecked through the shell. This weekend should be showtime.

Of turkey love and random news

A romantic comedy has been playing itself out at Goat Rope Farm, where we now have two male and two female turkeys. The males are much too gentlemanly to fight but they spend a great deal of time displaying and following each other around to make sure their rival doesn't get a moment alone with the ladies. Still, somebody is getting somewhere since the females are jointly sitting on what appear to be 27 viable eggs. We're hoping at least a few make it.

Meanwhile, here are a few items.

 CONFUSING AYN RAND WITH JESUS seems to be a problem for granny whacker Paul Ryan. The Jesuits cleared things up a bit.

STRANGE BEDFELLOWS. Here's a look at left/right unity on prison reform.

BIG FOOD. Here's a look at how the corporate food system derailed the struggle against obesity.

WHEN RED WAS RED. A friend of mine just published a book on the history of the Socialist Party in West Virginia.

ANALYTICAL THINKING AND RELIGION may not go very well together.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

R.I.P. Frida

We had another casualty on Goat Rope Farm this week. Frida, an elderly female turkey, was killed by some kind of varmint whilst engaged in another effort to hatch some eggs. Frida took the whole reproduction thing very seriously, although she only had one live chick (turkey puppy?) in her time here despite many efforts...and an owl got it. May she be reborn in the Pure Land of Amida Buddha.

We remember her and many other humans and animals that have passed this weekend.

See y'all again Tuesday. I hear it might actually not rain for a day or two this weekend and I have hot dates planned with fences, gardens and such.

Gender issues

We interrupt Goat Rope's regularly scheduled program to report due to a strange eruption of gender issues on the farm. It seems that our male turkey Diego (above, left) was in a state of confusion after his partner started sitting on eggs.

He responded by doing something that I think is pretty unheard of amongst normal males of his kind: stealing chicken eggs and sitting on them. Like a broody hen, he pretty much sits on them all the time. He's even been caught in the act of egg theft.

(I would go out and take a picture of him in the act but for the fact that a recent attack of sciatica or something makes it too painful for me to take any unnecessary steps.)

This is not normal. But then most of the animals around here would fit right in at the Island of Misfit Toys on the Rudolph Christmas special.

THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM. As concerns about debt and deficits grow, a bipartisan group of lawmakers are calling for cuts in military spending.

HEALTH CARE REFORM will cost WV much less than the state Department of Health and Human Resources previously estimated.

UPPER BIG BRANCH MINE DISASTER. Here's the most recent NPR coverage.

FEELING YOUR PAIN. New research suggests that racial bias interferes with empathy.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

Fowl play

It is with sadness that we announce the passing of The Little Hopper, the first baby turkey born on Goat Rope Farm. He seems to have met his end in an encounter with an owl (we deduced this from the fact that parts of him were found hanging from a tree). He apparently escaped the the safe house at dusk and tried to roost, which attracted the predator's attention.

Arpad, the canid charged with protecting the other animals (when he's not hanging out with his girlfriend up the holler) was initially chagrined. However, in his defense, his job description does not include flight.

Hopper, we hardly knew ye.



GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: UP IN THE TREES

Turkey babies!

We interrupt our regularly scheduled program to announce the hatching of Goat Rope Farm's first baby turkey. If all goes well, there could be as many as six more to come.

The proud parents are Frida (pictured above) and Diego. The father was unavailable for comment as he was busy displaying to anything he could find and attempting to mate stray feathers left on the ground.

Unlike turkeys in industrial type farms, which are over bred mutants incapable of natural reproduction, Diego and Frida are heritage breeds which retain more of the features of their wild ancestors. As a result, the baby pictured above came into the world in the time-honored fashion; that is to say with a great deal of showing off on the part of the male and a great deal of apparent indifference on the part of the female. Something, however, must have worked.

THE BANALITY OF TORTURE. Here's NY Times columnist Frank Rich on the torture policies of the Bush administration.

ON THAT NOTE, some people close to the situation have argued that Bush era torture policies were so counter-productive that they may have contributed to the deaths of many US soldiers in Iraq.

OH GOOD. Executive pay at investment banks is going up.

JOHN BROWN REVISITED. The 150th anniversary of John Brown's historic raid on Harper's Ferry in what is now West Virginia will occur this fall. Here's some new insights on this event by a history professor from Shepherd University.

MORALITY AND POLITICS. Here's a good article on the research of psychologist Jonathan Haidt on how liberals and conservatives share many key moral values but place difference emphases upon them.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

The turkey fallacy

One way that people can get in big trouble is by assuming that the future will be exactly like the past. In philosophical terms, this is called the problem of induction.

It's easy to fall into this trap. The human mind evolved in a fairly simple environment compared to the one we're living in today and it's pretty natural to just assume that things will be like they've always been...except they won't.

As Nassim Nicholas Taleb put it in The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable,

Consider a turkey that is fed every day. Every single feeding will firm up the bird's belief that it is the general rule of life to be fed every day by friendly members of the human race "looking out for its best interests," as a politician would say. On the afternoon of the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, something unexpected will happen to the turkey. It will incur a revision of belief.

The hypothetical turkey's sense of safety would have been at its highest right before its greatest danger. But turkeys aren't the only ones to have this problem. Humans have it too. As Taleb points out, it is a problem inherent in empirical knowledge:

Something has worked in the past, until--well, it unexpectedly no longer does, and what we have learned from the past turns out to be at best irrelevant or false, at worst viciously misleading.

Take home message: things change, sometimes really quickly. We should be prepared to do the same.

SPEAKING OF TURKEYS, here's a good item on the Wall Street bailout mess.

THE NEXT BIG THING. Expect the Employee Free Choice Act, which would make it easier and safer for workers to join unions, to be a major issue in the coming year. Winning that would probably be the most socially significant piece of legislation in recent years in terms of rebuilding the middle class.

INTERESTING GREEN ENERGY IDEA here.

YOU ALREADY KNEW THIS, but driving while drowsy is dangerous.

HOW DOES YOUR DINOSAUR SMELL? T. Rex did it pretty good.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

GOOD AND HANDSOME

A handsome man guards his image a while;
a good man will one day take on beauty.--Sappho, Exhortation to Learning

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED