Her nest was not in an easily accessible location in the creek bottom but we tromped into the weeds once she was settle on the eggs and attempted to catch her. She wasn't all that thrilled with the idea and left her nest. We pursued her and it became obvious that she was better at maneuvering rocks, weeds and sticks that we were. We gathered her eggs, carefully climbed back out of the creek bed and brought them into the yard where they were placed in her intended new residence. As we were trying again to catch her it started to rain. Although that was cold, wet and uncomfortable for us, it did work to our advantage as she was smart enough to go into the pole barn for shelter from the raindrops. We grabbed our trusty trapping net (originally designed for sport fishermen but makes a wonderful fowl catcher) and with limited space for her to escape to managed to get the net over her. She struggled and it took both of us working on the task to get the net removed from her feet and head. She is a heavy bird and when squirming is most difficult to manage!
We put her in the nesting pen where her eggs were and she immediately threw herself against the wire trying to get out, then paced back and forth. At this point we were dripping with water from the continuing downpour and wondering if we would be putting 17 turkey eggs in the incubator to hatch. We left her unattended while we went inside to dry off and wait for the storm to pass.
Upon inspection later that evening, she was peacefully sitting on her eggs. She has remained faithful to the task and hopefully there will be baby turkeys by the end of the month.
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