No critter fighting

No critter fighting here. Broke up a fight between the hens today. The girls didn’t recognize their sister at first. Her mother trying was picking on the one hen to chase her off and away from the group. She had left the group to raise six chicks, the only hen to have chicks this year. Well the chicks are gone; this has been a real hard year on the turkeys. This hen was one of seven hens. Mom has come back to be with her girls after raising a clutch of chicks last year. The seven hens are two years old and mom is five. I watch last year as the seven hens chased off a black bear. Why they call them black bears when there brown, I don’t know. Anyways, the hen was trying to get through a chain-linked fence and was having problems finding he way through. The other hens heard the cry and all ran over to chase her off. Not sure but it might even been one of mom’s chicks from last year since it looked a bit small. I walked over to the hens and separated them from the one hen. They went down by the house but were looking on to see what this hen wanted. I sat in the pine needles with my back to the one hen listening to her walk back and forth. She flew to the top of the fence and down into the yard and right by me. I could see she knew me because of how close she came to me. We both walked towards the house and the other hens wanted to confront this hen. Soon they were chasing each other around the yard. I started to whistle one I’ve picked up from the turkeys when they are calm. Soon the birds found she wasn’t a threat and became part of the group again. I can only guess that they have to challenge the new bird to find out if she belongs. Turkeys are very family oriented and will stick close to each other. I really find them so very fascinating.