A Brush with the Law
Playing chicken with a brush-turkey is a full-time job as I recently discovered. If birds of a feather flock together then you can't blame a single male brush-turkey for choosing my place to build his dream pad and shop for a bride. A large block of land, plenty of nest building material and water views provide the perfect canvas for him to strut his stuff. Last weekend, Mosman was open for inspection and one bold bird sporting a laterally flattened tail and a resplendent red and yellow fleshy collar resembling mayoral robes landed in my yard. My next door neighbour once owned a pest control business. He reverted to his then company's advertising slogan of "one flick and they're gone" and with a wave of his hand directed the megapode over the fence into my garden. Until this moment there was no cause for alarm as brush turkeys regularly passed through the neighbourhood. Things changed when I discovered that construction of the scrub turkey's nest w...