Musings From A Mid-Suffolk Meadow: New Additions To The Meadow

Gosh, it's been a week since I posted. I am not sure where the time goes - well actually I do; I work full time (I leave the house about 8ish and get home at 6pm) and when I get home I cook tea and then DD has her bath and we lock the animals up and by then it is about 8.30pm and I am usually so shattered I have been having a bath and going to bed.
I am also on the Committee for a large family event which is held yearly in the nearest town so with meetings every fortnight for that and all the associated paperwork it keeps me busy.
I have read back and see that last Sunday I complained of a pain in my stomach the night before which meant I had to go to bed early, well it has happened a few times this week and so I have been in bed very early - I have thought long and hard about this and did some google research and initially I thought I just ate too much at meal times and decided to cut down and then on Saturday evening I was in loads of pain but I hadnt eaten hardly anything all day as I was an organiser at a charity fun day but when I looked at what I ate I realised it was toast for breakfast, quorn fillet in a bun x 2 for lunch and chips and mushroom/spinach in puff pastry for tea - I then realised that most days consist of at least bread with 2 of the 3 meals I have a day!
I have had a read and think I am gluten intolerant - some people don't think this exists but having a read of the symptoms made me realise how much gluten I have every day so I am going to try 2 weeks gluten free and see how I feel. At the end of the 2 weeks I intend to have some toast and see how it affects me although if I feel really good I might not bother and just stick with gluten free.
I am 2 days in and I feel great, usually after every meal I feel so full I feel sick (even if I only have 1 slice of toast and an egg) but I thought I ate too much but now after each meal I don't feel anything (well after a roast dinner I did feel slightly full but not so full I felt sick). I have also noticed how little I am eating now - usually I would have breakfast and then need a snack and then have lunch by 11.30am and then more snacks in the afternoon but for the last 2 days I have not needed a snack and have not felt hungry. I know a lot of products which contain gluten also contain sugar, the more you eat the more you want to eat and the cycle continues.
So I will see how I get on - it will be interesting as breakfast is always toast and egg and I just adore pastry and of course no roast dinner is complete without yorkshire puddings.

Anyway on to the title of the post - we have 2 new additions to the family. We have 2 turkey poults hatched by Mummy Turkey.
Mummy Turkey had taken herself off a month ago to sit on eggs, we knew where she was and kept an eye on her - on Sunday DH noticed her in the main field with 2 poults.
Turkeys make very bad mothers - they are so clumsy and just don't seem to be able to manage their young. If they are not treading on them, they are losing them as they obviously can;t count and wander off with one missing and then they die of the cold. In previous years we have left Mums with their young and let nature take its course but we always end up losing all they hatch (which is why we also hatch in the incubator) so this year we decided Mummy and Poults should come and live in the back garden.
Well what a palaver we had yesterday trying to do this - the back garden was easy, we mowed a path through to the chicken hut at the top of the garden (pictures before) and put straw in the hut but when it came to bringing Mummy and Poults back it turned in to an hours nightmare!!
When we got up the field Mummy and Poults were on the edge of the field near where the hedges start so DH decided to coax her out in to the field for us to catch but instead she took off like a loony leaving her babies behind. I kept the poults warm down my top until Mummy came back for them. We gave them back and let her calm down but then she decided we were a risk and took them over the fence, down the ditch in to the next field!!!
DD and I scrambled the same route in to the other field (not ours) and found her but then she took off dropping her babies in the process (she has them under her wings usually), she kept calling them but they did not respond - by this time they were too cold and didn't have the strength to call so we were hunting through 2ft high grass/stinging nettles to find them. We found one easily and after 15mins when we were about to give up we found the other one (he let out a pitiful cry so we could locate him).
Then we took them back to our field and tried to catch Mummy but then one of the poults jumped from DD's hands and ran to its Mummy, I still had the other one and we tried to entice Mummy out but she stayed put and then my poult jumped and ran into the undergrowth!!
Mummy then ran off to join the other turkeys in our field and kept calling her babies but again they did not answer as they were too cold so then we had our 2nd hunt to find the poults who were in dense grass and nettles!!
Luckily after 15mins we found them both and then managed to capture Mummy in the fencing and we quickly jumped in the truck to bring them home!!!

They are doing well in the hut although Mummy was not keen last night and kept jumping at the door to get out (Turkeys hate being enclosed, they are wild animals and prefer to be in the open which is why in all the years of breeding turkeys only 2 have hatched eggs in a hut, the rest (about 10) like to wander off and hide and then reappear with poults in tow) and we were worried she would squash them but this morning everyone was doing well.
Throughout today they have been out for a walk in the top patch and she is doing well to keep them warm but also fed and watered.

Unfortunately there are no pictures of the poults yet as every time I get close she makes noises at them and they run and hide under a wing!! But here are some of Mummy: