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Brush-turkey in My Backyard

Kevin Purdy

My partner and I live in the thick of Crown Street in Surry Hills, Sydney, but thankfully we have our own little oasis in the backyard, with one of the biggest trees in all Surry Hills, a Liquid Amber. We also have a wonderful range of other trees and plants.

Our backyard is an oasis for every kind of bird that passes this way: Cockatoos, Wattlebirds, Currawongs, Magpies, Doves, Lorikeets, Koels and a host of other beautiful critters. But last weekend we witnessed something very out of the ordinary.

We were in the lounge room, when my partner shot up and went to the window, “What was that!” she exclaimed and rushed out the back. “Kevin!” She cried, “there’s a Brush-turkey in the backyard”.

I, of course, also ran out and saw, yes, there was a Brush-turkey in the backyard. We were both stunned, it’s impossible! We exclaimed, how the hell did it get here? I grabbed my iPod from the kitchen and made this little film.

You can see the local Currawong getting territorial, “get the hell outta here” it said and up the poor Turkey jumped, up and over the fence, to where? We don’t know, but we both wished it well in its very strange journey.

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Music by Purdy from the 2017 album 'In Transit' on Soft Records.

Banner image: (link: https://search.creativecommons.org/photos/02b93bc3-09ca-4284-9a99-f8015349230d text: "Australian Brush-turkey (male)" by rogersmithpix is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0