I will have to say that last night was possibly one of the worst nights I have had in a long time. We watched storm clouds move in in the evening, but on the radar, it looked as if the storm was going to go north of us. We were at Mom and Dad’s property feeding and milking when lightening started flashing in the sky. The dark clouds still lingered in the north. When we started to head home, a warning sounded on the radio. Obviously, the storm had a pretty good chance of at least coming close to us. We had spent the time between work and chores planting the flowers that we bought over last weekend and finding a spot for the new cottonwood tree. I figured a little rain would be good for the plants. Not long after we got home and ate supper, the wind started picking up and light rain started. Heavy rain followed with the worst hail we’ve had in a long time. It sounded like all the windows were going to be shattered. The ground was beginning to be covered in pea to marble sized hail…our yard actually looked like it had snowed. Our family doesn’t “deal” with storms well after having a tornado 7 years ago. Our youngest was only 3 at the time, but obviously he remembers more than we realize. At 10, he literally panics. Our backdoor had to be braced with a chair under the door knob and the rain poured in under it into the dining room floor. After what seemed like forever, things calmed down. Caitlyn ran out to the cars to see if windows had been broken out, and slid on the ice in the driveway. I hadn’t realized that our animals weren’t able to get under shelter. Our turkey hen with 6 poults is housed on the north side of the house so that she is blocked from the hottest sun and from most of the rain. Unfortunately, the rain and hail last night came in from the north. I found 4 of the 6 babies literally buried in ice. I had to dig them out. Two of the babies were able to get to shelter, but the others weren’t able to beat being covered. I brought all for limp bodies in the house, Troy grabbed the hair dryer and I grabbed towels. He started on the only one that showed signs of living. I wrapped the others up and started warming them up just in case. Two started moving some so I just turned the faucet on in the kitchen and let warm water run over them to try and heat them up as quick as possible. Their poor little bodies were bruised and bloody from being beaten by the hail. At this point, I fell apart…it had been building and I was trying to control it…didn’t work. After nearly an hour of working with the babies, we had 3 of the 4 with eyes open, and one calling his momma. Somewhere around 11pm, 2 of the babies were dry and warm and were returned back to the hen. One was still having some kind of seizure problem. I wasn’t expecting him to make it and figured he had been hit to many times in the head. I wrapped him in a towel so that he didn’t have much room to move and put him in a box in the closet, hoping he would be better by morning. At about midnight, I went outside to try and find the other hen that had the smaller babies. I found her under a tree and assumed that her babies were with her, so I didn’t check any further. By this time, I was alone. Everyone else had long since gone to bed…I figured I better join them.
I woke up way before the alarm and waited until I had more daylight to check on things outside. The baby I had kept in the closet recovered well, stood and flew in with its momma. The other ones had survived the night…we only lost 1. I heard the other hen calling her babies. I found her and a few feet away were her 2 babies…dead. All I could think of was…if I had only checked further last night I could have saved them…but I didn’t and I felt terrible. I gathered them up, and got the one that we lost last night and buried them in the yard. I noticed our new tree had survived the storm, but was leaning…and our flower bed was pretty much ruined. The vegetable plants on the porch were pretty damaged, but salvageable. I feel terrible for the little turkey lives that were lost last night, and can’t help but tear up thinking about what they went through…I’m kind of emotional that way. I’m thankful that my family is all safe…in time, this will all be in the past…just one of those things that we experience that makes us who we are.
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