Turkey's Revenge: Wild Bird Crashes Into and Trashes N.J. Boy's Bedroom

November 15, 2006         14:33

MILLSTONE TOWNSHIP, N.J. --  Turkey day came early for one New Jersey
family when one of the wild birds crashed through a house window and
made a big mess.

The episode began around 3 p.m. Monday when Lisa Lane, her daughter,
Lauren, and notably, their West Highland white terrier, Bubbles, pulled
up to the house.

About 20 wild turkeys were feasting on crab apples in their yard, not
an unusual sight.

When the birds saw Bubbles, they flew away in a hurry. One, though, did
not have a smooth takeoff and crashed into a second-story window of the
Lanes' home.

"It was very exciting," Lisa Lane told the Asbury Park Press for
Wednesday's newspapers. "What's so funny (is) it's around Thanksgiving,
and I have this wild turkey in my house."

After Lane called for help, state police, an animal control expert and
a turkey-hunting neighbor sporting camouflage and toting a baseball bat
showed up for the roundup. But by the time the turkey search party
arrived in the bedroom of 8-year-old Jake Lane, where the bird had
crashed, the gobbler was gone.

But not without leaving its mark.

"The bird had relieved himself all over," Lisa Lane said. "The room was
a disaster."

Tony McBride, who runs the state Department of Environmental
Protection's Wild Turkey Research Project, figures the spooked bird is
probably fine now.

And its escape is no big loss for the Lane family. They're planning to
eat Thanksgiving dinner out, so they didn't need to get a bird.

... How come the forbidden stuff is so much fun?