roosting in the tall trees outside our back door.

It was beyond ANNOYING as they make a racket getting up there and back down in the morning.

When one or more find a group of trees tall & full enough for the whole flock to roost in, safe from night predators (which we have a ton of) they all make loud, screeching noises to call the rest of their tribe to come roost with them. They gather and roost around dusk, while it's still light enough for them to see to get up there, but late enough to have fed plenty.

Once they are settled in and daylight is rapidly fading, we have no choice but to leave 'em be and roust them out in the morning to discourage them returning the following night. I suppose that we COULD roust even though it is late and light is nearly gone, but many of them would die falling out of the trees if scared by us and/or eaten by predators since they couldn’t get into another bunch of trees in the dark.

They cannot see well AND really can't fly according to normal bird standards. They run quite fast flapping their relatively small wings, and then JUMP into the air in a burst, which manages to get them up off the ground long enough to get up into the tree branches. Turkeys have heavy bodies which limit their endurance, but wild turkeys manage short, powerful bursts of flight to reach high pperches.Typically, they land on whatever branches they can and then hop upwards to reach the tree tops where they are safest.

They sleep safely by locking their gnarly, powerful feet onto the branches. Startling them by yelling, making loud noises, throwing stuff up at them, etc will get them down, but NOT safely because they go into a panic and start flapping away, loosening their grip and then falling helplessly to the ground rather than the usual controlled glide getting out because their terrible eyesight is nonexistent at night so they are unable to see a clear path to glide down safely. So we discourage them in late afternoon with enough time to move on or early morning at first light to try to get them to find new perches to sleep on. Otherwise, the racket in the wee hours of the morning wake us all up.

So, long story short, we made it unpleasant enough right outside the door so that they go further away in the lower fields where we dont care if they roost. Soooo, I haven't heard the word "roust" in several years. LOL.

Betcha didnt expect a silly, personal anecdote when you shared your word pick?