In mid-June, I was using the hose to water the shade trees and suddenly a turkey hen burst out from under the spear-leafed phormium, revealing a clutch of eggs. I caught myself before I hosed down the eggs and the hovering hen. She stayed for a month, never seeming to leave her spot in my front yard. Google told me that she would lay one egg a day but that they would all hatch together and the hatchlings are called “poults.”

Then, two weeks ago, she was gone, leaving this behind. I think that half of the 10 eggs hatched. I never saw her again, or the poults. But I feel like a grandmother.