Posted on 10/14/2017 7:45:14 PM PDT by Rebelbase
The 72nd Yellville Turkey Trot opened Friday with questions over whether the turkey drop portion would continue. The Chamber of Commerce for the small northern Arkansas city has distanced itself from the tradition it once endorsed and is hoping a "phantom pilot" won't fly over this weekend. But that hasn't stopped thousands of people from emailing the chamber about doing more to protect the birds.
"Why don't you jump yourselves with no parachute. ... Think you'll like it?" one person wrote to the chamber Monday. Others used more colorful language.
Arkansas is one of the nation's top turkey-producing states, and the weekend festival is meant to be a celebration of the bird. There is a 5K run, music and dancing, and the Miss Drumsticks pageant, in which contestants are judged only on their legs. Of course, turkey also stars on food vendors' menus.
"It means fall is here," the Yellville Chamber of Commerce wrote in an open letter. "It means a turkey dinner a few weeks earlier than the rest of America. It means homecoming for many. ... Turkey Trot is so much more than turkeys being released from an airplane."
The festival started a year after World War II as a complement to a turkey calling contest run by the local American Legion hall. During the first turkey drops, which helped the festival draw a crowd, the birds were dropped from the courthouse roof for people to chase, with some becoming pets and the others Thanksgiving dinner. But at least 50 years ago, the switch was made to a small plane.
(Excerpt) Read more at abcnews.go.com ...
Simple solution. Drop frozen Butterballs on the protesters. Everyone will leave satisfied. No turkeys killed in the drop and a hell of a lot less protesters.
funniest episode of WKRP.
So funny. Thank you for posting !!
Don’t forget about Harvey Whinestain.
How many of these critical emails come from citizens of Yellville, Arkansas?
If the answer is, as I suspect, ZERO, then why should the town fathers of Yellville give a damn? If some idiot in California gets his knickers in a knot over turkeys in Arkansas, why should anyone in Arkansas care?
Great minds...
If it is your typical broad breasted grocery store bird, it most definitely can’t fly. They can’t even mate naturally because they are so heavy in front.
Turkeys do fly small distances and to roost
I’m not sure the big deal but I’ve never seen them dropped from altitude
They might not recover in flight
Has anyone here seen it
I have a huge chinkapin oak about 100 feet high and 200 foot span in my yard
Occasionally they fly up to roost high
As do Owls
Not at same time
And when the owls migrate a bit it’s huge crows almost like that scene in Game of Thrones
SQ:
Prairie turkeys fly any?
I’m with you. I understand there is a foodchain and we are all in it, but I don’t understand sadism.
Turkeys can fly but it is not a pretty sight. Kind like the way Forest Gump ran when he had leg braces on.
Hey, you never even gave any of us a chance to chime in with that. That was a very fowl thing to do..........
If turkeys can’t fly.... it’s their own damn fault for not learning.
The locals were claiming “turkeys can fly”. Yes-—WILD turkeys. And even wild turkeys are not long distance flyers. They can make it to the top of a tree, not much further. The highly bred domestic turkeys are so breast-heavy that they can hardly walk. They develop painful arthritis of their leg joints. They can’t even breed naturally without harming the hen, so they’re all AI. Thus, you cannot possibly say that the commercially bred turkeys they throw out of a plane have much of a chance at a safe landing in this ridiculous practice. It’s barbaric, inhumane, and just plain stupid.
I had a `Toadsuck Ferry’ tee shirt my cousin from Gentry, Arkansas gave me.
Is the ferry in Toadsuck still running?
false dichotomy. Animal cruelty isn’t right because abortion is wrong.
Live turkeys or baked ones?
This really isn’t animal cruelty. It’s not a dichotomy , it’s an observation that these perpetual protesters are protesting the wrong thing.
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