What I saw on my Thanksgiving drive

I am always completely charmed by Madison County. We have our historic covered bridge, our park, wonderful schools, nice people, and something that always delights me (city gal): animals, animals, animals!

I've blogged before about the wonderful animals around, chickens, goats, cats, sheep, horses, buffalo (!), turkey buzzards, eagles, birds, and dogs, but yesterday took the cake.

On my way to Thanksgiving dinner with friends in Colbert, I passed such scenes of rural beauty it took my breath away. The leaves are still clinging to the trees and the sun was very bright, clear, and warm. The pampas grass was waving and the roads turned and curled and as each turn was made the new scene was more breathtaking than the last.

Wait a minute! What was THAT??? Backing up, a dangerous thing to do on a narrow, curvy road, I swung by to take a second look. Sure enough, this ostrich looking bird was pacing the fence parallel to the road. What IS it? I thought. Wonders never cease. First the buffalo and now this.

My friend Christie from "Life at the Condo (With Toddler)" answered my Facebook question with, "emu"? And sure enough, it is, as a comparable photo confirms.

What is an emu doing in Colbert GA? Emu farming's virtues are extolled here, it is a totally usable bird but the oil apparently is liquid gold. They require little feed and little ground space. I have no clue if the farm at Colbert is an oil or meat agribusiness or if the emu has other virtues and that's why it's there. For example, Pineland Farms in New Gloucester Maine keeps a guard llama with their sheep. The one I met was called Zorro.

In researching this emu thing I discovered that there is an emu farm on the other side of the county at Bowman. Fancy Feather Farms raises emus for oil and for meat, along with free range chickens and free range beef, and lots of other things. You can visit, which I might do one of these days.

So that's why I love it here. There are always surprises.