She's one bird with plenty to be thankful for this Turkey Day.
It was a fateful day fours years ago this week when Dan Castine pulled up to his home on Ellen Street in Haverhill with Tomasina in the back of his truck.
The winter-white, wide-breasted turkey had been injured two days before Thanksgiving 2005 by other birds in her pen at Ingaldsby Farm in Boxford, where Castine manages crops and harvests firewood.
"Because she was in very bad shape, she was not considered as a suitable dinner bird," said Dan's wife, Laura Castine, adding that the Ingaldsby Farm sold 300 dinner turkeys that Thanksgiving.
"When the hatchet man came to pick up the adult turkeys, he found that Tomasina had been severely pecked by other turkeys," said Laura Castine, who works in the farm's bakery and volunteers with Merrimack Valley Hospice.
The Castines nursed Tomasina back to health over the next few weeks, dressing her wounds and feeding her molasses and water. Since being saved, the lucky fowl has resided comfortably in a pen in a shed attached to the couple's home, which also is shared by an injured chicken the couple took in.
Tomasina never fully recovered from her injuries. She has trouble moving about and cannot fly, but is otherwise thriving despite her disability, the Castines said. Dan Castine often carries Tomasina, wrapped in a towel, outside to sit in a pile of hay in the front yard. The turkey's diet consists mainly of seasonal berries and corn-based pellets.
"She's a good girl," Laura Castine said of Tomasina. "She loves our cats and gets along with all our pets. Sometimes she clucks and makes beautiful noises."
A photograph on the couple's refrigerator shows Tomasina resting on the living room floor with their cat Smoky Joe and a black Labrador retriever named Jet, who died last December.
"Don't worry girlie," Laura Castine jokes to Tomasina on a recent day when the topic of conversation turned to today's traditional menu. "We're not going to serve you for Thanksgiving."
The Castines met in 1994 at Ingaldsby Farm and married soon after, Laura Castine said. They also share their home with four rescued cats and a bunny.
Today is Tomasina's fourth Thanksgiving since being spared.
"I remember he came home from work four years ago and said, 'Honey, don't be mad, but I've got something in the truck.' I was just happy it wasn't a pig or a goat," Laura Castine said. "Even a turkey has something to be thankful for on Thanksgiving."
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