CULTURE WATCH : Turkeys Will Be Diners, <i> Not </i> Dinner

The guests of honor will not be dressed to kill at the Vegetarian Society’s Thanksgiving feast today at Balboa Lake in Sepulveda Dam Recreation Area. No one-way trips to the table for these birds.

They will be chauffeured from Malibu and will stuff themselves before the humans sit down to eat mock turkey--a wheat product.

What do turkeys eat at Thanksgiving?

“Well, they especially like corn-bread stuffing and green peas,” says Victor Forsythe, the society’s executive director.

The birds--pets kept by animal freedom fighter Lewis Marvin at his 600-acre Malibu hilltop spread called “Moonfire”--have much to be thankful for this year.

In the big fire, Marvin lost his guest house and chicken house. And, he adds, his six turkeys barely escaped being roasted.

“As the flames came over, about 60 feet high, singeing everything, including our house, the turkeys and chickens and pheasants went behind this big ficus tree. We didn’t have any fried chicken.”

His turkeys think the Pilgrims got it all wrong. “Every Thanksgiving,” says Marvin, a vegetarian for most of his 60 years, “we lend them out to the Hare Krishnas and various vegetarian societies.” Lend being the key word.

Anyone planning to trot on over to Balboa Lake between noon and 4 p.m. to feed the turkeys might want to know that turkeys eat leftovers--but no white or dark meat, please.