The season in MS opens up in just about three weeks. Here's a story I wrote from the 2015 season that I've posted here before but thought some might like to read it again or for the first time. It's a bit long. The season is almost here...get ready.
"The Cabin Bird"
Morning time came quickly. Like a bucket of water being poured over your head. BZZZZ BZZZZ BZZZZ. My alarm was going off as I jerked up from the couch I was sleeping on to turn it off. It was just after 5:00 a.m. and a short night's sleep had come to an end. I realized I would have gotten about the same amount sleep in the back of my truck as the couch in our old cabin.
The week leading up to the 2015 Mississippi turkey season had been cool but with acceptable weather. It was the talk among a few turkey hunters I knew that gobbling would probably be late again this year due to a late winter. Deer season had seen warmer weather with spats of cold, but nothing like February when Mother Nature brought plenty of ice and snow to the state.
So it was all well and good when a couple of weeks before the season I was shuffling through some mail on my night stand at my house and realized I was in a wedding on opening weekend for a longtime friend. For whatever reason, I thought the wedding was the week before the season, but not so. I would be spending the opening weekend in an ill-fitted, rented tux with thoughts of strutting birds going through my head. "Do you take this fat, loud mouth gobbler with inch and a half spurs to be your lawfully wedded, stuffed bird," said the preacher. "I do," I said. Or at least the ceremony went something like that.
By the time the second week of the season rolled around, my urgency to get in the woods had come to a boil. I worked a normal daytime job Monday through Friday that didn't allow me to hunt in the mornings, and I was living three hours from our family farm. This left me as a weekend warrior that had to execute on the limited number of hunts the six-week season allowed me.
Reports had come in that gobbling was sparse the first weekend, as expected, and I was hopeful that a week later the feathered friends of the woods would begin to get more vocal. But for as good as the weather was leading up to the opening weekend, it was just as bad leading up to the second weekend. It rained Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, and part of Friday as I hopped in the truck to head to the proverbial boxing ring that the turkeys and I would dance around the next day.
My brother and another close friend were to meet me at our rundown cabin. The structure is covered in red paint from half a century ago that's peeling in more places than not, and it's evident a paintbrush hasn't been on the property in a while. The cabin's better days had been sometime around when man walked on the moon for the first time and Conway Twitty's "Hello Darlin" was a new catchy tune and not an all-time classic. Regardless it has stayed standing and functional the last few years by the grace of God and well-placed duct tape. The tin roof reflected its age.
As it were, our friend called and said he was feeling under the weather and wouldn't be able to make it that weekend. He had caught a stomach bug the day before he was to drive over. My brother also informed me that Friday afternoon he had a birthday dinner for a friend to attend in town and would meet me at the cabin in the morning. He had the luxury of living only 15 minutes from our land. As my tires sloshed and slid in and out of ruts and up the muddy road to the cabin that evening, I knew I'd be there solo for one of only a few times in my life. It was already dark and extremely quiet on the farm.
Inevitably, when I awoke on the couch abruptly from my alarm, I had a text from my brother saying he stayed up too late and he was going to sleep in for the morning. I also had little sleep that night from a combination of staying up too late watching old hunting DVDs, and the couch I finally decided to sleep on having the comfort level of a hollowed out oak log. But knowing that my hunting opportunities for the season could likely be counted on one hand, I begrudgingly sat up to get my wits about me.
It was still dead silent outside—the kind of silent where the floor creaking under your feet even sounds loud. And from the sound of it from the night before, the kind of silent that when a mouse runs across the floor it sounds loud. Whether it was a huge mouse, a creaky floor, or both, it had my full attention at some point during the night.
After deciding to finally sit up on the couch, the only thing I could hear at all was the unmistakable sound of vehicles going up and down the two-lane highway that laid about a half-mile back down from the cabin. The asphalt, and the subsequent cars on it, split the farm proportionately into one-fourth and three-fourth chunks of land. At that time of night, when the sun has just put its slippers on and is brewing its morning coffee, pretty much the only vehicles on the road are 18-wheelers going through their paces carrying their cargo north and south. I had realized over the years it was easier to hear turkeys gobble on the roost on the weekends, as compared to the weekdays, because people were still asleep when usually they'd be commuting into their workplace from the county.
Rarely did I hunt on the smaller portion of our farm because it was mainly swamp, and the cabin was on the larger 300-acre piece of land. It was composed of mainly open cattle fields with ridges and hollows made up of oak and pine trees. In a few areas there were big woods between fields, along with enough kudzu to have a lifetime supply for Wrigley Field.
I began to feel the pressure to get dressed quickly due to it being a clear morning and the sun would be up soon. It was late March and there still wasn't any foliage on the trees so I decided to wear an old pair of Mossy Oak green leaf pants with the dominant pattern being tree bark. I slipped on my ghillie suit jacket that completed a mismatched camo ensemble that any self-respecting turkey would be ashamed to be fooled by in the woods. Old timers had been killing turkeys long before HD printers churned out the newest camo patterns and hydrographic camo-dipped guns made their way into the woods. I figured I'd be ok.
I grabbed my 12-gauge pump shotgun and some shells as I slipped out the door to the cabin that had swollen too big for its own doorframe from the recent deluge of rain. Shutting the door now took a little more muscle than usual. I was already trying to be quiet as I stepped off the front deck because it wasn't out of the question for a gobbler to be roosted in the not so far distance of the cabin. About 99% of the time no one stayed there, so it had become just another part of the landscape weathered by time and the natural elements.
I was headed about a quarter-mile down a gravel road that cut through a field to a cattle gap situated more or less in the middle of the property to listen at first light. As I strode down the edge of the road in the grass, which was quieter than crunching down the gravel road, my boots squished and squashed through the wet ground that was waterlogged from recent days.
I made it there only a few minutes later than I would have liked and set my decoy bag down while I waited. The first songbirds had just started going through their predictable morning scales, but no crows had opened their beaks yet. The sun was just starting to paint the sky with different colors that can only be seen during those few minutes a day. I decided to wait a little bit to see if a gobbler would be a good little turkey and sound off on his own accord. After about ten minutes went by and nothing but a few crows had rang out through the woods, I was getting anxious.
I decided to owl hoot with my natural voice, which had been successful on many occasions with the same dirt under my feet, to see if I could make one shock gobble. After a couple of short sessions and nothing answering back, I assumed my owl calling might have sounded like a sick owl with a smoking problem. I chalked it up to the first attempt of the year.
I was beginning to think it might be a tough morning when off in the distance to the north I heard a gobble. It was a good ways off—at least a half-mile up and down several fields and ridges. I heard it once more and decided to hold out a little while longer. It didn't take long for me to hear another bird to the east sound off a few times, but just about the same distance away from me on the edge of our property. Neither tempted me to put one foot in front of the other for them only to shut up by the time I got there, but that might be the only option.
A couple of minutes later, at about the same distance, I heard one more bird gobble just south of the second bird to the east and I noted it. Mind you this whole time the distant gobbles were likely being muffled by 18-wheelers and more traffic hitting the highway back to the west. I was about to head east, to the back of the property, where I had heard the two birds gobble when all of the sudden I thought I heard a gobble back to the southwest...near the cabin.
This is directly back towards the highway, and I couldn't tell if I was playing tricks on myself or I had really heard one. It was rare for one to be roosted in that area but not unheard of altogether. Sure enough, after a couple of more gobbles within about two minutes I decided I was headed back towards the cabin. I picked up the decoy bag, slung my shotgun over my shoulder, and headed back down the road.
After about 100 yards I heard him sound off twice more. He was beginning to heat up. I kept to the edge of the field near the woods since it was bright enough to see at this point and stopped after about 300 yards to listen again. I needed to get a better bead on where he was before I moved again—a product of having no leaves on the trees. After about 30 seconds of standing still he gobbled again, and I was shocked that it sounded less than 200 yards from the actual cabin.
I began to move again in his direction since I had pinpointed, for the most part, where he was. It seemed he was directly south of a huge ditch, in a big stand of oak woods that were peppered with tall pines. By the time I reached the road leading up from the highway to the cabin, that ran directly beside the deep, round ditch, I unloaded my strutter decoy and hen. I assembled them with haste and each second felt like a minute. I imagine most hunters feel that way in the heat of the battle while putting in stakes and trying to get their decoys, at the very least, not looking like a turkey with a drug problem. For the fields that we hunted, it was very difficult to hunt the birds without decoys—that and I enjoyed seeing the turkeys interact with them.
As I began to swing around the ditch, which went slightly up in elevation before falling back off into woods to the southwest and open ridges and draws to the west, the gobbler almost blew my hair back with a double gobble in the nearby woods. I wasn't sure at that point if he was on the ground, but I knew he was within 100 yards, and I needed to get set up as soon as possible. I positioned my decoys behind me and to the left in the field as I eased up against the side of the ditch with small trees at my back.
And when I say small trees, it equated to me leaning up against one tree that I quickly realized was rocking back and forth from my weight. It was like I was leaning against a flagpole on the 18th green of Augusta National as it swayed ever so slightly back and forth just waving to any and all turkeys that might wander out of the woods in my direction. I knew that wasn't going to work, so I just hunched back into cover as far as I could and leaned on my vest. It wasn't perfect, or really wasn't even good, but every turkey hunter has been there. A bird is bearing down on you and it's either a bad set up or no set up.
All the while, during which I had set up decoys and fidgeted around in the brush against the ditch, I hadn't heard the bird gobble in a couple of minutes. I let things settled down a bit and then yelped lightly on my mouth call. Nothing. I yelped again about a minute later—again nothing. I started to wonder where the bird was, and what he was doing. For all I know he could have been looking at me from a tree or wondering around on the ground just out of sight. I assumed at the very least he wasn't making his way to me, but I couldn't even be sure of that.
After about ten minutes went by I decided to purr on a glass pot call and yelped lightly one last time. Again, I received no response. I decided at that point since the set up was decent at best, I was going to shut up for a while and see if he would reveal where he was. It was likely the ruler of the woods was strutting around somewhere out of sight and hadn't invited me.
About 15 minutes had gone by and he hadn't said a peep—it was like his feet being on the ground forbid him to gobble now. Not even any hens had started talking to disclose their location. The sun was well above the horizon shining right at me at that point. Suddenly, as I'm thinking about what my next move would need to be, I thought I heard a gobble below me towards the swamp that starts about 400 yards away. Sure enough, one minute later I hear a clear gobble below me and bounce up out of my terrible setup with new life.
I quickly gathered up the decoys and eased down the edge of the woods near where he was initially roosted before the sun came up. He gobbled a few more times as I began the descent into what turns into moderately thick, grown cedar trees sporadically growing on the hillside. There isn't a rhyme or reason as to the layout of where the cedars are on the hill—like the good Lord just closed his eyes and slung out cedar tree seeds long ago. They're just at odd spots with thick cover, vines, and shrubbery growing up against out-of-place oak or pecan trees. But most importantly, the cedar trees made a thick wall between him and me.
As it turns out, he had worked his way onto an open ridge about 300 yards from where he was roosted and was gobbling his head off about every 30 seconds. I was slowly, yet methodically, easing my way through the cedars and brush that were below him and navigating the two small draws that ran perpendicular to his direction. I would make a move behind cover, wait for him to gobble, and then move again circling around to the ridge top as cover provided.
He finally had stopped moving away from me as he made that ridge top, covered in sporadic broom straw, his concert stage for the morning as he tried to belt the hits for all to hear. My goal was to make it to the front row as soon as I could without him knowing it. I had finally run out of cover to get closer and he was about 150 yards away. From behind some cover, I could see him from my vantage point half-strutting every so often and gobbling. There wasn't a man, woman, child, or chipmunk within half a mile that didn't know he was there.
Not long after I reached the draw below him, he marched his way up the ridge, which was the farthest side of the ridge from me on the natural oval-pattern he had settled into. It looked like he was going through his morning PT. Once he got there, I eased up as far as I felt comfortable and set out the strutter and hen decoy on a thin finger of the ridge-top field that eased down toward the thin cover I was going to make home for the next part of the morning. The offshoot of the field probably wasn't 30 yards wide, but it was kind of like a runway down to the cover. I quickly rolled and back-pedaled backwards out of sight with the elegance of an elephant.
With nothing but a young, fat cedar tree below me and tangled brush, I decided to just ease down into some broom straw and vines and call to the gobbler from there. It wasn't perfect, but my thought was that by the time he was in sight it would be too late for him. I wouldn't have to bring him too terribly far from his current position for him to see the decoys since they were situated below him and off to the side of his ridge top.
I had kept a pretty good idea of his position by his willingness to gobble unprovoked as he went about his business above me. I let out a very slight yelp from my mouth call, and he gobbled a few seconds later. After a minute, about 100 yards out I could see his head darting back and forth and stretching out looking in my direction. He had cut the distance down to my location and was at the very least interested in what he was hearing.
Slowly but surely, he was picking his way me down the runway finger of ridge top as I waited below. I gave him one more soft purr and a couple yelps and shut up. He had disappeared below my vantage point, in an area of the ridge top that dipped slightly, but I was pretty sure he was still headed my way. I was absolutely sure he could see at least the top of the strutter decoy at the end of the runway he was walking down, and he must have been thinking he was missing out on some action.
After about one minute more, I saw the top of his fan appear about 50 yards above me and to the left just over the rise of the hill. His feathers were glowing in the bright sun. He began to half strut every so often as he very slowly made his way towards the decoys to my right. Finally, his head came into view about 30 yards away but was blocked from a clean shot through broom straw and vines. I could see that his attention was fully focused on the decoys as he continued to slowly get closer. He worked from left to right, down the runway and finally got within 20 yards of my position.
He stalled for a moment, and I could see the wheels turning in his head as he tried to figure out the situation—like he didn't recognize this stiff fella but I'll be damned if he wasn't going to have a word with him. A few more steps closer to the decoys and he stuck his head straight up to get a better look at them. Big mistake. He finally cleared the brush with that movement and BOOM! I fired off the shot and began to fly up the hill in almost one motion.
He began to flop around and I imagine I looked like Adrian Peterson running up the hill to get him, but more likely like John Goodman. I quickly made it to the bird to get a boot situated on his head, and I had rolled him up at 17 yards. It was an unusual set up, and I was somewhat surprised it worked. It appeared that he didn't have any hens to speak of, and that's likely what got him killed.
I let out a pretty loud "WHOO" while I fist pumped and my morning hunt was over at 7:45 a.m. As I turned around and looked back up the hill I could see the dilapidated red cabin sitting there only 300 yards away. After a moment, it began to sink in that he and I both slept only 200 yards apart only a few hours ago. I have no doubt in my mind he could have seen the lights go out in my room in the cabin the night before if he was looking in the right direction. I could have waved out the window as I said "Goodnight." Again, it was rare to have a bird roosted in that area.
He turned out to likely be a 3-year-old with just at 1" spurs and almost a 9" beard. Most mornings I imagine he went about his business around the old cabin and didn't think twice about it. It was just another part of the landscape that had been there, undisturbed for the most part, for his entire life. He could have sat on the rocking chairs and rocked back and forth in the shade. For all I know he could have set up a picnic on the front yard table each morning and I wouldn't have known it—just him, the old boards, tarnished tin, peeling paint, and his thoughts—maybe even an 18-wheeler passing somewhere in the distance.
