Okay. My buddy, Mike, and I were finishing out our last hour of hunting today (noon for Virginia). Had something happen that neither of us had ever seen or even heard of before.
We're set up on the edge of a small field. After no response to sporadic yelps, I let loose with a cuttin' routine.
Less than 10 seconds later, we hear a bird fly up into a tree. Now this is at something like 11:10 am. We're bothing sitting there trading dumbfounded glances at each other.
At that point, I can see the turkey. Its a gobbler, about 75 yards out up in a tree. We can also hear other turkeys walking around near that tree.
So, as I'm sitting there, I watch the gobbler limb-hop toward the field edge. He's checking the field out from the tree! He stays in the tree 3-5 minutes. Mike, who has already tagged out for the day, does a couple of soft clucks and purrs. And the gobbler leaves the tree back to the ground. We don't hear or see him any more.
We don't hear anything for 15 minutes. Its now 11:40 or so.
I make a series of yelps with a different call and I get an immediate response from a hen from the same area we figured they worked their way toward.
Two hens, then, start talking a lot and getting a little aggressive. Mike and I do the same thing. They are closing the distance quick!
Then Mike whispers, "there he is! to the right of that lone pine."
Well, my view of the right side of the pine was blocked by brush, so I never saw him. Mike said he was strutting. The hens finally turned and they worked their way back down the ridge at about 11:55.
Both of us just sort of sat there like, "What the (blank) just happened?"
I've never seen a bird fly up into a tree to check out a field.
Have any of you all?
We've named the bird "Einstein."
Hopefully, we can clear all this up by the end of the season...LOL
Ken
