This was my final trip of the year and had mixed feelings as I left out late Thursday night. Turkey hunting is a one-man game in a sense and while I do like hunting by myself traveling by yourself really gets old. And these half day states make it even worse. My plan was to hit as many states as time allowed and shoot at the World Sporting clays championship in New Jersey over the next weekend to break my hunts up.
I get to my spot in WV late Friday afternoon and scout out the area for the next morning. At daybreak I hear a distant gobble, so I make my move to get closer. I set up about 80yds from the gobbler and wait for him to fly down. When he hits the ground, he is on the run straight away from me, before I ever made the first call. I make a few moves trying to catch up and I see another hunter walking through the woods, so I whistle to let him know where I was, I had heard another gobble way off at daylight so I decided to head towards the other bird in hopes he wasn't a runner and didn't have anyone else on him. As I'm closing the distance to where I thought he would be I hear a shot in the distance, then I see another hunter walking a ridge. I whistle at him and he waves and turns and heads away from me. A few min later another shot, now I'm thinking this is nuts, everyone is killing birds and I'm just running in circles. A few min later boom a louder shot even closer, then I hear the gravel popping in the distance and boom another shot. Now I know what's going on and I'm not happy. I end up making a few moves and finally make a call and a bird gobbles 70yds away. I make some scratching sounds and he gobbles again closer. He steps out at 35yds head bright white and ruffled feathers then when my red dot lines up with him it was like a light switch was flipped. He wilted and turned a dull shad of red, like he knew he was dead. At that point my heartbeat wasn't even elevated. If I had killed him, it would have been 100% out of spite for the people messing me up. So I let him walk and I felt good about it. After he walked off I slipped out to the road and caught the guy riding the road shooting every quarter mile. It was a man and his son in a Subaru, they did a 180 and slug rocks everywhere when I stepped out.
Rain sets in so I make the drive up to Massachusetts to give it a go on Monday morning. I find some birds and get permission to hunt this farm (yes I know its legal trespass if it's not posted but I'm from SW MS and I don't like it, so I still ask) The next morning I'm set up on the North side of the road where the farmer told me I could hunt and all the birds were roosted on the south side of the road. After watching them do their thing for a few hours and watching a cool fight I finally called the hens to my side of the road. The gobbler comes in with them in full strut and walks to 30yds and I just look at him and take it all in. I let the whole flock walk by me. About 30 min later a lone gobbler steps out in the field about 150yds away and after some soft calling he reluctantly walks in to less than 40yds and I give him a pass too. I know I'm crazy.
After quitting time I'm talking to the farmer and telling him about my morning and he's apologizing for not letting me know I could hunt the south side of the road. I tell him no worries I had great hunt where I was. He told me to please stay another day and hunt the south side of the road, then asked if I would shoot one for him and his family to enjoy since he didn't hunt. I told him I'd be glad to stay another day and tried to get him to go with me but he just didn't hunt.
That afternoon I got the ultimate show and attempted to roost them but the neighbors dog had other plans he scatted them as there were going to roost and I didn't have a clue as to what bird went which direction it was kaisos
The next morning I'm sitting under a wild rose bush on the south side of the road. And as day breaks, I hear him gobble and he is where I hoped he would be. I see 2 birds fly down but it's a hen and a jake a little while later I look over my left shoulder and there is a hen 20yds from me and I see a gobbler strutting right behind her and they are coming my way to meet the other two birds that are now 15yds in front of me. All of a sudden he breaks strut and runs straight away from me over the hill and out of sight I was asking myself what I did to screw that up, but the other 3 birds never spooked. Then I hear wing slaps and pops and I can see the tips of wings over to hill, it was two gobblers fighting. After a couple minutes all goes quiet and I haven't moved a muscle. The jake gets a little nervous and I see an object moving towards me through the thick canopy of the rose bush that I'm tucked away in. He struts up to 8 steps and I let him do his thing for a few seconds and when he stretched his neck out to look at the jake I squeezed the trigger. It was a really cool hunt I said my prayers and took some pics of a bird that had landed in the dew covered grass. The farmer was extremely happy that I got one and couldn't wait to try it out since the only other meat anyone had given him was the legs off of one.
I leave there headed to Providence Rhode Island to meet a buddy of mine from back home for dinner. After an awesome steak dinner at Mills Tavern, I make the drive over to Connecticut in hopes of finding a bird the next morning.
The next morning I wake up to rain on my camper shell but I roll out and head off in the woods anyway. I don't hear anything a daylight so I make a quick move up the road to some public next to some fields. I start my walk in and hear a gobble in the distance. I get set up somewhat close to where I think I need to be and make a soft call. The bird gobbles maybe 150yds away and starts gobbling pretty good. He gobbles maybe 10-15 times then it was like a light switch he goes quiet. About 10 min goes by and I see a hen fly out of the tree maybe 80yds up the ridge. Then I see a red head and another red head, it's a jake and a long beard and they are all easing my way. A second jake walks up and they all kind of lock up and are looking my direction and I can't figure out what's going on but I can tell they aren't real keen on coming any closer. Then out of the thicket to my right a gobbler comes out in full strut walking straight to me, surprised to see him I just locked up and when he got to 10 steps he probably so my eyes and stretched his head up a little and that was it. I was happy but pretty sad too. But I said my prayers and walked out with a toad of a bird.
The next 5 days were spent in New Jersey at the World Sporting Clays Championship but each morning I got up early and went and found birds for the fun of it.
I left New Jersey late Sunday night after watching my friend get the Championship trophy and headed to PA for the next morning. I picked out a small piece of public and walked in a good ways. At daybreak I hear one bird gobble so I ease in and get set up. I ended up being real close. He only gobbled a couple times but when his feet hit the ground he was 35yds from me. I just watched him as he eased off into the woods without a clue I was anywhere in the world. Call me crazy but I just didn't want to kill him. I walked back to my truck pleased with the way the morning had gone and drove home. That was the last hunt for me this season.
So on the letting the birds walk thing. If anyone knows me or has read any of my hunts you know I get pretty worked up over a turkey. I've always said that if that feeling ever goes away, I'm done killing them. Well that feeling had gone away for the time being. I still love the hunt and will continue to hunt them, but I might be taking my big camera instead of my gun on some of my hunts. I've wished so many times to have had a camera instead of a gun on some hunts. My whole life I've always felt bad about killing them but I just like to eat them to much to not shoot them. But seems like at least in my area there are fewer and fewer and when you do kill one there may not be one to replace him for many years.
But I had a heck of a year although it was tough but I'm looking forward to next season and to see where it takes me. Hoping to be able to share a tree or camp with a few friends along the way.
