So, I'm not even going to get into the blow-by-blow of my Wednesday morning. Suffice it to say, when a bird screws you over TWICE before 9:00 on the same ridge.....he's just done gone and made it personal.
So yesterday, I decided to change things up a bit and get between this bird and another one down my big ridge. They seem to like to get together in the morning and hang out. Well...... Gobble time came. Every gobbling bird was across the valley. So, dripping sweat from having climbed the power line straight up on to the top, I walked right back down. Got in the truck and headed to the other side.
I have a blind set up over there for rainy days or if I have a kid with me. My lower back was wearing thin. So I opted to plop in my Rural King chair in the blind for a spell and rest.....and listen. I put out the decoys I keep stashed in the blind and sat down. Wasn't long til I heard a gobble WAAAAY out front. I knew exactly where it was and it wasn't good. Across a side valley. Probably 700 yards away in a neighbor's field. I get outta the blind and start walking around a bit calling with my box call. The bird is mostly just gobbling non-stop on its own. but SEEMS to be answering me, too. Hard to tell with all the sound delay at that distance.
I decided to pack all the crap (except for one hen deke) back away in the blind and go after this thing. So off I go and down over the hill into the near end of one of our fields. Calling a bit as I go and the bird seems to be answering. My total advance was about 225 yards closer to the bird. The field slopes down. So I staked the hen in the top back corner and found a huge triple maple tree to sit beside just a few yards up into the woods above the field. The deke is 10-15 yards to my right. It was about this time that the bird that had been gobbling straight endways on its own.....stopped. I called from my setup for about 30-40 minutes and nothing. A bit of background info...... I have been in this very same scenario probably a dozen times. The bird won't leave the neighbor's field. But it's too tempting NOT to try every stupid time. The bird is in a long, narrow field....above a 50 yard strip of multiflora....above another long, narrow field....above the neighbor's lane...above a power line....beside a stream...below 100 yards of a near-clear cut.....which borders the bottom of our field. I have never successfully called a bird across.
So, anyways..... after the 30-40 minutes.... I get up, gather my crap, yank the deke and walk back up over the hill toward the blind. I was just about to the top where things level out and I stopped to catch my breath. Stupid bird gobbles again from the very same place he'd been the whole time.
I just thought to myself, "screw YOU". I ain't climbing into this trick box for the umpteenth time. OK. Yes I am.
He gobbles again. I cut him off with a diaphragm. TWO birds gobble back. I cutt again annnnd BACK down over the hill I go again. Stake the deke right where it had been. Get up along side the big maple again. get comfy and call. They answer. I shut up and sat there. They gobbled another time or two. Next time they gobbled they were a couple hundred yards left of where they had been...and MAYBE in the lower field. Hmmmm..... I called. Silence. Next gobbles were from our property and they were on the far end (300+ yards away) of the tractor road that comes to the field I'm set up in. These things are coming !!!
I can see the 100 yards of field to my left. I can see straight in front of me and right. But the tree I'm beside blocks my view about 1/4 of the middle of the field. But the road the birds were on comes into the field along the bottom straight below me AND it comes up along the western edge to my left. Both of which I can see. Faintly, I hear "DOOMP DOOMP". Sounds like a pair of birds strutting. But I can't see anything. "DOOMP. Brrrrrrrrrrmmm"!!! Where the heck IS this thing
I lean slightly back to get one eye peeking around the tree and there......30-35 yards....is a half a fan in full strut. All I can see. But all I needed to see. Dot was on and gun on the stick. I pull the hammer back and start straining to look through any crack I can to find the other bird. Finally I see it in the lead by a couple yards. Just walking. Beard swinging. Not strutting. I have my dot aimed RIGHT at the edge of the tree I'm against. I know when the first bird come out he'll be RIGHT there !!! Still hearing "DOOMP. Brrrrrrmmmm" !!! Can't see either bird for the tree that hides me from them.
A red, white and blue head appears right on the red dot. Then an entire bird, shining bronze in the sunlight. He had not a clue I was there. He turned and took a couple steps walking away. I was deciding if I would wait a few more seconds for the strutter or....... ?? Then it occurred to me that the bird that had screwed me over had been the silent, subordinate one of the pair. Equating that with the bird whose wattles were currently wearing my red dot, I hit the gas pedal. Full send at 24 yards. Over.
I thanked the Lord, put the cover on my sight, zipped up my belt pack and went to fill out my last PA tag.
One of the BEST hunts I've had in a while.
If you look in the top left of the first pic, you'll see a pair of Fraser fir at the edge of the field. Right there is where my 2024 archery buck fell. Kinda neat, I thought.
