Dad's Turkey

Dad got a turkey on Saturday. He was pretty excited about it! Here's his account:

Friday was the opening day of turkey season - of course I was stuck at work. I heard the first shot of the season as I walked out the front door to head to the Hatchery. One less chance already!

When the work whistle hit, I was back to the house and changed out of my work duds in a few minutes. A quick goodbye to Harley and Amber and I headed up the "hill" next to our house. Amber and I debate what constitutes a hill and a mountain, but in my book it is a hill. In any case, I wandered around for most of the afternoon without seeing or hearing a thing.

In a classic rookie move, around sunset, I decided to take a break in the middle of a logging skid road after a series of desperation yelps. Five minutes later I caught movement out of the corner of my eye as a gobbler snuck in to check out the commotion. With my gun laying next to me, I never had a chance - he busted and ran down the mountain gobbling all the way to Orofino.

Dejected, I hiked back towards the house. Just before I reached the bottom of the hill, I jumped four birds. They skirted around me and then flew up in roost trees just above the road and only about 150 yards from our backyard.

The next morning I slept in until 5 am since I didn't have a long commute! By 6:00 am I had 4 jakes at 25 yards, but I decided to pass on the shot. It was only the second day!

Of course, when they started to leave, I had a change of heart - I didn't buy this turkey tag to make tag soup! My ensuing chase was frivolous as the jakes' gobbling had attracted another hunter. I met up with Mike - who had been awoken from his tent by the gobbling. Lacking a better plan, I tagged along with Mike for the next two hours listening to stories about his past hunts here. It was interesting, but uneventful. It started raining around 9:00 am so we headed our separate ways; Mike to his truck and me back home.

Back at home I told stories to Amber and Harley, ate breakfast, and watched the rain pour down. About 10:30 am, just after Harley went down for a nap, the clouds broke and the sun peaked through. I couldn't take it, so I grabbed the shotgun and headed back up the hill.

I only made it about 200 yards when gobbler let loose at about 100 yards. I quickly spiked in a jake and hen decoy and dove for the first tree available. By then, two birds were gobbling, but they sounded like they were headed away. After some more calling they turned and started heading down. About twenty minutes after I set-up, a gobbler and jake poked their head over some rocks at 35 yards. There was just enough brush in the way that I hesitated shooting.

The pair surveyed the decoys below them, but refused to come any closer. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, I let out a couple of soft clucks and the jake couldn't take it anymore. That prompted the gobbler to follow. The jake was in the lead, and got to within about 10 yards before the gobbler split off and I was able to get a shot. At fifteen yards he never even flopped. I wouldn't have expected anything less with the 3 1/2 inch hevi-shot load at $2.50/shell!

What a great time! The bird had a 9 inch beard and 3/4 inch spurs - a classic 2-year old. My neighbor, Rick King, explained that many of the birds in this area are hybrids of the original Eastern and Merriam's turkeys they released. This bird looks like it had more Merriams than Eastern and the middle two tail feathers were slightly mottled - neat!

Now if I could only find one that thinks Harley's babbling sounds like a hen turkey!