My First Turkey Hunt

...or "A Beautiful Mississippi Morning"...
...or "Three of Three Down for the Turkey Slayer"...

I had the most amazing time this morning! Last night we made a last minute decision: since the kids were both at the grandparents for the night, I would go turkey hunting with Chris this morning. After he described his hunt earlier in the week, I told him I'd like to go out there with him sometime, just to see what it was like. I thought I was just dreaming though because getting the kids situated with childcare on the same night doesn't always happen. When it did and Chris's hunting buddy fell through, it was fate for me to go!

Friday night Chris rummaged through his camo to see what I could wear. There was a pair of faded camo Wranglers that fit okay when I wore them over a pair of my own jeans. He had a long-sleeved camo shirt that went well over my own layers of a shirt and sweatshirt. He had an extra mesh mask and of course an extra camo baseball cap. I had some Timberland hiking boots that I haven't worn since college that did the trick. I had to wear Chris's knee socks to have something long enough to pull up over my jeans, to keep out the bugs. I was quite a sight!



We woke up at 4:20 Saturday morning and got dressed and in the truck by 4:45. We tried to stop by the gas station on the corner for a doughnut, but would you believe they were CLOSED? I had no idea that gas station was not open 24 hours! I'm obviously not very well aquainted with life before 7:00 am.

It was a long drive to the national forest land where Chris hunts, and I kept thinking I wanted to doze off. I contemplated Chris's devotion to this hobby--either this is the biggest thrill ever or he and all the other turkey hunters are crazy!

We parked the truck in Chris's desired location and sprayed down with Off Deep Woods. I strapped on my turkey seat (a cushion you strap to yourself so you can sit down next to a tree without getting your bottom wet--ingenious!). Chris blew his owl call..."hooo...hooo...hooooooo!" and a turkey gobbled really loud! "That's a good sign," Chris said with a grin. "It's really too early for them to gobble yet!" We started into the woods towards the turkey. It was still very dark so Chris led out with the flashlight. We had a short distance to walk through a thick patch of woods to get to a trail, so Chris said. I was walking 2 inches behind him trying to walk in the exact spots his feet had been, and I kept getting smacked in the face with branches. I put my foot into a hole once and yelped and got a dirty look from Chris. At this point I decided I did need my own flashlight, which I had packed in my own backpack. We got it out and the walk went much better. I mostly watch the ground and I swear we were going in circles, but eventually we came to a trail.

As we walked, the turkey was gobbling over and over. It was amazing! I've heard it on the hunting shows Chris watches, and even on the turkey calling CD he listens to in his truck, but hearing it in person was pretty amazing. This turkey was fired up and gobbling at nothing!

Chris wanted to set up next to a large tree in a small open spot near a ditch. We could tell the turkey was in a tree near the ditch, maybe 120 yards away. We didn't know which way he'd fly down out of the tree so we just picked a spot Chris knew they had come to another morning. We sat below that tree for quite a while, and as the sun came up, the woods came to life. It was just beautiful to see the woods gradually illuminate with the early morning sun. We saw a woodpecker at the top of a nearby tree. I could have sat in the peaceful quiet of those woods, with the turkey gobbling in the background, for a while. I could see why Chris enjoys being out there so much.

As we sat there, Chris showed me some really neat turkey calling! He would explain, "We want him to know there's a hen over here, but not overdo it so he will come our direction." And he would do a few soft yelps on his slate call. We knew the turkey heard us so we would just be quiet for a while. Another time Chris took off his hat and got out his new box call. He said, "We want the turkey to think some hens are flying down out of the tree over here." And he did a couple of cackles on the box call, waved his hat really loud through the air, and then beat the hat in the leaves on the ground. I thought that was pretty ingenious!

Sometime after that we could tell the turkey had flown down, and unfortunately was on the other side of the ditch. Chris felt like he probably had hens with him, and was just gobbling in the tree because he liked to hear himself gobble. (Apparently they will also gobble if they are alone and looking for hens.) He also heard some hens yelp but my untrained ear missed that. We waited a while and it seemed like he was definitely headed the other direction, we got up and headed down the ditch line a ways to cross the ditch and come up a ridge to the other side of the turkeys. The whole time we were walking (as quietly as we could), the turkey was gobbling like crazy. He was full of himself! We crossed the ditch and when we came up the other side the turkey was noticeably closer. We walked a short distance and Chris saw what he thought were hens up on the ridge, so we quickly picked a large tree next to us, and knelt down. Chris was in front of me, and I was slightly behind the tree. The turkey was too close for us to set up sitting down under the tree. We watched for a minute and saw the gobbler on the ridge line, strutting along and gobbling. We could see his beard swinging down--it was so exciting! We didn't have a good shot from where we were, so we had to coax him to walk along the ridge line where Chris could get a clear shot. Chris did a couple of yelps with his mouth call, and we were under enough cover that he could scratch around with his hand in the leaves, to sound like a hen scratching around on the ground, looking for bugs. After that he got his gun set up and asked me to do the scratching in the leaves behind me. After 5 or 10 minutes of strutting and gobbling, he finally got to a good place and BAM! Chris shot him at about 45 yards away! Chris immediately ran through the woods to him. I picked up the turkey seat he left behind and ran over there, too. The turkey was still flopping a little bit (*a little sad and gruesome, I know...), so I learned that the trick is to step on the turkey's head so he doesn't try to get up and run off. That kinda freaked me out a little bit, but apparently turkey hunting is not for the weak at heart!



My new favorite picture of Chris:


The next several minutes involved Chris finding his shotgun shell in the woods. (Every time he kills a turkey he glues the turkey's beard in to the shell and strings it on a leather rope with the spurs on either side. He has many of these "trophies" hung on the antlers of his deer mount in our bedroom.) We set up my camera on a nearby mound to take some pictures using the timer.









On the walk back I took some beautiful pictures in the woods, and at one point we got about 150 yards from another gobbling turkey and tried to call it in so I could shoot a turkey of my own--with my camera! (Since I don't have a hunting license and don't know how to shoot the gun!) That turkey ended up going another direction and we didn't feel like following it, so we just headed back to to the truck.



The drive back was somewhat quiet. I shot some beautiful scenery from the truck on the way home, and just reveled in the amazing hunt we had together. It was very special to share such a great morning with my loving husband, doing what he loves best. And I think I love it too...I'd like to go again! Of course it may be disappointing to go time after time and NOT kill a turkey, which is what Chris does with such devotion.











Thanks, sweetie, for a wonderful morning! Congrats on three turkeys this season!