Fall Turkey, 2019

Like the previous autumn, 2019's fall turkey season was to last only one week in our area (unless you counted the two days prior to the new Saturday opener for rifle deer season). So, I had to try to tag a turkey during the one-week season.

Like my friend Scout, I had done my due diligence, scouting for birds a number of times; but the turkeys I'd found vanished a week before the season. Unlike Scout and me, my son, Bob, is not retired and had only limited time to scout prior to the opener, yet it was he who located some turkeys the evening prior to the opening day and invited me to tag along. I figured that hunting with him was my best bet. I managed to crawl out of bed early, and after a short walk we were set up well before daybreak.

Thankfully it was a nice morning: I do not deal well with cold weather, and I was able to wait comfortably for sunrise and, hopefully, for the chatter of a flock of turkeys on their roosts.

That didn't happen, and we were getting ready to leave that spot for another on out the mountain when we heard the clucking and yelping of several turkeys answering the yelps Bob had been making. Since they were above us, we had to swivel around the trees where we were sitting to prepare for their arrival – if they would come to Bob's calling. Facing up the side of the knob, I was situated to Bob's left. The turkeys were doing their chattering off to my left.

After Bob sent out more yelps, a couple of the turkeys replied. Several minutes later, Bob called again. He was answered by soft clucking from a grapevine tangle uphill from me. Not long afterwards, a turkey appeared in the tangle and stopped. He was fewer than 30 yards away.

I had already propped my 12-gauge shotgun on my knees and was peering down the barrel, aligning my sights on the bird. At first he was obscured by the vines, but he then took a couple of steps my way. I pulled the trigger. The 14-pound gobbler crashed to the leaves, and my hunt was over.

As Bob had predicted, that was the end of it. "Birds on this knob do not call very much even when they're scattered," he said, though we hung in there for a while, trying unsuccessfully to call another one in. We then went home, and Bob quickly dressed my turkey for me.