Not being a professional turkey hunter and seeing how my son wanted to shoot a turkey bird with his grandfather’s old model 12, 16 gauge, I called one in. Calling in a professional turkey hunter seemed much easier than calling in a turkey; this is probably because there are more professional turkey hunters than turkeys.
On the specified day the expert showed up. I was a bit surprised to discover his camo pants did not match his camo shirt or even his camo turkey vest. But, when he spread that vest open, like a big gobbler shaking the morning dew from his wings, my eyes caught a glimpse of what looked to be a dozen, hand crafted slate call strikers.
Impressive!
Figuring the birds would not stand a chance with a real professional in tow, Bat and I headed out to the woods with the expert. I also knew he was an expert because he talked of things like putts and purrs, grand slams and spurs. A real turkey talker he was. Course, that fancy Remington VersaMax shotgun he was carrying – which might have cost as much as his turkey calls – served as final confirmation this man was the real deal; a feathered warrior.
It was foggy and when our expert caller hit his first note, the hens went to chattering and a gobbler sounded like he yelled at them and told them to stop. They didn’t. Well, that’s until they flew down from the roost. Then the forest fell silent. 20 minutes more calling produced three hens. Well, the expert said he called them up but they stopped about 25 yards short of us and looked around like they thought there might be an injured crow somewhere. The hens got tired of that pretty quick and ambled on off in the direction the other 40 turkeys we saw marching down the ridge had went.
Bat had to go to school and had still not had breakfast so, we figured the morning was blown and headed toward the house. Not wanting to sound like a non-believer, I asked the expert, “What you think went wrong this morning?” He didn’t say anything for a bit. After we had walked a littler further he offered his expert opinion and said, “I’m not real sure what was wrong this morning.” Bat just looked at me a grinned.
I said, “Dude, I thought you were the expert! Don’t you know turkeys are stupid?” He never said another word, just kept walking towards the house; head hung low. A true professional turkey hunter would never call his quarry stupid, even though he knows its true.
Confession: I cannot tell a lie, the expert turkey hunter I mentioned is my good friend Chris Ellis. He’s killed a lot of turkeys in a lot of places. He’s being hunting turkeys so long, he sometimes walks with that wobbling, head bobbing kind of jive so similar to the young hens he tries to imitate. Unlike me, Chris is also a firm believer in luck. This proves that he is indeed a professional turkey hunter because what else do they have to trust?
MT cases comes up MT handed for the very 1st time!! That’s a 1st because Turkeys R’ Stupid.(period)