Miserable Start to 2020——- Part 2: Embarrassing End

Week four of the 2020 Wisconsin Turkey Season and our last tags of the year are on the board waiting to be filled. Alex and I are hunting together again just like week one.

Unlike week one, the weather is 20 degrees warmer and the buds on the trees are starting to burst with little mini green leaves. I think my wife and daughters would call them cute. I just call the in my way most of the time as I try to locate the birds.

The first day was more comfortable than day one week one but yielded the same results on our morning hunt.

That would be it for me. Work had suddenly and very happily become busy. The Covid 19 virus had taken its toll and made you thankful for every order you could get.

That left a quick hunt on Mother’s Day morning. Alex filled his tag one late afternoon on a layout belly crawl across a corn field with two of very good friends holding fan decoys. The targeted tom came charging in at a sprint and was stopped abruptly by 3 and half inch 12-gauge load and 3 guys having a blast. Then abruptly I had the only tag to fill.

Alex joined me and we chose to hunt behind my parent’s house. We hadn’t hunted it together for quite a while. The sun hadn’t broken the horizon and we heard our first gobble. Experience and land knowledge are helpful. We knew precisely where they were roosted. It called for a decision down the tracks and call them in for a fly down or up the hill that requires a short hop off the roost but a long ugly walk up a lime stone rock, leaf ridden hill with small branches hiding under the leaves just waiting to put you on your butt for the hunters.

We talked about it for a second and I made the call. Up the hill. Two reasons. First experience told me they have usually hopped off on top then worked their way to the fields. Second it would be a revisit to the spot Alex shot one of his first his bird and we double up that day. Great memory.

We made it up the hill uneventfully. I brought a chair to sit on and Alex leaned against a tree. The Tom and hen decoys were set and it was time to call. A quick scratch of the slate and we were answered quickly by two gobbles. Right where we thought they would be.

We had been sitting less than 10 minutes and we were into good shooting light and we heard a bird fly down and seconds later Alex says “Do you see him? He is strutting” I say no. I struggled to locate the fanned bird behind all the tiny “cute” leaves. Nothing. I looked over to Alex and he said “To the right near the fence now. Can you see him?” I finally located the bird as he was getting ready to cross a fence and surely escape into the large stretch of tall pine trees.

I pulled up my shotgun located the bird and boom. Bird runs away, boom, again bird keeps running. We have been hunting for less than 30 minutes and I whiffed twice. Twelve years earlier near that exact spot Alex and I double up on two shots. Ouch.

I ethically checked to see if I got lucky to make sure the bird was not laying there and I saw its roosting buddy run away. But nope clean miss. So proud. UGH!

It was early, too early to quit so we went back and started calling. The two toms came back circled us just out of range. One tom came in behind us in range but over Alex’s shoulder so it was a no shot situation. They wondered off but a hen came to visit and hopped on the log I had my gun barrel resting. She stopped on not more than five feet from us. I could see the bend in her eyelashes. She was a sweet thing, I understood why the boys liked her.

That was it for Mother’s Day hunting.

The last day of my season, the last evening of the last day and it was beautifully sunny, dry and 58 degrees.

We went to a piece of property Alex filled a young man’s first tag with earlier in the year.

We set up quick it was already 6pm. We heard a gobble on our side of the valley but one or two ravines to the north. We sat for another 20 minutes trying to coax him over but it wasn’t working. We packed up and walked north to the ravines. We stopped and called every couple of hundred yards locating the bird each time. Kind of a Marco Polo with a 12 gauge and a slate call. The ground was noisy like walking on a combination of corn flakes and raw spaghetti. The highway to the west to of us would add to the noise as cars hit the rumble strips at the intersection. All these noises we were sorting out as we listened hard for gobbles or putts of birds to give away their location.

We stopped just before each crest of a hill and before we entered a ravine. It happened to be the furthest ravine still on our property. That part was nice the pace was fast and exciting. It is a strong possibility we may be drawing the birds to us as we closed the gap on them. The other part was less than wonderful. The ravines were steep and we covered at least three quarters of a mile. We stopped at the edge of the last ravine and called the gobble came back and we thought we pin pointed his location. We stopped one more time near a fence that separated a corn field from a pasture. I looked at Alex he pointed to the fence with where two wires were off between the steel post so we chose the safe and easy crossing point. A laughed to myself a little sweat was beading up on his forehead. Three weeks ago these would be icicles. My forehead was more like rivers of sweat rushing to my eyebrows as my heavy breaths pushed the rivers to waterfalls over my eyebrows to the crunchy earth.

The last known location of the bird was still a couple of hundred yards up the field according to its last gobble. Alex grabbed the fan and said let’s get to near the top of the rolling hill in the middle of a corn stubble field that was laid neatly between the deep ravine woods and rolling pasture.

We stood with the fan in front of our faces not able to see the edge of the field and called. The Tom gobbled again he had move toward us and we could almost feel the vibration from the sound waves. We sprawled out flat on our stomach’s the fan in front of us. I had my gun pointing straight ahead directly at the last gobble. Alex used his mouth call and gave a loud raspy yelp. The response came back quickly now he had crossed our faces and was to the right of us. If he came into us from that direction I was out of luck. I could not swing my gun that way and shoot. Alex was laying just to my right.

A head appeared at the crest of the hill. A hen. NO! We were going to get busted by her. We froze and waited, she disappeared back over the hill. Did she take the boys away? We waited. Nothing. We lifted our heads and looked to the right over the crest of the hill where the hen went and I saw some birds. She had busted us but she was not overly startled by two 200lb plus males laying face first in the dirt holding a 12 gauge and a fake Tom. She had taken him away but not too far.

We immediately dropped back down. They were still just 70 yards away. Two maybe three birds. I thought one had a red head. So, did Al. “Did you see that one had a red head I whispered” Alex he said “yes.” He called again with his mouth call, another gobble. Then we saw him, we could not tell if was a Jake or a tom at first glance. Another guy gobbled just behind him.

The bird kept approaching all we could see was his head. He was coming toward us. Then he fanned and gobbled and gobbled and gobbled. Now straight ahead of us. He fanned and all I could see was the top of his fan revealing he was indeed a mature male. I whispered to Alex it’s a Tom. He was 25 yards out only giving us the head shot. Al whispered “Stand up and shoot him.

I started to move but then decided no. I will wait. Al whispered again “Stand up and take him.” I said I am not confident enough I can get up quickly and quiet and smooth enough to successfully do it. Do you remember the two 200lb guys on their belly? I was on the very high end of the 200. I would be more like an Easter egg trying to find its feet with a loaded gun. I was far from a twenty something athlete that would make that move without even feeling one joint protest the movement.

Let’s wait I said. Call again. That was all it took the fan came over the hill and right at the decoy in our hand. He was at 15 yard and said “I am going to shoot. Al said “Wait let him get closer.”

What the hell I thought if it gets any closer I will be able to smell the bird’s breath and know what it had for dinner. I had the bird at the end of my gun. He was gorgeous. I could see his deep black eyes and the bumps on his head his waddle wiggling back and forth as he strutted toward us. His bright red head with highlights of blue focused dominantly at the fan decoy in Alex’s hand. My bead pointed directly between the head and the beard. I could almost see this guy on my grill. 5 yards. Boom. Some feathers flew. But no flop. Nothing. The bird took two quick steps and took flight, I raised my gun to shoot again and in the ejection chamber rested the empty shell. No second shot. I looked over my shoulder and saw Alex lying flat on his back arms spread wide like someone knocked him out.

First, I looked like any Dad would do to see if he was ok. Had something happened? After inspection his only injury was exasperation. He finally spoke with a half-smile on his face. “What had just happened?”

I had no answer. Humbling, Humiliating, Fun.

I felt like a Minnesota Viking or Chicago Bears field goal kicker in a playoff game. I must have pulled it to the left or right. I looked at Alex laying on the ground with a look of disbelief. It is not like I never miss. I have become rather good at it lately. From a success rate of almost 100 percent my first 20 years of turkey hunting. I have now missed 3 of my last 5 very baggable birds. Each time with an audience. So, I really don’t know why Alex looked so surprised.

Missing is easy. Just don’t have the barrel pointing at your target. Hitting is just as easy point the barrel at your target. Finding out why you are having issues with it is not so easy.

It has never been about the shot or filled tag. It obviously makes It better. But what a night. What a sneak, Great calling. To be that close to a very smart mature bird was amazing. It was not his time to visit my freezer or grill.

He must have some unfinished business. Make me proud my two fortunate targets of my second season. Get your job done Thank you, you gave us a nice show and some great memories.

The long trip back to the truck had my emotions on a roller coaster. I could see Alex texting. The word will be out. I smiled a little, you can’t make this stuff up. I went from exasperate to frustrated back to exasperated. What the heck was I doing wrong? I am sure that list is long but I was self -evaluating. I handed the tom decoy back to Alex. “Take it.” I said am not sure what my next emotion will be and I don’t want to throw the decoy. By the way your driving home. As the dust settled my final emotion rested on embarrassed. With a smile on my face.

Not physically tagged out and not an official statistic in the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resource under filled tags. But filled again with memories. All positive memories even with negative results. These two hunts will haunt me a little but every time I think about the missing I think about all the cool things that led up to the miss. I wouldn’t change a thing. Ok that is a fib. One of those birds should be in my freezer.

That ends 2020.