Turkey Scratchings - News, Notes and Hunt Reports from the Turkey & Turkey Hunting Staff

Giving One a Ride

Jim Schlender — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 23:48:22 GMT

I don't know who coined the phrase, "give him a ride in my truck," but Adam Fleck of Fort Atkinson, Wis., obviously knows what it means. Way to go, Adam! My friends Steve and Sherri Fleck take their son hunting whenever they can, and he was along on two of their successful trips last spring. Looks like Adam has a successful turkey hunting career ahead.

In Praise of Ugly Calls

Jim Schlender — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 16:59:05 GMT

In the Winter issue, Brian Lovett uses his new column, "The Complete Caller," to tell about the merits of the often-overlooked tube call. We needed photos to go with Brian's article, so he brought in his 10-year-old Perfection brand tube. Here it is on the left. It looks like a couple scraps of PVC pipe jammed together, and the diaphragm tucked into the small end is the only clue that it's a turkey call. It won't win any call-making contests, but so what? When something works you go with it, and Brian says that's why he still carries it.

That got me thinking about one of my go-to calls. The call on the right is a crow call from Ben Lee Calls of Coffeeville, Alabama. The late Ben Rodgers Lee gave it to me during a tour of his little manufacturing facility in 1989. No, that's not a wooden barrel; it's wood-grain plastic. And the sticker, what's left of it, further adds to the K-Mart style. But wow! It blows deep and loud like few other crow imitators I've heard.

I own several good locator calls, but every winter when I'm sorting through my mountain of "stuff" in preparation for spring, Ben's call always ends up in the must-have pile. And as long as it keeps on making ear-splitting, irritating sounds, it will have a place.

Another Tough Turkey

Jim Schlender — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 18:26:03 GMT

It's ironic that on the same day I was posting Lovett Williams' photo of the strutting hen (see Oct. 1 entry), Turkey & Turkey Hunting online editor Corey Graff was encountering a different hen that was full of herself. The next day he sent me this photo and story:

Turkey vs. Jeep

Driving home from the F+W offices, I made a turn onto a lightly traveled
country road and came face-to-face with a turkey defiantly standing
her ground in the center of the road. I came to a stop. The turkey poked herhead up and seemed to be challenging me -- then ran to one side of the road, turned and then puffed up her chest and stared at my Jeep.

As I began to pull forward, she ran back in front of me, so I stopped again. Suddenly the bird turned and ran away down the centerline, then stopped, turned around and again began defiantly posturing.

She never strutted, but the display continued for several minutes -- long enough to pull out my camera and shoot a few photos throughthe bug-splattered windshield -- until eventually the bird stepped aside and allowed me to drive past. Even then, shen never ran off.

Did this bold bird have little ones in the nearby brush it was protecting?
Or did the turkey simply feel like playing chicken? If the latter was the case, the real question is: Who won?

Cool Strutting Hen Photo

TTH Staff — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 21:22:21 GMT

Posted by Jim Schlender, Editor

Lovett Williams Jr., a longtime contributing editor and Biology columnist just sent in his Q and A column for the March issue (yes, we are already thinking spring around here!). He included a photo of a strutting hen that I thought was so cool I wanted to give everyone a sneak peek.

Williams says that a hen briefly fanning her tail feathers while jousting with rival birds is pretty common, but a hen that is fully fanned and dragging her wing tips like a gobbler is extremely rare. During his countless hours of turkey observations over 50 years, Williams says he has seen this behavior only three times.

Halfway Around the World ...

TTH Staff — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 15:58:13 GMT

Posted by Jim Schlender, Editor

I just got this note and photo from Sgt. Jeremy LaBorde of West Monroe, Louisiana, and thought I'd share it. Thank you Jeremy for your service to our country. Glad you're back, and have a great spring!

I was a Scout Team Leader in the Army for four years with a total of 27 months spent in Iraq and just finished up my enlistment last June.

I was going through some of my pictures the other day and remembered this one so I figured I would pass this along to show that even halfway around the world there are still a few good turkeys around. We took over this house south of Baghdad last February at the beginning of 3ID's big push to reclaim the area.

The gobbler came with the house, along with 7 dogs and numerous chickens. He only had a 3-4 inch beard but it was good to see something familiar for a change after 13 months in country.

And no, we didn't cook him, even though it would have probably been the best meal we had in a long time. Thanks for putting out a great magazine. Garry Owen and Never Forget!

Stray Shots

TTH Staff — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 18:30:32 GMT

Posted by Jim Schlender, Editor

This blog entry marks the first of what I hope will be many more dedicated to sharing the countless pictures that I don't know what else to do with. Here are two to kick off a collection of "stray shots."

This one was making the e-mail rounds this morning. Ironically, I was just looking for photos to go with Jim Spencer's article in the Fall 2008 issue (due out mid-August), "The Principles of Camouflage." No, this one won't be in the article, but it would certainly fit. If you don't get it, you're not looking closely enough. Thanks to Rick White from Hunter's Specialties for forwarding.

Speaking of Rick White, a couple Aprils ago we were walking along the edge of a plowed field in Kentucky when I happened upon this um, impressive, sign. It's a gobbler dropping, I know, but how big did this bird have to be? As I pulled out my Olympus point-and-shoot to snap this picture, it occurred to me that sometimes this job gets a little weird.

Kids n Turkeys from 2008

TTH Staff — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 20:11:33 GMT

Posted by Jim Schlender, Editor

I'm way behind in posting some of the great pictures we've received from this past season. Here are a few of my favorites from friends in the industry.

Hunter Maddy, 8, son of well-known turkey hunter and Quaker Boy pro-staffer Keane Maddy, shot this 23-pound longbeard near home in Centerville, Iowa. "We had three strutters come gobbling every step to us across a 100-yard field. Hunter used his 20 gauge Remington 870 with a Comp-n-Choke tube and No. 6 Hevi-Shot. He crushed the bird at 28 steps. A very exciting morning!"

Andy Johnson, a hunter safety instructor in Alabama and Georgia, sent me a priceless photo of his 2-year-old son, Hunter, with this note: "A few weeks back I was cleaning a turkey while my son was watching. He said, 'I get my gun' and ran inside and came back with his toy rifle. I just happened to look over and here's what I saw. I quickly snapped a cell phone picture of him and the Flambeau King Strut decoy. I think I'm raising a future turkey hunter!"

"By far my most special hunt ever," said Tim Herald, public relations manager for Under Armour, about his 7-year-old son Drew's first turkey. The Heralds live and hunt in Kentucky.

Tad Brown, product development manager for Flambeau Outdoors, had a great morning introducing these youngsters to turkey hunting on a chilly Missouri youth hunt. Preston Tremain, 14, and Makenzie Moore, 11, couldn't have asked for a better guide.

When Joe Monteleone isn't working in sales for CZ-USA firearms in Kansas, he's usually hunting. This year he took his 7-year-old Nathan out on opening morning of Missouri's youth season. Nathan made a 20-yard shot with a .410. "Talk about a proud moment," Joe said. "It was a huge thrill for both of us!"

June Scribblings on a Spring Past

TTH Staff — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 15:05:56 GMT

Posted by Brian Lovett, Contributing Editor

A lousy old joke tells us there are two seasons in the North: winter and road construction.

I guess that should strike a chord with turkey hunters. After all, don’t we have two distinct periods: the season and the off-season?

Sadly, unless you’re on a plane to New Zealand, we’re well into the latter. And I don’t know about you, but I’m finding it difficult to let go of the former.
It seemed like things had just started to “get right” during the final five days of Wisconsin’s season. Birds that had been solidly henned up most of the previous week began getting lonely, and die-hard hunters willing to brave 2:30 a.m. wake-up calls and hordes of hummingbird-sized mosquitoes started scoring consistently.

During the second day of the final period, I got solidly thumped by two field turkeys but decided to try another spot before quitting. I walked into the woods at 10:45 a.m. and was walking out at noon with a gobbler slung over my shoulder. It had been a classic midday hunt, complete with lots of hard gobbling and sunlit strutters slowly coming to the call. I couldn’t have ended my home-state season in better fashion.

I wish I could say the same for Minnesota. My last hunt of the year, with friend and fellow T&TH contributing editor Scott Bestul, proved disappointing, though it wasn’t for lack of turkeys or trying. Both mornings, gobblers did the same thing: hammered on the roost, talked a bit after flydown and then slowly shut up as they drifted away with hens. To make matters worse, I goofed up the only pair of workable turkeys we encountered by misjudging an afternoon setup and missing a bird with a poor shot.

While driving home from that hunt, feeling the effects of several hard weeks in the woods, I told myself I was ready for spring to end. I was dead tired and needed to catch up on matters I’d brushed aside during the season.

But that weekend, I began to miss it. I’d run a call here and there while putting my stuff away. And then I’d think about the woodpeckers, whitetail fawns and other cool stuff I’d seen afield.

By Monday, I was in full-blown withdrawal. In fact, I’m still there. The only therapy, I guess, is a bit of fishing, some baseball on TV and frequent daydreams to appreciate all the wonderful moments I experienced in the turkey woods.

I’m sure you’re in a similar state of mind. It’s OK, friend. We’ll make it.
Just don’t tell my wife that the fall season opens in 114 short days.

(Way Up) North for Turkeys

TTH Staff — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 03:45:57 GMT

Posted by Jim Schlender, Editor

You get some strange looks sometimes when you say you're going "Up North" for a turkey hunt, especially when you live in Wisconsin. But a couple weeks ago that's where I went: to Michigan's Upper Peninsula.

My friend Rick White from Hunter's Specialties drove up from Iowa with his son, Dan. I brought my son, Jacob. And Pat Muffler, an H.S. field-staffer from Marquette who had graciously invited us up to his stomping grounds, would be hunting with his son, Philip. I guess you could call it an impromptu youth hunt. Dan, at 15, already has nearly 20 turkeys to his credit. Philip, 13, had killed a fall gobbler last season, and 12-year–old Jacob would be trying for his first gobbler.

(By the way, Michigan is "youth friendly," in that non-resident turkey tags are the same price as resident tags, only $15. It's a neat program and a good way to welcome more youth hunters to the sport.)

It was surreal to listen to gobbling in the same cedar swamps and pine forests where I'm used to hunting ruffed grouse. The turkeys were there, and lots of them. Everyone we met had a story about turkeys in their backyard and invited us to have at them. Not surprisingly, those dumb-acting turkeys that were pecking around rural bird feeders in the dead of winter had morphed into unpredictable, mostly quiet and now henned-up birds.

At the end of Day One our group was 0-for-6, and by noon on the second day only 13-year-old Philip had filled his tag. He will have a tough time topping his first spring bird: The tom's spurs measured just a shade under 1 7/8 inches! It was a bird Pat had tried to work a couple other times and the story was always the same. His calling riled up the hens, which led the tom away. This time, he and Philip sat down, shut up and waited on the tom to show up at his mid-morning strut zone. And it worked, perfectly.

Jacob and I hadn't worked a bird close in two days, so on the last morning we took a lesson from Pat and set up on a field edge at a farm owned by one of Pat's friends several miles north of Escanaba. We had good insider information telling us that turkeys had been traveling the narrow corridor with some consistency. It was another no-gobbling morning, but before I had time to be disappointed, a whole mob of hens showed up not long after flydown, trailed by a lone longbeard. I resisted the temptation to call, "just for effect," and let them work their way toward us. Finally, Jacob was able to drop the hammer on his first tom.

I have lots more to share about hunting the U.P., but I'm goint to save it for one of the Spring 2009 issues. In the meantime, check this page again soon for more photos of youth hunters from the 2008 season.

Classic Merriam's Hunting, Part 2

TTH Staff — Thu, 22 May 2008 20:03:19 GMT

Posted by Jim Schlender, Editor

Last week I wrote about a short yet classic Merriam’s hunt in South Dakota. The next morning was more of the same … sort of.

Eddie Stevenson and I had followed the directions of outfitter James Woodley, parallelling a riverbank in the dark while looking for a “big clump of cottonwoods." We found the trees, but after walking a half-mile or so we weren’t sure if we had yet reached the area Woodley suggested or whether we had walked right past it. With the first hint of light, the turkeys gave us the answer. It sounded as if at least four gobblers were roosted across the river in the trees that ringed a large hayfield.

The closest birds were only 150 yards away, but with the river between us and them, I wasn’t sure how the morning would play out. Then I remembered Woodley telling us that the birds fly back and forth across the river routinely. I hoped he was right.

Stevenson and I set up about 15 yards apart against a couple of big trees. When some squawky hens joined in with the gobbling, we went ahead and threw a little bit of everything at them – the Wet Willy box that had worked so well the day before, a K&H Glass Hammer pot call and various mouth diaphragms all got a workout. With so many hens roosted near the gobblers and that darn river in between us, we figured we had nothing to lose.

Eventually we heard birds flying down. I even caught glimpses of a few of them as they pitched down toward the distant hayfield. (Sigh.) One of those mornings, I figured. The gobbling became sporadic and then ended altogether. (Louder sigh.)

We kept calling and got an occasional answer. Then, about 45 minutes after the first gobble, I caught movement in the tall grass across the river. It was a hen, and as soon as she hit the open edge she hopped up and flapped across. She was followed moments later by another hen. A third bird followed, and it looked much bigger … gobbler!

The hens had already skirted us and run off, and we were afraid the tom would follow, so we hit him with some more calling. The tom alternately strutted and gobbled, looking our way and then looking at the rapidly departing hens. The hens had appeared so suddenly I hadn’t been able to get my gun up. Now the tom was drawing closer and I wasn’t ready to shoot. He started to fade away, and then went behind a tree. I turned 20 degrees and aimed at the right side of the tree. “When he comes out …” I said to myself. Well, he stepped out, all right, still in strut. I cutt at him. He strutted. Eddie cutt at him. He strutted. He was drifting out of range one foot at a time, and now I was wondering if I still had a shot. The bird paused and looked back at what I figured was about 50 yards.

Finally, the bird stretched up his neck as if to say, “I’m leaving, last chance to come with.” I pulled the trigger and ended things right there. I looked at my watch: 5:30, just 12 hours after shooting my first South Dakota turkey.

Once again, it had been classic Merriam’s hunting. We didn’t have to worry about overcalling, and the bird had closed the distance in a hurry.

What wasn’t so classic was the gun and load I had used. Stevenson, Remington’s media relations manager, had brought several of the company’s 870s and 11-87s outfitted with the new ShurShot stock, which is a sort of hybrid thumbhole/pistol-grip stock. These guns have a 23-inch barrel and come outfitted with fiber-optic, fully adjustable rifle sights. In short, they are dedicated turkey guns.

Stevenson had also brought several boxes of Wingmaster HD loads, Remington’s version of “heavier than lead” shotshells. Normally I would have been shooting No. 6 shot, but somehow ended up with a box of 4s. This all worked out well, because the turkey I had just killed with the 11-87 turned out to be 60 yards away (I paced it off twice), not 50. With hardly a stitch of grass between me and the bird and no landmark but the aforementioned tree (which Eddie and I had both estimated to be 30 yards away; it was 42), I’d been fooled.

I like carrying a range-finder when turkey hunting – and obviously could have used one in this situation -- but out West I thought a binocular would be more valuable, so I took my trusty 8x30 Swarovski and left the range-finder at home. Even a gear junkie like me has a limit as to how much stuff to carry. I don’t advocate taking 60-yard shots, but in this case, having a tight-patterning, dedicated gun, choke and load paid off and made up for my error.

Livin' on Pine Ridge Time

TTH Staff — Tue, 20 May 2008 14:08:49 GMT

Posted by Brian Lovett, Contributing Editor

If someone offered me two Butterball turkeys for the low cost of a 1,560-mile round trip on a few hours of sleep, I’d tell them to buzz off. But two hard-gobbling, snow-white Merriam’s gobblers for that price?

Deal.

I just returned home from a whirlwind trip to the Oglala Sioux Pine Ridge Reservation in southwestern South Dakota, where I joined two friends and legendary turkey hunter Jeff Budz for a Merriam’s hunt. For folks who don’t know Budz, check out his Web page at www.tagitworldwide.com. This hard-driving hunter has 50 grand slams to his credit, so we couldn’t have asked for a better guide.

The area had been pounded by up to 9 inches of snow two days before our arrival, but the previous group had still enjoyed great success. And sure enough, Wade Atchley of Alabama got the trip off to a dandy start by killing a gorgeous gobbler at about 6 p.m.

The next morning, Budz promised to take us “deep undercover,” so we wound through miles of muddy two-track roads into some of the most gorgeous pine-covered hill country you’ll ever find. And when two birds responded to pre-dawn coyote howls, the Jeff Budz Show was on.

Atchley immediately scored again, taking another beautiful bird at less than 15 paces. Budz then found me, and we tried to track down a hard-gobbling bird on a hidden ridge. After about 20 minutes of intense walking and climbing, we eased up a slope and peered over.

“There’s his fan!” Budz whispered. “Get down.”

Thankfully, the bird hadn’t seen us, but we had no cover. That’s when Budz pulled out a great trick. He took a tail from a Merriam’s he’d shot that week and fanned it in front of us, which not only imitated a strutting gobbler but also gave us a bit of cover. Immediately, the strutter walked 15 yards closer, and I shot him at 41 steps.

It was a great moment, but it didn’t last long. Even as we stood over the still-flopping bird, Budz spied a lone strutter on a ridge 500 yards distant.

“Brian, go kill that turkey,” he said.

Who was I to argue? I dropped off into a bottom, hiked up and down a couple of ridges and made my way up to the field. Then, I ditched my vest, belly-crawled to a crest near a lone pine and surveyed the area. Seconds later, I spotted the bird’s fan about 80 yards away. He hadn’t seen me. Better yet, he seemed to be heading my way. I yelped softly on a mouth call, and the longbeard gobbled, dropped off his ridge and then waltzed to within 36 steps, where my load of 31/2-inch 6s stopped him.

As amazed as I was with the quick success, I hadn’t seen anything yet.
Budz, Atchley and Atchley’s friend Ronnie had watched from the truck as I shot the bird, and they’d also spotted two strutters on a nearby ridge. Within 40 minutes after I scored, Budz had Ronnie on the birds, and two shots echoed across the hilltops. Atchley and I arrived minutes later to see a pair of big gobblers in the grass.

Our group had just killed five longbeards before 8 a.m. With that, the trip was finished. We took a few pictures, cleaned the birds, thanked Budz for a great camp and headed home.

It took me 11 hours and 20 minutes to zoom across South Dakota, Minnesota and most of Wisconsin, and I was dog-tired when I finally reached my house. Atchley and Ronnie’s trip spanned 20-some hours. But I guess that’s the price we had to pay for our brief sojourn on Pine Ridge time.

A Classic Merriam's Hunt

TTH Staff — Wed, 14 May 2008 02:24:34 GMT

Posted by Jim Schlender , Editor

I had heard countless stories about cooperative, loud-mouthed, hard-charging Merriam's turkeys but had never gone after one. So I was thrilled at the chance to share a turkey camp with several writers and industry friends near Interior, S.D., last week. Interior sits about an hour east of Rapid City . The area is mostly flat cattle country punctuated by spectacular views of rock formations that make up the badlands. Badlands National Park sits right on the edge of Interior and the views it presents would make the trip worthwhile even if you weren't turkey hunting.

With a few hours of daylight left after arriving, stowing our gear and patterning our shotguns, my friend and Knight & Hale representative Gary Sefton and I were eager to stretch our legs. We started our hunt on some private ranch ground that was bisected by a creek. Glassing from high ground, we had spotted several turkeys on the other side of the waterway and planned to drop into the bottom, cross the creek and try to make something happen.

We followed a cowpath down to the bottom. When we got there we found our "creek," which appeared benign from up high, was actually a pretty swift-moving small river. This was no doubt due to runoff from the massive snowstorm that had hit the area just days earlier. There was no way to cross, so we had little choice but to retrace our steps back up toward the top. While following the edge of a small pasture where we had bumped a hen on the way in, Sefton suggested we just wait out the evening right where we were. After all, because we were unable to cross the creek we didn't have a lot of room to roam.

Sefton alternately ran a mouth call and K&H Silver Hammer friction call. Within minutes two hens popped out of a canyon across the pasture. They came within about 40 yards and milled around before finally wandering off.

"Hit that box once," Sefton said.

I stroked out a few yelps on K&H's new Wet Willy box call he had given me just a couple hours earlier. Powwwww! A gobble came from deep in the canyon, barely audible. I hit the box again and the bird gobbled, this time closer. This tom was following the script. Less than 10 minutes later he appeared at the same place the hens had come from. The deal got even sweeter when the bird's buddy appeared right behind him.

The turkeys alternately strutted and gobbled each time Sefton coaxed them closer with his mouth call. Suddenly it occurred to me we might have a very real chance at a double. I was able to shift my gun into position after setting down the box call, but Sefton still needed to do a bit of creative slow-motion pivoting to draw a bead on the birds as they quickly cut the distance from 150 to 50 yards. By the time they got to almost 30 I was wondering if they would run us over. Finally, Sefton gave the signal he was ready. My shot was immediately followed by his, and moments later we were tagging a pair of 3-year-olds.

"We ran 'em hard and didn't give 'em any water, didn't we?" Sefton joked as we shook hands and admired our trophies.

I like a long duel with a crafty longbeard as much as any other hunter, but I have to admit it's kind of neat to bust a tom that plays by the rules every now and then. This was a classic Merriam's hunt: They traveled a long way to get to us and they liked lots of loud calling. The hunt was especially meaningful to me because this was the third subspecies my friend and I had killed together. And because I'm quite often the last guy in camp with an unpunched tag, I didn't mind closing the deal early. Besides, I still had one tag left and three more days to fill it.

I'll save the rest of my South Dakota story for my next blog entry.

Tangled Up -- Bad

TTH Staff — Wed, 14 May 2008 02:02:28 GMT

Posted by Brian Lovett, Contributing Editor

If you’re seeking tales of classic hunts, you might want to click out of this entry. Maybe you can read Jim Schlender ’s tales of South Dakota.

However, if you’re in the mood for the type of bizarre, goofed-up yarns only Eastern wild turkeys can provide, read on.

The other morning here in Wisconsin, I struck a bird high atop a timbered ridge and then marched toward him. When I reached the property line, I called again, and the bird responded from what seemed like a mile away. But hey, with nothing else going on, I had nothing to lose, so I sat down and yelped again.

Fifteen seconds later, I looked up to see the gobbler sprinting. What the heck? But instead of running toward me in the finger ridge, he paralleled me and dropped off into a deep bottom, where he gobbled his head off for the next 20 minutes. Of course, I expected him to charge up the hill at any moment, so I had twisted around the tree and struggled to hold my gun up for what would surely be a quick shot.

And you’ve no doubt guessed that he never came. Instead, he slowly waltzed and gobbled down the bottom, eventually giving me a farewell response from about 150 yards distant.

“That does it,” I thought. “I’m going to dog him all morning.”

I arose, slipped 50 yards through the woods and called again.

Nothing.

Certain I had bumped him. I cursed my clumsiness and wondered what to do.

“Might as well sit here for a half-hour,” I thought. “Maybe I didn’t bump him, and if so, he could come back.”

Fair enough. I sat and left the calls alone.

After 30 minutes had passed, I’d had enough, so I scanned my eyes through the trees for one final look.

Turkey at 150 steps!

I couldn’t believe it. Was it him? I didn’t know. But I’d find out soon, because the bird began running at me.

Soon, I heard soft crunching in the leaves, and a small blue head popped up five feet away. It was a hen. She saw me immediately, putted once and then ran away.

I was flabbergasted. A pepper-hot gobbler runs through the woods toward me, then goes completely around me and gobbles his head off going away. And to top it off, a hen sprints to me, busts me and probably boogers the woods while making her escape.

Only then did I see the two strutters that had been trailing her. They were walking up a logging road behind some thick brush, and I wasn’t sure if I could get on them in time. Somehow, I managed to contort my body around the tree, lean forward, cant the gun and stop the trailing bird at the edge of range. And thankfully, he collapsed at the shot.

It was one of the oddest hunts I’d experienced in a while. While toting the 2-year-old out of the woods, I wondered how the first gobbler and the hen and her strutters hadn’t crossed paths while running in opposite directions.

Who knows why turkeys do what they do half the time? I guess if we ever figured out everything, it wouldn’t be much fun.

Biology Lesson on Turkey Crops

TTH Staff — Fri, 02 May 2008 19:27:06 GMT

Posted by Jim Schlender, Editor

A reader identified only as Lowell recently e-mailed this photo with a note:

"I shot this turkey last weekend near Ozona, Texas, and after cleaning it I checked its crop to see what it had been eating and discovered all these small snails. Would a turkey be able to digest the shells and is it common?"

I forwarded the photo to our Biology columnist, Lovett Williams Jr., and this was his reply:

"Yes, turkeys can digest them, shell and all. I suspect some of the shells remain in the gizzard while being ground. The hens are said to eat snails to provide minerals for their egg shells but I think they can get enough from their bones and then replace them in the diet later. Gobblers are known to eat snails for the nutrition. There's a lot of meat in escargot."

The shells are interesting enough, but I was also struck by the variety of items in this bird's crop. And I wondered about the red things ... Chili peppers? I wonder if Lowell likes his turkey meat extra spicy.

What's Worse, Rain or Wind?

TTH Staff — Thu, 01 May 2008 14:02:21 GMT

Posted by Brian Lovett, Contributing Editor

Quiz time: What’s worse, rain or wind?

Trick question. Neither. For me, at least, the answer is lightning.

And that’s just what Steve Stoltz and I were facing – well, more accurately, running from – during the early-morning hours April 25 in northern Missouri. Even after several days of steady rain, another ear-shattering thunderstorm was descending on the Heartland.

On a positive note, Stoltz and I made it to the truck without being electrocuted and only partially drenched. On the down side, we’d left several hard-gobbling turkeys at our fly-down setup.

“Well, hopefully it will clear up and we can get back in there,” said Stoltz, a world-champion caller and pro-staffer for Mossy Oak and Knight & Hale Game Calls.

Later that morning, it seemed like the storm had passed. Sun peeked through the clouds, and the ominous flashes of lightning disappeared to the southeast. And as promised, Stoltz and I returned to our original setup, only to hear a turkey gobbling on his own.

“He’s up in that pretty timber,” Stoltz said. “But that’s across the creek.”

Ordinarily, that wouldn’t have been a big deal. However, because of the recent heavy rains, the typically narrow, shallow creek had turned into a muddy torrent. We sure couldn’t get across it without a boat, and it was a good bet the turkey probably wouldn’t hop it, either.

Still, Stoltz went to work. We set up along a fence line bordered by two large fields near the creek. The gobbler responded immediately to Stoltz’s calling but didn’t move.

After about a half-hour the situation hadn’t changed much. If anything, it seemed like the turkey had walked up the hill a bit and might be losing interest. Stoltz and I looked at each other and started stirring. But just then, a small dot appeared across the field.

“Steve, it’s a hen,” I whispered.

We sat down again and watched the bird feed slowly along the field edge. Moments later, another hen joined the first.

Meanwhile, the gobbler seemed to fire up again and began circling the hill toward our setup. Stoltz hit him with some yelps and excited cutting, and the bird went crazy.

Within minutes, the bird had circled to within 80 yards of our setup — still across the raging creek, of course — and was camped straight away from us, gobbling his head off. He stayed there for several minutes, and then walked to our right, camping under a large oak obscured by creekside brush.

“Dang it,” I thought. If he didn’t jump the creek in front of us — an obvious crossing spot — there was no way he would come through the thick foliage to our right.

That seemed to be an accurate assessment. The bird gobbled and spit and drummed regularly but refused to budge. But that’s when Stoltz pulled out his ace. He went into an extended clucking and purring sequence, mimicking hens that were feeding in the field but wouldn’t approach the gobbler — much like the actual hens that were still behind us. Then, Stoltz went quiet.

He didn’t call for 10 minutes. Then 20. Then a half-hour.

Soon, the gobbler appeared to be getting desperate. He gobbled hard a few times from under the oak, and then seemed to drift left. Soon, I heard soft crunching in the streamside brush.

“He’s moving,” I thought.

A raucous gobble confirmed it. He was coming back toward the creek.
I never heard the bird fly over the water, but seconds later, a brilliant red head popped up over the rise. The gobbler briefly went into strut, took a step and then craned his neck to look at the two hens in the field. My shot punctuated the hunt, and the longbeard toppled down the creek bank.

On my way to the bird, I checked my watch. The hunt had lasted 90 minutes, and Stoltz hadn’t made a peep for 30 of those. We whooped in celebration, retrieved the turkey and relived the great hunt. It had been a treat to see Stoltz work that bird, and I told him so.

“Well, I just wanted to let him know the ‘hens’ were still here, but they weren’t coming to him,” he said. “And then I just played on his ego. It didn’t hurt that we had two live birds behind us, and I’m sure he could see them where he was at.”

To top things off, we returned to the truck just before another lightning storm zoomed in from the northwest. Temperatures plummeted 15-some degrees in the next hour.

I guess we endured the worst Missouri could throw at us that day. But thanks to Stoltz, the best was riding home with us in the truck.