Adventures' Outdoors'
In Wisconsin
100% Gobbler’s
by Rick Spoerl
As my Uncle and I sat in the turkey blind together, and my son Sean sat in the blind behind us with the video camera, I thought about the two tom’s Sean and I had whacked two day’s before. It sure was a great opening day. We had hunted hard all day moving our blind into a nice strutting field when five minutes before close we had two toms’ sneak into our decoys after getting their butts kicked by two bigger toms. They thought they were pretty sly until a couple loads of number four’s ended their sneak.Now we needed to get a big tom for Uncle Al. After hunting this area for some ten years we had never gone 100%. That is, someone always seemed to go home skunked. Sean and I killed our birds on opening day and slept in the next day while Uncle Al hunted alone. After picking him up after the morning hunt he seemed a little bummed out. You see everyone likes a little company once in a while out hunting. So we decided to pick up his blind and move to the same spot Sean and I had scored on Wednesday. After a little scouting we made it back to camp.
We made a fire on the beautiful shore of the red cedar river. A small camp site complete with abundant waterfowl skimming the tops of the waves, a gorgeous sunset, an occasional fish to catch and the wonderful rippling of the river water to quickly put anyone to sleep. This area is truly a treasure. Thanks to a local friends uncle we were welcome to enjoy it. All the farmers in the area were extremely friendly, and although they saved their deer for their own families, we were welcome to blast a few turkeys on several farms. The farmers enjoyed our camaraderie and visited us at our camp fire’s regularly for some chow and a beer or two.
Before we went to bed in our pop up campers that night, we decided that I would sit in the blind and help Uncle Al call. Sean, my thirteen year old son would sit in another blind behind us and see if he could maintain his composure long to hold the camera steady enough to get some quality video as a tom turkey walked into the cameras lens.
So here we are sitting in the dark waiting for that first rumbling gobble. I had told Uncle Al where the turkeys were roosting a couple day’s earlier. But things had changed, the birds began some sporadic gobbling but the gobbles were coming from the complete other end of the farm. Then I started thinking again about percentages. Oh no, don’t tell me were going to sit out here for three more day’s and again not go home perfect.
Uncle Al had not been successful in three years, but it wasn’t that he didn’t have any chances. Two years ago he did. But he being the unselfish hunter he is, he called in a turkey and handed my brother, his nephew his gun. Wait, why didn’t he have his own gun with him? (That’s another story). Anyway my brother Ryan scored his first turkey as Uncle Al watched in delight.
The next year Uncle Al invited my Dad (his brother) into his blind and called in a beautiful gobbler. With one carefully placed shot my Dad popped his first bird. Again my Uncle watched in delight as another family member shot their first turkey from his blind. Now, it’s not like Uncle Al hasn’t harvested a bird or two. He has several toms and a couple jakes notched in the barrel of his shotgun. But after a few years of passing up jakes and letting others shoot birds he called in, he was certainly getting a little anxious.
When I put the call in my mouth I thought, boy wouldn’t it be nice to return the favor to Uncle Al by calling in a nice Tom and getting it on video as he pulled the trigger? But the birds were now on the other side of the farm, some 500 yards away. As their gobbling got quieter, than fell silent, I again thought, well what are the chances of going a hundred percent? We’ve never done it before. I mean, even the state average is only around 25%. Than I realized, this is a strutting field. If we stay here long enough, their going to come.
Then I saw them. "Three birds out across the field two hundred yards out". "Their coming into the field". "Wait" I said, "four, no five, five birds". As I got my binoculars up I confirmed yes four toms and a hen. But it wasn’t to be. As I put everything I had into the call they wouldn’t even look over, and just continued paralleling the field moving away from us. These birds were much more interested in themselves then more hens. Being the first week of the season, the toms are more into themselves then the hens. It was still early in the morning and I figured they would be back. But just as soon as I was giving up, Uncle Al had spotted another bird coming from the same opening Sean and mine had two days earlier. This bird was alone, and although extremely cautious, began his ten point buck like crawl.
The bird was a hundred yards out and only occasionally going into a half strut, then coming out of strut quickly looking the area over. He began hanging up on every yelp. The only time he would move toward us, is when I would give him a good holler while cutting. As he got closer, I hoped my son Sean was getting the video. I began to get excited as if I was the one pulling the trigger. Although my Uncle is a seasoned veteran in the turkey blind and didn’t need any coaching, I couldn’t help but go through every step, "ok he’s here, 30 yards, 20 yards, take your safety off, 10 yards, get your gun up, shoooooooooooot".
My Uncle had to be laughing inside. After He and my Father had taught me nearly everything about hunting, now this hotdog of a nephew is coaching me. Well, I doubt it made a difference in his shot, the bird hit the ground stone cold dead. Sean yelled "Ya, you got him". And he got it all on video. After Uncle Al had helped so many others, it sure was nice to return the favor. It was mighty sweet to beat the odds and go 100%.