And A Strong Cup of Coffee

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Eastern wild turkey
Eastern wild turkey

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What season is this again?

The night before we were going to be heading into the woods, I looked around for my home made box call and slate call and could not find them.  I only had a store bought box call, push call and electronic call.  I have tried and can not use the mouth calls, so those are pointless. I gathered up my camo and got ready for the 4am excursion.  I can't help but wonder exactly why I want to go turkey hunting; it's a season of ridiculously early starts, ticks and warm weather. And ticks!  There is really not much that is appealing about it.  But, Dad and I were going to try to find a turkey.  We started off at the Sky Condo in a ground blind.  We sat and waited. I used the chalked-up box call and the...

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One road and SO many signs!

In search of our turkeys, we walked down this camp road.  It was around noon and there were some great spots to sit and call from along the way.  Right from the start we knew this was an animal haven!  The tracks and scat were all over the place.  Some of the tracks actually surprised us.  A fresh bear track. Check out those claws. Two bear tracks.  A better view of the palm of the paw. It was like Grand Central Station for turkey up and down both sides of the road. Turkey tracks and turkey scat. While we did not see any turkey that day, Brian did call in five Toms the next day.  The great thing about hunting and being outdoors is that you never know what sort of adventures you will have during the...

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The beating of the drum

I have been thinking about it since Friday.  The gobbling that just got closer and closer, seeing the quick movement in the dense trees and brush just in front of me, that black band across the top of those dark brown feathers and his white head stretching above the blow downs to find that purring hen that he was after.  I could hear the drumming and strutting as he got closer.  Finally, there he was in front of me.  He stepped out, his long neck leading his puffed out body into the slight clearing... The field where we started calling.  Dad and I woke up a little before 2:30am in order to have breakfast and meet our guide, Brian for our turkey hunt.   We got to these fields around 4:30am with just...

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Prologue: I should have listened to myself

On Thursday night, before our big outing with Brian, Dad and I sighted in our new shotgun.  We paced out 30 yards and started shooting at our make-shift turkey heads. Dad shooting at 30 yards. Dad's pattern. My pattern. My comment to Dad after I took two shots at this piece of paper: "As long as a turkey comes in from my left, I should be in good shape."  Oh the irony!  Dad and I were confident that as long as a turkey was within 30 yards, we would be in good shape.  I worked on setting the bead in the middle of the gun so that it would not pull to the left.   It was a new gun for us and long - 28 inches but it was comfortable and I was confident that I could shoot it. We went to bed around 8pm so that we...

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Turkey Season 2.0

Here we go! Turkey season has kicked off in Maine and as Dad and I are getting ready to head out with my friend Brian, I can not help but think of where we werea year ago. I wanted to shoot a turkey while I was pregnant so that I could say that I got both a deer and turkey while waddling around in the woods.  It didn't happen but Dad and I learned a lot about this new critter that we were hunting, which is why I asked Brian to take us out for a day.  We need to learn how close they need to be to us in order to take a successful shot and we need to learn how to get them to come to us.  We were successful last year in having them call back to us, but we were not able to get them to come to us.  I think (hope) that is...

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