Pennsylvania Game News - April 2018 - 41

before heading out.

Listen Closely
Back at camp, I took advantage of
a lull in the storm and hiked quickly to
a field turkeys frequent in the evening.
Standing in the shadows of an oak tree,
I thought I heard faint wingbeats off
to my left. Curious, I moved along the
field edge toward them when something
caught my eye, just inside the woods.
I froze to see a thick-bearded gobbler
turn on a limb 15 feet up a tree. He let
out a startled putt at the sight of me, and
dropped to the forest floor.
Busted!
I knew better than to get so close to a
roosted bird, but I let my excited curiosity get the best of me. Lesson learned.
Back at the cabin, I scrolled through
trail camera photos of gobbler after
gobbler.
I knew the bird that busted me wasn't
the only one out there to hunt.
When the alarm finally went off the
next morning, I jumped out of bed, fired
up my truck and headed into town to
meet Uncle Paul.
We made it back at the cabin at 5 a.m.
Perfect! We had plenty of time.
After giving Paul the quick tour of the
cabin, we looked at a sketch I'd drawn
of the property.
He grilled me with questions. Where
do the birds typically roost? When had
I noticed them first gobble every morning? He wanted to know the trails and
open areas where the birds likely would
be strutting.
And he asked me to pinpoint the best
spot to listen for gobblers.
The spot where I'd spooked the gobbler the evening before seemed to fit
the bill.
We grabbed our gear and headed out
APRIL 2018

as beautiful hues of purple and pink
pierced through the woods line.
Any minute now they're going to start
gobbling, I thought.
We took another trail to the field edge,
close to where I'd seen the gobbler the
evening before. Uncle Paul pointed back
toward the cabin.
"Did you hear him?" he asked.
"No," I responded, my heart beating
faster. "Did you hear one?"
"Oh yeah!" Uncle Paul said. "He's
back by the cabin!"
Standing as still as possible, I turned
my ear toward the cabin. Then, I heard
it, too. A definite gobble.
"We need to get up there now and set
up near the gobbler!" Uncle Paul said.

Busted and Baled

We started back up the trail, and every
gobble I heard quickened my pace,
until I was well in front of Uncle Paul. I
stopped to let him catch up. He seemed
perfectly calm and collected.
We began our ascent up the steep
trail to the bench we knew the gobbler
was on, when he hollered again. This
was going to happen! We had a gobbler - likely still on the roost - firing off
with deep throaty gobbles, and I had the
"turkey man" with me.
We cut into the woods about 20 yards,
and placed a hen decoy. I settled in at
the base of a wide tree, with Uncle Paul
setting up about 15 yards behind me.
Hens clucked and cackled on the
bench, and to our right. They were off
the roost. This would happen fast!
Uncle Paul let out a few soft tree
yelps on his custom-made box call, and
gobbles followed immediately.
By this time, I was shaking, trying to
steady my Mossberg 12-gauge.
Uncle Paul sent out some purrs and
41
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