“Roost control to Gobbler one you have clearance to start engines and taxi to runway 32 west.”
“Roger Roost Control. Gobbler One is ready on 32 west. Engines run up and ready for launch.”
“Roger Gobbler One. We have two contacts bearing 280 degrees.”
“Roger Roost Control. Freeing guns and going in.”
“Roost Control this is Gobbler One. I have a SAM lock on me. Contacts are hostile. Breaking off.”
And that pretty well sums up opening day for me.
I was pretty excited when the alarm went off at 4 am. My first ever turkey hunt was about to begin. I donned my camo grabbed the bow and headed for the bush. I had a plan to hunt about the only bit of turkey sign I saw on my friends farm. I walked to the edge of the corn field and found a bit of dryness for my blind and set it up. It was the best situation because it was a narrow strip of grass with swamp water on one side and field mud on the other. Made a rather limited number of seating options. The swamp was huge and I was hopeful the turkeys would cross it today.
Gobbling started early which made me happy. I heard several birds gobbling away. It wasn’t long after dawn that I heard something splashing through the swamp. I didn’t have the back flaps of the blind open so I could only see through a couple of tiny openings. I could see a coyote slowly sneaking through the water heading towards the downwind side of my decoys. I think I had him fooled. Clearly not as smart as the turkey’s turned out to be. I didn’t mind the idea of starting my day with a coyote but as soon as he got downwind from me he disappeared back into the bush at a much faster clip than he came out.
I did manage to see some birds. I had two come in through the gap in the fence from the neighbor’s field. They took one look at my decoys and disappeared. I later realized that one of the hen decoys had become bent. I’m guessing they don’t look like that in real life.
Maybe the decoy set up wasn’t brilliant. I got the new issue of Ontario Out of Doors and it had a great bunch of articles on setting up decoys. Sadly I got it 2 days after these sad pictures were taken. Not great timing on their part I thought but what can you do?
That pretty much summed up my day. I hunted in the evening but it was so uneventful that there is no point even describing it. Heard nothing, saw nothing, did nothing sums it up completely. On a positive note I did manage to cross this rather large swamp and get into the bush.
The bush was only slightly less swampy in many areas but what I found a lot of were deer trails that looked like this.
I’ve already started to pick out some good trees to use my tree saddle in. I might not have had a great turkey hunt but come fall I will definitely be a deer ninja. Until then I guess I’m going to keep lying to turkeys until one of them falls for it.
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