In all seriousness, same old same old but this guy gobbled more today than all season combined. I knew where he was headed and cut him off at 8:00. He was loaded up with hens and jakes. I was below them in a beech hollow. I kee keed and finally got the hens to break down the hill- 100 yards west of where I killed his friend earlier. I honestly thought this bird was already dead.
I love those little hollows and ridges that you walk by a hundred times and never notice until you sit to a tom. Seems every time I catch a fish, feather in a wad of ducks, kill a deer- my gut just says, "this is the spot." Never paid much attention to this area, other than its connecting beauty. I wish I'd have remembered my phone for a pic. It's nothing but 25-35" beech trees.
The bird probably gobbled 20 times, but man was he drumming. Never in my life have I heard drumming like this gobbler was.
The only thing I could think about when I saw this bird top the lip if the ridge and break over it- and commencing to blow up and drum next to an almost ancient looking beech tree- was that I wished the world could see what I was seeing. If anything, I wished a youngin or a newcomer could see and feel (emotionally and physically). And when he gobbled 35 yards away behind an even bigger beech tree, I wished the world could have seen that giant beech quiver.
Ten minutes of vrooo boooo vroooooooommmmm and he stepped out to his death.
I almost hated to end the season there, as I was lucky to go today. I have a couple of utes I want to take, but to me- outside of taking a ute- turkey hunting is a one man game. It's a game between a msn and a bird that, if you think about, is a freak of nature for our modern day ecology. An 18 pound gobbling, scratching, paranoid bird- and thanks to NWTF and MDWFP and we hunters, we all get to chase them. And every spring is different. In the woods and out. Spring is a sentimental and weary time for me. But the spring woods never change.
When I see a sunlit full fan shaking with every drum, black as night against a paper-white beech tree, I see God the Creator, when I leave that realm and back to town and people , I see where His Son was needed for the rest of things to work.
Those hills and hollows won't fail to call me back next year, Lord willing. Sure, I'll knock around any chance I get in those woods, but it will be different. It won't be in the same context- I'll only be observing nature, not actively taking part in it. I personally believe there is no way to know the woods unless you partake in them.
When I was walking out, I looked up that ridge that raised those two gobblers and thought about how I'd miss it. Who knows what circumstances I will greet that ridge with next year. The good life or trials and tribulations? I don't know, but I do know the ridge and it's hollows and bottoms will be the same as before with maybe a few minor differences, pending a major natural disaster or us humans trying to "improve" on it. And that unchanging state of those hills is what I love most about them. They're kind of like the God I believe in- unchanged, steady, true. Just my observation as a sinner.
So now I can rebuild relationships, feed my dog, pray for sympathy at work, and try to find where my classes left off in March. I will attempt to start myself back on a steady diet of plain- boiled chicken and rice to get the digestive system back working. From there ill attempt weight gain, probably see a therapist.
Are the crappie biting? How long until duck season?
