Posted: 4/19/05
A beautiful turkey hunt, birds or no birds
By David Heiller
Argus News Editor
We nosed our way up Schnickís Hill last Wednesday morning. It wasnít quite 6 a.m., and the familiar old road had a strange to look to it in the headlights of Glennís Explorer. The gravel was covered with grass. In the old days, it was rock and dirt worn bare by more frequent trips, from cousin Bobby all the way back to great-grandpa Gottlieb.
Glenn parked at the top and took out his weapon of choice, a Remington Wingmaster 12 gauge shot gun. He put in two shells. He said he really only needed one. He has shot nine turkeys over the years, and used nine shells. I grabbed my weapon of choice, a Nikon D70 camera, and we headed for a point overlooking the river.
Glenn had just arrived from Ohio the day before, and he hadnít had a chance to do much scouting for turkeys. Mark Schnick, who owns the land, had told him to hunt near the wood pile, but Glenn didnít know where that was, nor did I. It didnít matter, Glenn said ó this was kind of like a scouting trip.
ìOK,î I said. I thought about teasing him, saying, ìThatís a good excuse if we donít get one,î but I didnít want to jinx our luck. Besides, it wasnít like we didnít know the lay of this fine land.
Before we entered the woods, Glenn put his hands to his mouth and hooted like an owl. It was a good imitation. I almost tried it too, but again I used good judgment and refrained. Glenn said that turkeys sometimes gobble in response to loud noises like that.
Glenn staked two turkey decoys about 30 yards in front of him. ìAlways point them uphill,î he whispered. ìBut not facing you.î
Then we settled in, Glenn against a pile of fallen logs, me slightly behind him against a tree. I slipped some camouflage netting over my face, and covered my camera with a camouflage hankie.
Glenn started calling, using a diaphragm in his mouth and a slate call in his hands. He did yelps, cackles, clucks, purrs, sometimes simultaneously. It was amazing to me how realistic the calls sounded. I didnít know what they meant, but they sounded very real to my human ears.
Mostly we sat still and listened. The noise of cars drifted up from the highway 500 feet below us, carried on an updraft of chilly morning air. A freight train rumbled two miles away in Wisconsin. I could feel the earth shudder slightly. The line of red on the horizon grew brighter, then the sun poked up. It was going to be a beautiful day. I felt lucky to be sitting where I was, watching it unfold.
The only thing missing was a turkey. Glenn did his best coaxing. It was almost comical how much passion he put into it. I almost ran over to him a couple times. But not a gobble did we hear.
Time to move
At about 8 oíclock Glenn stood up. Time to move. We walked to the west, along the edge of a field, past several deer carcasses, then we dipped into the woods. A turkey blasted out of a tree nearby and flew into the valley. A good sign.
The decoys went up again. By now the sun was getting warm. We sat there for another hour. It was very tranquil. My eyes drooped a few times. But I didnít fall asleep! Still no turkeys.
So it was off again, over a rise and into the woods to the south. ìGordon used to hunt deer here a lot,î Glenn said, referring to our cousin. ìHuntî was a term Glenn used loosely, because Gordon never really intended to shoot a deer; he just loved to watch them. I wish he was still around to do that.
No turkeys there either, so it was time for another move. It might sound frustrating, that we werenít hearing turkeys, and I probably would have been disgusted if Glenn had been disgusted, him being an older brother and all. But that wasnít his approach. He was enjoying a very fine morning in the woods, and a turkey would be a bonus.
Not that we didnít keep trying, at two more spots. At the first one we both saw a tom with his tail feathers fanned out, just on the rise above us silhouetted against the blue sky. ìProbably a bunch of hens around him,î Glenn whispered. We crouched down and found good spots nearby. Then it was more of Glennís fine calling. This time we heard some toms gobble a response. But they were quite a ways away in the Shellhorn valley, and they didnít come closer. Nothing from up above.
We stood up finally and eased up the hill. The tom was still there! And he didnít move as we got closer and closer and saw that the tom was a round hunk wood on top of a woodpile. Mark was right, the woodpile was a good spot to see a turkey.
Well, nobody is perfect. Maybe we were a bit anxious. We headed for one more spot, the river at our right, blue and sparkling. A very magnificent sight. Iíve always loved the Schnick land, from my very earliest days in the woods with this very brother. I thought of my ancestors on this property. Did Gottlieb ever get tired of that beautiful river glittering below their doorstep? Did life ever got that mundane for Ludwig? I bet not.
One last hurrah
The last spot we visited was to the north, towards Hankes. It seemed like a great spot, and we heard a lot of toms below us toward Helkes. Glenn called off and on, but mostly it was quiet.
I heard a noise behind me. It was very soft, not even a twig breaking. Softer than that. I turned my head slowly, like Glenn had instructed me. I couldnít see anything so I twitched it a bit more. A big turkey roared off the ground.
Darn it! Glenn looked at me. His netting covered his face, but I could still see that look, or maybe I just imagined it. ìWay to go David,î it said.
And that was that. It was 11:30 now, and time to stop. We headed back to the truck. ìMaybe I moved too fast for that turkey,î I said. ìI just heard this little noise.î
ìThat happens,î Glenn said, interrupting my excuse. He was not upset. It was too fine of a morning for that, and two more days of turkey hunting awaited him. Two more days in the woods, walking, sitting, waiting, watching. Anybody who hunts turkeys, with a shotgun, or with a camera, knows that you canít complain about that.
Caledonia Argus
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