Time Off

    Second week of the season found us out hunting the east slopes of the Cascade Range again. The weather forecast was still frigid in the morning, around 30 degrees and windy with a light snow. After leaving work a little early that day I arrived at the ranch that we were going to hunt again around 12:30 in the afternoon, the wind was still blowing hard but it had warmed up to about 45 degrees now and the skys were starting to clear. Jim Schill still had work to do around the ranch but would join me later if he could or hunt the next morning. I of course was ready to head out and see if I could find a lonesome gobbler up on the ridges.
    Grabbing my vest and shotgun I headed across the ranch to an area that we had seen and heard several gobblers on previous outings.These particular gobblers have a pretty reliable routine right now of flying down in the morning, chasing the hens around the fields for a couple hours and then start working their way up to the ridges and eventually back to where they roost. Mid afternoon should find them part way up these ridges and/or on top. I started part way up the side of the ridge along an old logging road. About 15 minutes into the hunt I noticed a bright red speck part way up the open hill side. Checking it out further with the binoculars I could see there was a bachelor group of about 5 toms feeding and dusting right there. They were about 80 yards from me and up about 20ft higher, only a couple small pine trees separated us with just the edge of the cat trail for me to hide in, which was only about 2 feet high. I decided I would try and get closer by belly crawling along the edge of the cat trail but as soon as I started to crawl my box call rubbed in my vest and made what was basicly a loud putt! I peeked up over the edge and saw that at least one tom was checking out the sound. I got as low as I could, shed the vest and continued snake crawling for about 10 minutes along the trail and got about 40 or 50 yards closer. I took another look over the edge and saw all 5 birds were slowly working away from me. One bird was about 40 yards from me now and looking, I decided to take the shot, raised up on my knees and fired. A clean miss! Birds gobbled and took flight up the ridge! Twenty five minutes from the truck and already missed my first tom.
    I began to second guess if maybe I should have tried to set up and call them but I kept telling myself they would have busted me getting set up or any number of other excuses but thats hunting, we win or lose by those decisions. That time they won.
   So after notching that situation up to experience I decided to go pick up my vest and head in another direction to where we had seen birds on the opener. About 15 minutes of climbing up the ridge I reached the top of a saddle that faded down to the open meadows where the birds normally flew down to in the morning. As I crested the saddle some movement caught my eye as 2 mature toms hurried up the hill. Right behind them were 4 or 5 more birds, mostly toms again. I drew a bead on a bright red white head and squeezed the trigger. The tom hit the ground and never moved, not a flop, kick, jump, nothing. I had to double take if that was the bird laying in the brush or a log or what, I had seen birds hit the ground and not move like that before but it was usually a dove hit head-on by a load of #7 1/2 's at 15 yards, not a mature tom hit by a load of #5's at 30 yards. But no complaints, I was happy! I had my hands on a nice 23lb mature Merriam's tom with a 9 inch beard and 3/4 spurs, not the biggest by east coast standards but decent for Washington State. A few quick pictures and back to the truck. I couldn't help thinking, this was worth taking off work early today! I should do this more often!
Well I hope you're enjoying this turkey season as much as we are, good hunting to everyone, be safe. And take some time off and go hunting!
Rich