Dad, Frank, and Charlie: Turkey Trials (Part 2)

Reminiscing of Charlie's Cabin 

We had quite the feast the night before our weeklong turkey hunt was to commence. Dad, Frank, and Charlie didn't disappoint. They were reminiscing of turkey hunts gone by with plenty of missed opportunities of birds in the morning and pool shots at night. Most of those adventures took place at Charlie's cabin in rural southwestern New York. It is where I cut my teeth in the woods. Though the rich farmlands were loaded with deer, turkey were not as easy to come by. Thirty years ago, a successful hunt in New York consisted of a weeklong adventure highlighted by a couple of days of "hearing" gobbles. In the fifty plus years of hunting in Western New York, my dad had only killed one turkey, and it wasn't even anywhere near Charlie's cabin. Charlie, on the other hand did manage to kill three or four birds but mostly by happenstance as they wandered by his deer stand. Frank...well Frank was carrying a big ol' goose-egg for that area. To his defense though. I don't believe Frank hit the turkey woods as much as my dad and Charlie.

Now you can see why I was so anxious to bring these three to Tennessee. In the ten plus years I had turkey hunted there I had killed, or called in to be killed, a few dozen birds. And I could honestly say I could count on one hand the number of times I had been skunked while chasing thunder chickens in Tennessee. Truth be told, middle Tennessee is the crown jewel of turkey hunting in the Southeast, heck, maybe even the entire country. It's not often you'll find a place where every spring outing finds you hearing or working lovesick gobblers.

Undoubtedly I have been blessed and have been extremely successful hunting Tennessee birds. And I admit I have been quite lucky when it comes to turkey hunting because in all honesty, I don't even classify myself as a good caller. Good callers usually limit out in the Volunteer state within the first few weeks. I on the other hand, prefer my not-so-perfect technique since it allows me to spend more time lounging in the woods listening to the springtime serenade of birds in love. That's why I consider myself lucky.

Needless to say, Tennessee turkey hunting rocks! And it was high time for me to repay Dad, Frank, and Charlie for putting up with me all those years chasing birds in New York.

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Settin' Blinds

A twelve hour drive has a tendency to wear out one's body, especially when one's body is approaching eighty years of age. So when my three turkey guests asked to take it easy the following morning I complied. I even suggested we take a slow relaxing drive down to the lease. We left about mid-morning the next day. We had a lot of gear to haul and it would allow us to leisurely set up blinds in prime locations. Knowing the steep ridges would cause issues if they were forced to walk, I wanted to make sure their blind locations were easy to reach with their ATVs. And given the rolling wooded hills, I figured it would be relatively easy to find a discreet location to conceal their motorized steed.

The Lynchburg turkey camp.

Not wanting to venture too far into unknown territory Charlie decided to put his blind about a hundred yards behind the camp. Actually it was more like thirty yards but I wasn't going to argue with him. With two pop-up campers, multiple vehicles and trailers, loads of miscellaneous gear, and a makeshift "outhouse" I was fairly certain a wary old gobbler wouldn't venture within a half mile of the camp, especially with the noise we tend to make while loading up. I was beginning to understand why their record in New York was what it was but I have been wrong before and was willing to give Charlie the benefit of the doubt on his blind location.

Dad and Frank setting their blinds.

Frank was more adventuresome. He followed my dad and I up to the hardwood plateau and selected a great blind location near an intersection of a couple of long-straight logging roads. With a properly placed decoy, any bird crossing the road could see Frank's set-up from a quarter-mile away. Even I was happy with his blind location and I'm pretty hard to please.

Our last task was selecting a place for my dad. I already had a good idea of where I wanted to put him. It was on the far back end of the property near what we call the "red gate". To the average person, that term has no significant meaning whatsoever but to a tight brotherhood of hunters, a simple term oftentimes means a pinpoint location. I am sure every hunter knows exactly what I'm talking about. We often use simple descriptors to define an exact location within a large geographical area but those descriptors only have meaning to your tight knit group of friends. For example, everyone who has ever hunted at Charlie's cabin knows exactly where the "Big Tree" is, but to someone outside the brotherhood, they would spend a lifetime searching the woods for what they thought was the big tree. And in case you're wondering, the big tree was in the upper meadow not far from the small pond but just above Willy's tree. See what I mean? Perfect directions.

Needless to say, my dad was going to get plopped down by the red gate, and after a quick tour of the property, everyone knew exactly where my dad was going to be. Although I wanted all three guys to kill multiple birds, in the back of my mind, I was thinking my dad had the best opportunity to kill first.

All three blinds were set and the forecast for the morning was looking fantastic, a cloudless night and bright sunny skies for the next five days. We were going to start racking them up in the morning.

Up next...On Birds!