Larry A. Smail's Blog

Pileated Woodpecker

I haven’t entered many words as of late. Call me lazy! I have been busy, too.

The terrain I may be climbing!

The turkey hunting has slowed for me for a couple of reasons. One reason was the extremely hot temperatures we had recently. I find climbing hills in hot conditions adding asthma issues and allergies make for uncomfortable hunting for me. However, I did manage going turkey chasing in the early hours.                               

As second reason, is the fact of my step-father, Bob, and my mother wanting to add a garage at the homestead. This has produced a need of my services. We had to remove everything from a building my dad, and I erected many years ago. The second step was to tear down the building in order to accomplish preparatory work for the garage.This work required the removal of metal posts, too. Equipment is to come in and level the grade. A base will need to be placed to level the slope and stabilize the weight of the garage, too. This means more work to come in the coming days. Those posts had to be torched out since we had no other way to get them out.

Mayapple

Bob was out one morning in the heat.

Now for some brief hunt entries. On Saturday, May 9th, I set up for a gobbler. A hen began cutting below me. A second hen began cutting to my left. I called in the hen. She searched for me for quite a long time.

Monday, the 11th, found me planning a strategy on a good-sounding gobbler. I ended up following him for a distance. I had to cross a stream, road, and a hill. I caught up with him on the same level as he still gobbled occasionally. I set up, and the gobbler soon was around eighteen yards from me. The sight was on him. The Remington’s safe was off and the finger was ready to squeeze the trigger. Fortunately, for the turkey he sported only a couple of inches of beard material. I allowed the bird to exit. He sure sounded like a mature bird!    

  This morning the 14th, I moved in on three toms. I eased along a ridge at a site that has proven very difficult to set up on. The birds gobbled around sixty yards or so, but a brushy, gulley was between us. The birds were down and the one was as close as 45 yards, but I couldn’t see him.                                                                                

I heard two hens, and did call in one hen, before the toms shut up. Later, before heading to work, I saw a jake and hen in separate fields.