As deer season winds down spring turkey hunting looms large for hunters and anticipation grows as hunters search for their next gobbler.

“I think I might have some good news for you,” said my still young bride after completing her morning walk. For the life of me I couldn’t imagine what Kathy was talking about so early in the morning. She continued on uninterrupted, “I heard a turkey gobble three times while on my walk.”

    By now, my antennas had gone up and my ears were at full alert. “Where were you, where did you hear him, and when did you hear him?” These were just a few of the questions I had spouted out on this early spring morning.

    Before I knew it, I was back in the throes of this disease common folks call turkey fever. Is there a more glorious form of hunting than chasing the king of the spring woods? I think not. The challenge of imitating a seductive hen and enticing a battle wise old tom is perhaps the ultimate thrill.

    After getting my bearings on the supposed whereabouts of this gobbler, I quickly made plans to hunt him. The crops or work would have to wait, as I had a bird to challenge, and the battle would be life or death. To the death of him, I hoped.

    As I climbed the steep Huckleberry Hill a few minutes later, my mind raced back 25 years to an earlier time when I chased other birds all over these same hills; the Bogue Phalia Hills. Yes, the memories came flooding back, but not a peep out of the gobbler that I hoped would still be in the same area where my wife had heard him earlier.

    After a 25 minute jaunt up and over a few hills and hollows, I stood atop a ridge and strained to hear the King’s triumphant call. Alas, nothing answered the many crows, owls and birds that were chiming in and greeting the new day’s brilliant orange dawning.

    Since I had come this far, I picked out a likely looking spot and pulled out my Albert Paul Call custom crafted gobble box. With the wind kicking up pretty good, I knew that I needed a call that would carry throughout the lush, green woods.

    My set-up this morning had come to me quite easily. Easily after a quarter century of traversing these same hills, that is. My GPS system (Giles Positioning System) was still intact and earned the hard way, by trial and error. The ridge was only about 25 to 30 yards wide at the top, and I knew the bird would come right down the middle as it dropped almost straight down on either side.

After setting up in front of a blown down tree, I stroked a few sweet sultry yelps on my Albert Paul box. It sounded like a raspy old hen giving that come hither song to any available sultans. After a couple of yelps, I followed up with three crisp clucks. At the stroke of the second cluck, a nearby gobbler belted out a voluminous gobble that scared the wits out of me and almost blew me out of my seat.

    The gobbler was only about 125 yards away; apparently in his strutting zone on the tip of a knoll outcropping that ran perpendicular to the ridge I occupied. The bird would have to circle and come in directly in front of me, or so I thought.

    Fifteen long minutes passed by, and the bird never let out another peep. Finally a train whistled in the distance, and he began belting out gobbles in response to everything. Soon it was a log truck off in the distance, and then he gobbled at crows and finally, to a flock of geese honking overhead.

    Playing hard to get, I just held fast and kept quiet. The wise old tom did likewise. After a few more minutes of him gobbling without moving, I purred twice and clucked a few more times, and he cut me off. “Goooobbbbllllllleeee, obbbllllleeee” his thunderous gobble told me that he just couldn’t stand much more. He had to meet this seductive hen.

    A few minutes later, another thunderous gobble told me that the gobbler had cut the distance between us in half, and I readied myself for battle. His last two gobbles were so loud I thought that he was going to jump in my lap any minute. Suddenly a white head peeked out between the huckleberry bushes and stared intently toward me.

    After playing hide and seek for a few minutes, the old bird snuck a peek between bushes for the last time, as two ounces of copper plated number four shot laid him to rest.  He didn’t even flop. What a sweet unexpected hunt it had been. The gobbler’s beard was 10 inches long to go with 1, 1/8 inch spurs and 18 pounds of Bogue Phalia Hill’s grit. Editor’s note: To read more stories like this one check out Mike’s book, “Passion of the Wild.”

    Contact  Mike Giles at 601-917-3898

or e-mail him at mikegiles18@comcast.net