Ben Franklin was a great fan of the American turkey, admiring their courage and wiliness in particular. He even suggested that they be substituted for the bald eagle (which he called “a bird of bad moral character”) on our national seal.
I used to find Franklin’s respect a little hard to fathom. On back roads, I often come upon a flock of turkeys trotting in headlong panic, back and forth in front of the car, acting like not very bright poultry. I often wondered how they ever managed to thrive, so I decided to investigate.
I learned that wild turkeys live in deciduous woods. Hunting and land clearing in the 19th century drove them to extinction in Vemont. Reintroduced in 1969, they have flourished ever since, their population climbing to more than 35,000.
Turkeys are victim to all sorts of predators: from coyotes, bobcats, and fishers to snakes, owls, and humans.
But they’re not as easy to hunt as their performance in front of my car might suggest. They can run and fly fast. They have extraordinary eyesight, ten times better than humans’. They distinguish colors, and have great hearing. They flock, to better watch for predators, so they’re nearly impossible to sneak up on.
Hunters use mating season to their advantage by employing a turkey call, which imitates the hen. With luck, the tom approaches, strutting, gobbling, and generally showing off for the hen he thinks is nearby. He makes a drumming sound that’s like a v8 engine. The trouble is that a tom with plenty of mating opportunities will ignore yet another hen call. Frustratingly, this often happens at the beginning of turkey season, making the toms nearly impossible to lure.
In the evening, one can find where turkeys are roosting by hooting like an owl. Turkeys will often respond by gobbling as they settle into trees to roost. A friend did this and the next morning at 4, went out and set up about 30 yards away from the roosting tree he’d spotted. As it got light, he could see the birds silhouetted in the tree. He carefully positioned his caller in the bend of his knee so he’d make no discernable movement, and pressed. The call was answered by no less than four toms roosting in the very tree he was leaning against. Unfortunately, they immediately took to the air, and he was foiled.
Andy McLean has been hunting turkey since his granddad took him hunting in 1979. This year, he brought his little brother hunting on Youth Weekend. Together they sat down at the base of a tree, got comfortable and used the hen call.
Suddenly a hen came barreling toward them at a dead run. From the opposite side, a tom came racing to greet her. They met and tore off together before anyone had time to get them in their sites.
Eventually, Andy’s little brother did bag a turkey - just not one of those two particular lovebirds.
