Sunday, January 07, 2007
Day in woods brings year's end, another's start
Mark Taylor
Mark Taylor's Outdoors column and notebook appears regularly in The Roanoke Times.
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For most of us, the dawn of a New Year prompts a mix of reflection and anticipation.
We look back on the year behind us and at the one ahead, ideally with respective senses of satisfaction and excitement.
In my book there's no better place to do this than in the quiet winter woods, be it on a deer stand or in a turkey blind.
The timing is good, too.
The way Virginia's autumn deer and turkey seasons fall, that last hunt can usually take place on one of the first days of January. So while it can be the final hunt for one year, it can also be the first hunt of the year that lies ahead.
That important bookend hunt for me came Wednesday while pursuing wild turkeys in Botetourt County.
My hosts were good friends Carson Quarles of Roanoke and Gerald Austin of Buchanan.
Those two guys have provided me with some rich fall turkey hunting experiences during the years.
One of the best came on a bitter cold, season-ending Saturday a few years ago when they tag-teamed to call in my first fall gobbler.
Carson's Boykin Spaniel Brandy had flushed the bird and its buddies, and getting him within range of my 12 gauge had required three hours of patient calling.
Brandy retired not long after, and this fall Carson had to put his faithful hunting companion of 14 years to sleep.
Her successor is Mandy, another Boykin who has already proven adept at trailing the turkey wings Carson is using to start her training. Just a puppy, her first hunting season will be next year, so on this day we would be following Princess and Beth, Gerald's two Boykins.
It's possible to hunt fall turkeys without dogs, but dogs make it more fun, exciting and productive.
The idea is pretty basic.
The dogs range out through the woods searching for scent left behind by roaming flocks of turkeys. When they cut a fresh track the dogs take off, running willy-nilly into the gang, barking frantically and sending the turkeys in all directions.
To take advantage of the birds' desire to regroup, the hunters sit in blinds at the site of the break and start calling. Locating and flushing birds can take no time or take all day.
Wednesday, it didn't take long. After less than a mile of walking Beth and Princess got into birds.
We were spread out, so only Gerald saw the turkeys flush.
"Six or eight flew down this hollow," he said. "And a couple more went back up the mountain."
For 30 minutes, we stacked deadfall limbs to make two blinds, about 20 feet apart.
Carson and Gerald sat in one, Seth and I in the other.
It was time to start calling.
An hour later I heard Gerald hiss, "There's a turkey at two o'clock."
Blessed with freakishly good eyesight, turkeys will bolt at any unusual movement so I was cautious as I slowly swiveled my head.
The turkey was gone.
"It eased back down the hollow," Gerald said of the bird, which hadn't been close enough for a shot anyway.
After the moment of excitement, things got quiet again. Except for Seth's stomach. It was growling. I was starving, too.
Finally we got the signal from our guides that we could eat lunch. Then it was time for another two hours of calling.
I stayed alert, watching for movement from turkeys, which often come in silently late in the season. And I spent time thinking back on the fun year I'd had outdoors in 2006, and started formulating plans for adventures in 2007.
Gerald was doing some calling on a pretty box call he'd recently made. It sounded good, which was good for me. Gerald was going to give it to me after the hunt, and I was already looking forward to using it during this spring's gobbler season.
As good as that call and the others from that blind sounded, the turkeys weren't too interested.
Other than a single yelp from a bird about 100 yards down the mountain, we didn't have any more action.
More than four hours after we first scattered the birds, it was time to call it.
As we headed down the mountain Gerald handed me the call.
"You don't always have to kill something," he mused. "It's nice to just get out and enjoy the day the good Lord gave you."
That seemed a pretty appropriate way to sum up the final hunt of one year, and the first hunt of the next.
