THE WILD TURKEY 49 



proud of his achievement, and is deserving of the mag- 

 nificent prize he obtains. There are several methods 

 of capturing turkeys other than stalking them. The 

 most familiar is calling them up to an ambush by 

 means of an imitation of their gobble. Some turkey 

 shooters become very expert at this, and can call the 

 turkeys within a few feet of their guns. The turkey-call 

 is usually made of the wing-bone of the bird. Often 

 the sound is produced by the vibration of a leaf placed 

 against the mouth. The gobble is sounded at intervals 

 when a bird responds, and there is considerable excite- 

 ment while the wild, wary birds are approaching, but 

 when they step out in an open place a short distance 

 from the gun, the sitting shot is an easy one, and the 

 flying marks present no great difficulty for the second 

 barrel. 



Turkeys are often shot with the rifle, the aim being 

 at the head, so as not to destroy the flesh. Such shots 

 are often at long range, and difficult. Before the turkeys 

 were too wild, a dog was of service to tree them, in the 

 same manner dogs are used in some woods to tree the 

 ruffed-grouse, when of course, the bird is shot sitting. 



Another method of taking turkeys is to shoot them 

 on moonlight nights when they are roosting in the 

 trees. There are many accounts of this night-shooting 

 in the river bottoms of the Southwest, but when one 

 stops to think of it, it is unsportsmanlike to shoot any 

 bird after it has gone to sleep, and such shooting is now 

 prohibited in many of the States. Shortly after leav- 

 ing the roost, the turkeys are on the ground busily 

 engaged in feeding, and they are then more easy to 

 find and approach than later in the day. 



