104 
FOREST AND STREAM 
March, 1921 
ever, one must remember that the turkey 
hunter, like the successful sportsman 
along other lines, is entirely human, and 
therefore not entirely devoid of a cer- 
tain amount of egotism. The more mys- 
tery with which he can surround his 
favorite sport, the more of a past- 
master he becomes in the eyes of the 
neophyte. 
The modus operandi of calling is like 
this, except that climatic conditions and 
topography of habitat, etc., may cause 
some variations, which must be met by 
the judgment of the hunter. 
Very early in the morning, when the 
first roseate rays begin replacing the 
sombre gray of early dawn is the time 
to be in the forest depths in quest of the 
turkey. If it is winter you will listen 
to hear the flock fly from the roost; 
when you must rush into their midst 
and scatter them promiscuously, that 
they may respond to the call when en- 
deavoring to reassemble. If in the 
spring, you will listen for the salutation 
of the old gobbler. 
If no turkeys are heard, try imitating 
the hoot of the barred owl, which will 
frequently elicit a lusty response from 
the old gobbler. After locating a gob- 
bler you should approach to within a 
hundred and fifty yards, or thereabouts, 
of the roosting tree. Then seat yourself 
with your back against a tree somewhat 
larger than your body, and with your 
knees drawn up before you and your 
gun supported between them. Always 
sit facing the supposed roosting tree, 
and endeavor to so select your calling 
place that there will be open woods be- 
tween yourself and the turkey, for him 
to light in, or to enter when responding 
to the call. 
Most old gobblers begin to gobble 
while yet on the roost; sometimes in 
rapid succession ; sometimes at irregular 
intervals, and some will gobble but once 
before flying from the roost. Still 
others will gobble vehemently all day 
Some actually strut on the roost. 
A FTER seating and adjusting your- 
self so as not to cramp the mus- 
cles, you then take out your yelper 
and give a soft, gentle, quavering yelp, 
followed by a cluck or two. This is to 
attract the gobblers’ attention to your 
whereabouts, and he will locate you with 
unerring accuracy. If he answers, you 
stop right there, for if you continue 
calling, so will he remain on his roost 
and gobble. He will try to beat you 
at your own game, that is, he will try 
to bring you to him, while if you remain 
dumb, his fear of the supposed hen 
escaping him is aroused, and after care- 
fully scanning the surroundings, hoping 
to spy the hen, or to hear her respon- 
sive yelp or cluck, he leaves the tree 
with a rustle of wings, and sails toward 
the earth fifty or seventy-five yards 
from his roost. As he approaches the 
ground he gives his massive wings a 
flop or two to ease the momentum as he 
lights. He then stands erect, the em- 
bodiment of symmetry and lithe, slender 
grace, listening and scanning the sur- 
roundings with his great hazel eyes. 
Remain perfectly still now and he will 
not see you, nor will he make you out if 
le does, unless you move. After a short 
pause give a soft yelp or cluck, or both, 
and wait. He will gobble, strut and gy- 
rate around in an effort to bring you 
to him, but if unsuccessful, he will come 
to you. 
At this point, however, arises the dan- 
ger of a wild hen entering upon the 
scene, and in such an eventuality the 
only recourse is to wait until his service 
with the hen is over, when she will tim- 
idly disappear, or discover you and spoil 
it all. But if you are unobserved by 
both the gobbler and the hen, you can, 
in a short time, again arouse his pas- 
sion with a yelp or cluck, and he will 
go through all the manoeuvres as be- 
fore. As long as a gobbler will “talk 
back at you,” so long have you a 
chance to out-wit him; but bear this in 
mind, always let him have the last 
word. 
He is now nearly within range “Gil- 
obble-obble-obble, Puff, cluck, b-o-r-io-o- 
m-b-i”; another strut, and still another; 
nearer and still nearer he comes; there 
A wandering troup of turkeys 
is a pause; with pulses throbbing in ex- 
pectation you hold your breath until 
your lungs ache, listening for his next 
move. The thumping of your heart is 
almost unbearable; you gasp for breath. 
The stillness is intense; a twig snaps 
and you jump from the high-strung 
tension of your nerves. Ah, there he is! 
You almost choke in the effort to swal- 
low your heart, but finally succeed. He 
has now approached close enough for 
you to see the glint of his eye. Aim at 
his head and squeeze the trigger. He 
makes a few jumps then spreads on the 
ground, and after a few violent strug- 
gles expires, and you then realize that 
you have won at a game in which vic- 
tory is worth while. 
I T is for these moments of thrilling 
anticipation, and the conscientious 
satisfaction of having fairly out- 
witted his quarry in it’s native haunts, 
where the odds are always in favor of 
the hunted, that the sportsman traverses 
miles of forest and stream and endures 
the severest hardships, and not merely 
for the lust to kill. However, the All-wise 
Creator has decreed death by violence 
as the ultimate end of all creatures 
that are natural prey lof man, beast 
and bird, so in killing such inhabitants 
of the wild as are termed game, the 
sportsman is merely playing his role 
in the tragedy of life. No true sports- 
man ever takes life wantonly; and 
when he does kill he matches his skill 
against the native cunning of his 
quarry in 1 a spirit of fair play; shows 
mercy to the victim, and always leaves 
“some for seed.” It is this refinement 
of the spiorting instinct that places 
man infinitely higher in the scale of 
God’s creation than the beasts of the 
field or the birds of the air. 
The fundamentals employed by the 
experienced turkey hunter would en- 
able him to cope with any wild game in 
the world. To circumvent an old gob- 
bler with a long patriarchal beard is a 
feat commensurate with securing the 
great antlers of a coveted buck. Such 
a beard will be proudly preserved and 
treasured along with other valued tro- 
phies of his prowess. These souvenirs 
help to brighten the old hunter’s life 
along toward the sunset days of his 
existence, and he spends countless 
hours in rapt retrospect, for in review- 
ing memory’s pages such events always 
appear as they did on that spring 
morning ' of the long ago, when the 
diurnal tribes were awakening from 
the night’s repose, and nocturnal crea- 
tures were seeking their secluded re- 
treats. The seed produced by the ba- 
bel of wild life observed at this hour 
lives in his memory until he, himself, 
passes into oblivion. 
But each recurring spring, when the 
first Kentucky Cardinal carols forth 
his cherry “Boys, -get up, -get up, -get 
up,” the turkey hunter is seized with a 
longing akin to rapture, for the red 
bird is the first to herald the approach 
of gobbling season. Also the sight of 
the glorious dogwood, bending beneath 
its weight of great white blossoms, 
sends a delicious maddening to his 
brain ; for the dogwood’s young and 
tender and budding loveliness is seen 
only during the gobbling seasion. Thus, 
each spring the Red Gods call him, and 
thus, each spring, he answers the call 
of the wild, until his final entrance into 
the Elysian Forests of the Happy 
Hunting Grounds, where doubtless the ; 
cardinal sings eternally and the dog- 
wood is ever-blooming. 
I T has periodically been prophesied 
for nearly a century that the wild 
turkey would shortly become extinct, 
but fortunately this is not the case, for 
although Americans have been notori- 
ously wasteful of wild life, even to the 
utter extermination of numerous spe- 
cies, yet they are now leading the world 
in an effort to conserve our wild game. 
The United States is a nation of hunt- 
ers, and as most hunters have a keen 
appreciation of nature, it is most nat- 
ural that American sportsmen, as a 
class, have become ardent supporters of 
conservation. Colonel Roosevelt was, 
< Continued on page 137) 
