Monday, March 18, 2013

Under the influence; Wild Turkey and Talladega Nights

Friday March 15, 2013...

Ricky Bobby would be proud of us, topping out at 55 mph dodging pot holes and hugging the outside corners of the dirt roads in the Talladega National Forest, not because we were trying to qualify for the Sprint Cup Series but rather trying to beat the sun set so we could find our primitive camp ground and try to roost a turkey.

I was gripping the passenger's side door praying we wouldn't be involved in our own version of Nascar's infamous crash, the "Big One".  Trying to keep my mind from wondering dark thoughts of "this might be my last turkey hunt" I tried humming Jason Aldean's "Dirt Road Anthem".  That didn't work because we weren't "laid back swerving like George Jones", I quickly determined the Dukes of Hazard theme song was better suited.

Scott, my new hunting buddy, seemed the least bit concerned with the dust trail he was leaving...he was actually at home it appeared, maybe the roads he grew up driving on in Louisiana were similar or maybe deep down he wanted to be a Nascar driver?  The only time he let off the accelerator was when we topped a hill and a local woman, doing ever bit the speed we were, tested the shocks on her car by swerving to dodge us and directly impacting one of the many pot holes.
Scott said, "I think she got some air on that one".  

We shortly arrived at our camp, met a local who generously gave us some advice on starting points to locate some turkeys and we headed that direction.  If only we knew what he was thinking as we pulled off,  you see we were driving a 2013 Nissan sedan that Scott had rented that morning. His truck had to make an unexpected trip to the mechanic, so he chose the eco-friendly 4 door sedan that had about 3 inches of ground clearance and front wheel drive.  To say we were not your typical hunting party in Southern Alabama would be an understatement, next time I think we need to take a Prius.
Scott with the "eco-friendly" hunting sedan.  Lucky for us it didn't rain during our trip!

 We found our access point, it was a long leaf pine ridge that extended 1/2 mile into the heart of Talladega National Forest. As you fell off the ridge to either side you met hardwoods, most of these hardwoods started as draws that led into small creek bottom land mixed with hardwoods and oddly enough, cane thickets. Electing to abort the plan to roost a turkey, we marked the location on the GPS so we could find it in the early morning darkness the following day. 

The ridge of choice was chosen for various reasons; it had the highest elevation within a square mile of any direction, it had hardwoods that could serve as roosting locations and a food source, but most importantly it was the first location we came to and could not explore anywhere else because we had to head back and set-up camp before night fall.  Plus we did not want to get caught on these Southern Alabama back roads in a "city slicker" sedan on a Friday night, as we got back in the car Scott made a wise observation, "does this kind of remind you of Deliverance"?

After setting up camp we needed to head into town to pick up some provisions and our Alabama hunting license.  Brent, the nearest town with the necessary evil "Wal-Mart", was 25 miles north west of camp, 1/2 of the trip would be through the National Forest on the back roads.  The average man would give himself 60 minutes to get there.   

With Scott driving we made it into to town in 30 minutes, man would he make some tips delivering pizza out here. 

This is a view from the many roads we traveled via sedan, this one is in good shape
We made it to town safely, but the cotton tail rabbit and barred owl would argue differently.  Luckily we yielded for the 125 lb rottweiler, which appeared to be guarding the perfect location for a meth lab.  Out here, there seems to be nobody and what few people are here live a pretty isolated life.  Most homes were older farmsteads, hunting camps, and a couple modest ranch style homes.  However, the occasional trailer that reminds you of an episode from National Geographic's Drug, Inc would appear off in the distant pine thickets.  This rott had a purpose and he did it well. 

The trip to town was basically uneventful, that is as uneventful as a trip to Wal-Mart can be.  With our 3-day nonresident hunting license in hand, enough food and snacks to get us through two days we headed back to camp.

The drive back was safe for all of Gods woodland critters too, not one single animal fell victim to the Nissan.

We arrived back at camp to find our neighbors sound asleep and the primitive campground dark and isolate, good news as sleep should come easy.

Our camp for two days, Scott had the "penthouse" and I used my ENO doublenest hammock w/tarp (directly under the sun in this pic).  The campsite was primitive and very quite.  You could actually hunt a couple hundred acres in and around the campground, very convenient
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Saturday March 16, 2013
 
"The beauty and charm of the wilderness are his for the asking, for the edges of the wilderness lie close beside the beaten roads of the present travel." - Theodore Roosevelt

5:15 a.m. the next morning could not come soon enough, the two other hunters in camp were up and out at 5:00 a.m. , "and I thought we were excited."

We gathered our gear and made a cup of the finest instant coffee you could brew, the nourishing warm concoction did the trick of raising our internal thermostat from the night of camping in the 40 degree temps.

The Eco-Warrior Nissan was loaded and turning up dust by 6:00 a.m. and we where at the access point well in advance of our originally planned time, a benefit of camping in your hunting area.

Once we arrived and realized how much time we had to spare we tried to decipher why the other hunters left so early.  We came to two conclusions; they wanted to ensure they were the first to their spot or they went into town for breakfast, either way they were up to early for our style. 

We made our way to the highest point on the ridge that gave us our best chance of hearing an early morning gobble.  Much to our dismay that glorious gobble or "thunder roar" that signals Spring is here, did not come.  In fact we did not even hear a gobble on the distant private land, odd because the turkeys 250 miles North of us in middle TN are already strutting and gobbling.

As the minutes passed mother nature began to awake, song birds began their chorus and the most glorious part of all unwrapped...the morning sun appeared over the horizon, "Here comes the sun, and I say its alright".

 With the birds silent the first morning we had to break out the typical southern turkey hunters play book; series of hoot howls and crow caw's still did not produce the illusive gobble we so deeply wanted to hear.

We stood our ground and waited until we were confident the turkeys left the safety of their roost.  The we proceeded with the next chapter in the play book.

We methodically hiked ridge to ridge, stopping on the high points to make a series of soft yelps and purrs.  Waiting a few minutes to hear any type of response then throwing in a couple excited yelps or crow caws to trigger a shock gobble.

After we covered all the ridges within our area, we dropped down into the hardwood bottom.  We hiked deep into the heart of it and set up next to a narrow creek with flowing water, hoping what turkeys were in the area might not have been able to hear our locator calls due to the sound of the flowing water from the creek.  We set up on the edge of a forest opening and started a sequence of calls.

After 30 minutes of submissive feeding purrs and yelps things were still uneventful. With only two days to hunt, we decided we needed to get more aggressive and cover as much ground as possible. This was definitely going to be a "run and gun" type of hunt. 

First things first though, we needed to figure out where these birds have been calling home and ever since the sun rose and provided enough light to see, we did not pick up on any sign, albeit we were not to attentive either.  A decision was made that we needed to revert to the old school style of scouting and tracking methods.

A little over three miles and four hours later, the deep forest turned up nothing but a couple tracks on a fire break and one ridge with signs of scratching that probably took place more than a week ago.  The lack of sign made us re-evaluate our plans, we needed to think winter range and food source.

We headed back to the "Eco-Warrior" Nissan to regroup our thoughts and put a plan together.  After studying the map we decided to head to a large chunk of national forest land, this area was huge and would provide us with enough room to hike in deep and hopefully find some turkeys feeding on red oak acorns or any new green shoots that might be growing in the recent prescribed burn areas. 

Talladega NF is best described as rolling hills with long leaf pine ridges and hardwood bottoms.  They do a good job with prescribed burns, mast producing trees are not too dominant in the areas we hunted but where you find them you will find lots of game sign.  In 1935 over 60% of the Oakmulgee district was clear cut for Ag use, so most of the hardwood forest are young.  The above picture is a good example of the transition zones from pine to hardwoods you see in this area, in this picture no burn has been prescribed recently so it is very thick. 
We decided to drive the area first, to see if any other hunters were in the woods and to get a "feel" of the area.  Much to our surprise we only spotted one other hunter parked in the seven mile loop we made.  Even better news we discovered was that the Forest Service was conducting a prescribed burn in the Northern portion of the zone, so we banked that some of the turkeys in that area would hopefully have made their way South into the heart of this large zone.

After a quick and healthy lunch of vienna sausages, sardines, and snicker bars we headed deep into the forest.
We set our sites on a firebreak that cut 2.5 miles through a Western section of the zone.  This firebreak followed the spine of pine ridges most of the way and gave excellent access to hardwood bottoms, recent burns, and saddles that all looked like ideal turkey habitat.  We did cut a few fresh tracks on the fire break, at least we were in the right area. 

Once we got to the end of the last set of ridges that would eventually give way to hardwood slopes and the county road, we decided to fall off one of the ridges and follow a hardwood bottom back to the car, approximately three miles back to our starting point.

Once we fell off the ridge we discovered quickly we should have been down lower off the ridges the entire time.  Red and White Oak trees lined these bottoms, a recent burn had been through and provided excellent access to the remaining Red Oaks, in addition green browse was starting to sprout.

Once we finally left the pine ridges we finally found "turkey country"
About 2/3rds of the way down we stumbled upon our first group of turkeys, lucky for us we spotted them first as they were feeding.

We quickly sat down, a few moments later we could hear them purring and making a few soft yelps, all hens it appeared.  Since these were the first turkeys we had encountered and Scott was filming for a new turkey load, produced by Spectra Shoot, we decided to call and see if we could get a show.  We were also hoping deep down that a silent Tom would be in the group and we would luckily pull him in. 

After 20 minutes of calling back and forth with a boss hen we decided they had no interest in us and the turkeys quickly proved our theory.

They eventually made their way over one of the hardwood finger ridges and fed out of sight.  Scott and I regrouped and he informed me he had some good video of the birds and was pretty sure he seen two Jakes.  Puzzled why we seen no strutting or heard zero male vocalization, we still had hopes because we finally made our way into some game.

We waited a while to give the birds plenty of time to feed on.  We headed back up the ridge to try and cut them off a 1/2 mile or so in the bottom we hoped they were headed.  As we started to crest the ridge Scott motioned to stop, he had seen a turkey drop off over the crest.

Scott marked the location on the GPS and we slowly made our way back up to the pine ridge we left a 1/4 of a mile ago.

No matter if you invite him or not, Murphy will always make his way into your life.  For reason's unknown, a few of the hens circled in front of us toward the pine ridge, they were forced to come back in our direction because of a thicket that managed to avoid the recent burn.

As we started to crest one of the flats on the side of the main ridge, we busted the hens, they decided to take flight towards the bottom and when they did they spooked the rest of the birds.  Low and behold 20 or more turkeys took flight and in the middle we noticed at least one mature Tom and a couple Jakes. 

Scott climbing up out of one of the recent burns
Fortunately it was the hens that spooked the flock, so most of them took cover in trees or landed within sight in the hardwood bottom.

We quickly made our way up the ridge and out of the bottom, plans were already made to come back here in the morning.  It was 3:30 in the afternoon at this point, a few hours before roost, surely they wouldn't go too far.

The 2.5 mile hike back to the car was on the verge of gruesome, temps were in the upper 70's with the sun bright.  The hills we hiked up the way in had seemed to reverse, we were once again hiking up!

Hopefully the pork chop sandwiches planned for dinner will replenish the calories we had burned today.  According to the GPS we hiked 7.2 miles the first day, this does not include the two hours we hiked that morning while the GPS was off due to battery loss, sleep should come easy again. 

We arrived back to camp with plenty enough light to cook dinner and get a nice fire started.  We recapped the days hunt and made a game plan for our last day.

Hopes were high for the next morning's hunt and the hammock was calling my name and Scott made no qualms about calling it a night.

Lying in the hammock with a slight breeze passing through I replayed the events of our first day.

Man did we cover some absolutely beautiful ground, the Creek Indians likely used this area as a hunting ground and probably regarded it as a spiritual place.  Later, European settlers cleared the land for agriculture, to their ignorance this abusive practice lead to significant erosion and was described by some as a wasteland.  By 1935 the federal government had acquired the Oakmulgee unit and began its recovery into long leaf pine stands and hardwood bottoms. 

 Luckily, we live in a country that understands that this land is of the people, by the people, and for the people.

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Sunrise the last morning of our hunt

 Sunday March 17, 2013
"To be under the influence of pure enlightenment in the Talladega night and be in pursuit of the elusive Eastern Wild Turkey gives you a visual insight to why Ben Franklin adoured them so much.  To be in their home you understand they are American; courageous and determined." -T.C.

If Rip Van Winkle had a hammock he would have never awaken on that mountain, I am convinced.

I slept solid for several hours and when I awoke I felt like I had the energy of sleeping for 20 years, like Rip.  With temps in the lower 50's and the exhaustion from the previous days hunt, I had just experienced mother natures Ambion.  

With another cup of freshly brewed instant coffee in hand we headed to our parking spot.

As luck would have it another vehicle was there, OK by us though because the spot we marked on our GPS was accessible from another gate which turned out to be a more direct route in.


6:30 came and the only noise in the forest and surrounding areas were the droves of hunters, which sounded off with owls hoots and crow caws.  Scott thought he heard the distant tree yelps of some hens, but we could not confirm it.

My hammock and tarp sleeping system
We sat quietly on a recent burnt pine ridge to listen and take in the solace of the rising sun..."Here comes the sun, and I say its alright".

The turkeys were once again quiet, not even the hoards of hunters with their myriad of locator calls.  Even the lost Elk who migrated his way this far south buggeling could not muster up a shock gobble, I thought to myself, "this is going to be a long morning".

If you ever hunt public land you will learn one thing real quick, the majority of hunters will not stray to far from the road.  Granted, this is not a stead fast rule.  Rather it is a simple observation with some logic behind it when it comes to turkeys.  Let me summarize; most turkey hunting is a game based on sound, a male turkey gobbles and the hunter tries to mimic the sound of a hen (this has to do with the birds and the bees...blah blah blah) to lure him in close enough for a shot.  Since turkeys roost in trees and tend to gobble on the roost in the early morning hours of the Spring breeding season, hunters use this knowledge to their advantage.  Likely so, if you can hear a turkey gobble on roost before they fly down, you can use the cover of darkness to sneak in close and then try to mimic a hen to lure him in closer once he leaves his roost.  Sounds simple right?  Go try it and let me know how well it turns out for you.

With this knowledge in hand, the typical public land turkey hunter whom is trying to cover lots of ground will usually drive the perimeter roads and listen for a gobble.  If they hear this gobble they will then head off in that direction.

A recent burn, also the location we seen the first group of turkeys
I use that logic to form my own hypothesis; turkeys may be bird brains but they do still have a brain.  They are prey and in order to survive they must avoid the predator.  Therefore, I bank on the majority of turkeys to either roost far away from the roads or gobble very little, if at all.

Either way, this morning was uneventful for the road hunter and the back country hunter. 

Since it was our last day, we decided to head deeper into the forest.  Our game plan was simple, we were going to throw our entire book of game plans at them...something had to give right?  I mean, surely I still have enough primeval spirit in me to kill something to sustain myself, if not the extra snickers bar in my vest would provide enough calories to get me out and to the nearest McDonald's!

As we headed deeper in to the forest, we discovered more areas that had been recently burnt.  Mostly these were the slopes of the pine ridges, but a few of the hardwood bottoms suffered the fate as well.  I said to Scott, "these areas should provide strutting zones turkeys prefer and free up some available food".

Whether or not it provided the ideal strutting zones or not became irrelevant, we quickly discovered fresh scratching.  Turkeys had to be close, it was in the same vicinity as where Scott had heard distant yelps and the recently turned up leaves showed no signs of the morning dew, plus the smell of fresh earth was over powering.

We looked at the GPS and made a decision to make our way up over one more of the finger ridges that formed the perimeter of the bottom.  As we trekked up the ridge we spotted a hen feeding, slowly we reversed our direction.

We quickly demised our last game plan, we were confident this was the same group of birds we spotted the day before.  We knew there was at least one mature Tom and a couple Jakes in the bunch.

one of the few open hardwood slopes
Our options to set up were limited. Below us, approximately 100 yards, was a large hardwood bottom that was fairly clear, likely a strutting/feeding zone.  Behind us was a thick stand of pines and to our East was a recent burn.  Reluctantly we sat on the edge of the thicket, it provided a decent view of the bottom and a semi-clear shot of the draw that lead into the recent burn, other than that we were pretty limited.  Now all we had to do was call them our way.

After we sat up and Scott got his camera ready, we started a series of soft purrs with a few yelps thrown in.  Almost immediately the boss hen let out a couple yelps, I called back.

We played the game for 15 minutes, during this time not one single male gobbled.  At one point I thought a Jake had yelped back, but was unsure.

The birds fed nonchalantly in the bottom as we suspected and I continued to call intermittently.  This went on for another 10 minutes and much to our surprise we heard one of the Jakes gobble twice.  Things were looking brighter!

I would like to think it was the soft feeding purrs we made and subtle yelps that led them in our direction, or it could have been that we were set up on two of the three funnels that exited the bottom.  Regardless we did something right, so after a good 1/2 hour or more we finally had them in range.  Sadly though, the gobbler was nowhere to be found.  Scott did confirm two immature birds were in the flock, his safety was slid into the off position.

The first to pop over the rise was the boss hen, her sixth sense alerted her and the gig was up.  Scott had one of the birds within 20 yards, I watched as he settled his sights in on him.

The feelings of anxiety, pressure, and excitement had to form a thick cloud of emotions in the bottom.  BOOM!  The force from the 3" #6 Spectra Shot evaporated the emotional cloud and brought the reality back to the bottom.  Our first Alabama turkey was in the books!
Not the oldest bird we have ever killed, but will truly be one of the most memorable. 

We figured we put upwards of 12 miles on our boots that weekend with elevation gains easily over a 1,000'.  Hunting silent public land turkeys in territory that was virgin to us, competing against the locals who know the area well and the other out of state hunters like us, made this a truly demanding hunt.  Top that off with camping in a primitive campground and having absolutely zero experience with these elusive Alabama thunder chickens; you have the recipe for an extremely rewarding and exhilarating outdoor experience.

The Alabama Wildlife Officer, who was strangely waiting for us at our car, checked the bird and congratulated us.  He mentioned the birds in the entire county were all silent, this made us feel good about our efforts.  We have our suspicions why he was there, but we will not let the jealous local run us off.  

We were truly blessed to experience this hunt together.  Scott and I had never hunted together, so we went out on a limb and gave it a shot...no pun intended.

To experience the outdoors with someone that has similar passions is unexplainable.  I do not have many hunting partners, but those I do have are truly top notch quality individuals.

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"Unlike the Creek Indians who hunted in this sacred place, I am nomadic.  To witness first hand the miracles of God, will humble the most chesty of those who walk within his creations.  Walking home will never cease, as there is always another prey over the next crest and another sun rise to hear him roar. 
My decision to walk here was rewarded, as all hard work is.  I am reminded of the sacrifices and hard work our fore fathers endured so I can bask in their glory.  
Let us not forget the heritage of this great nation; Walking Home is... My Pursuit of Happiness"

 Myself (left) and Scott (right) with our "trophy".