Getting lucky: Sarah Connor, decoy love and money shots

I didn't have much of anything planned for this weekend until my phone rang Friday morning. Caller ID told me it was my friend Evan, so I didn't hit the "ignore" button like I usually do. Whenever Evan calls, guns, beer and good times are usually just around the corner.

"What are you doing tomorrow? Wanna go turkey hunting?"

Hell yes, I wanted to go turkey hunting! Ever since duck season ended, I hadn't put one damn thing in the freezer. I'd gone on one total dud of a pig hunt, and my long-awaited turkey hunt with a serious expert had been canceled. Here I was with my brand-new 12 gauge Sarah Connor and I hadn't fired her at anything more exciting than clays.

I needed some action.

"OK, we're going with my friend Ricky," Evan said. "Meet me at the Chevron Station in Ione at 5:30."

"See you then," I said. Read more...
I arrived at the Chevron station at 5:20 a.m. Evan pulled in at 5:40. Ricky showed up at 5:50 and we all proceeded to talk for another 15-20 minutes. Boy was I glad I'd gotten up at 4 a.m.

The gas station was doing a ridiculously bustling business for that hour of the day. "Shift change at the prison," Evan explained.

Ricky pulled something out of his truck and cradled it lovingly. It was a turkey hen decoy. "Check out the paint," he said, pointing out the sheen under the dull glare of the gas station lights. "It's from DSD. It's hand painted. Expensive but good."

I had to admit it was nice. Way nicer than my decoys, which warped easily and didn't seem to fool anything. I hoped I wouldn't accidentally shoot it. That would suck.

Ricky talked a little bit about his business, Gamehog Outdoors. He makes hunting videos, and people gobble 'em up. He'd been shooting turkey hunts since the season had opened the weekend before, and while he'd gotten some good footage, due to a series of snafus he hadn't gotten a money shot yet.

I glanced up at the sky and saw it was beginning to get light. The shift-change traffic had died down. It was like a signal. "We should get going," Ricky said.

Evan hopped in Ricky's truck and I followed them to a cattle ranch just outside of town. Lights off, we drove through the gate and down a dirt road, then pulled off to the side and shut off our engines.

The second I opened my car door, I heard gobbling. Gobbling to the left. Gobbling out front. Gobbling to the right. The oak trees that dotted these rolling hills were filled with turkeys.

You wanted action, Holly? Looks like you're going to get it.

Ricky grabbed his decoy, tripod and camera and started walking. Evan and I grabbed our shotguns and followed him under the lightening sky.

We came to a cattle guard and Ricky stopped. Should we go for the turkeys on the left or on the right? Left, he decided, and we made our way across a small creek and set up under some trees at the edge of a pasture. It was just like I'd seen on the TV shows - a classic setup. But would it work like TV, or was that just a fantasy world?

Evan and I sat close to one another and stared out into the field as Ricky began calling behind us.

Good Lord, this boy could call! I'd read about all the different sounds turkeys make, but I had never heard anyone call like he did, using so much of the turkey vocabulary so beautifully. It was a freakin' love song.

But it quickly became apparent that the turkeys in front of us had stopped responding. They were all out in the field about 300 yards from us, and Ricky could see jakes chasing each other around, not paying a bit of attention to his serenade.

The turkeys behind us, though, were gobbling every time Ricky purred. A few whispers later, we picked up and moved back across the creek, carefully avoiding all the fresh cow pies in our path.

Then the responses stopped. We saw a turkey on the ground to our left and ducked back where he couldn't see us. Ricky glassed that bird, assessed the situation again and determined we needed to go back where we started.

Was this going to be one of those hunts? In my mind, I could see all my other turkey hunts with Evan, where we always seemed to be 100 yards away from turkeys that knew all too well the limited range of our shotguns.

This time when we sat back down, though, Ricky could see a lone turkey off in the distance:

Without the distractions of the flock, Ricky was sure his song would work this time. So he started calling again.

"OK, he's going to head this way," I heard Ricky whisper behind me.

I had never seen a turkey get called in except on TV. The one turkey I'd killed two years earlier had just wandered by where I was sitting, so I hadn't yet experienced that spine-tingling call-and-response scenario, with a tom swaggering ever closer.

Evan had told me that the shot would be mine, so I got ready. A mask covered my face and a hood blurred my outline. I pulled Sarah Connor's stock toward my left shoulder. My right hand, propped up by my knees, cradled the foreend. My head was scrunched low so I wouldn't have to move much to take the shot. I was ready.

Ricky called. I squinted into the distance. The turkey moved all right. To the left:

We watched in disbelief as the bird made his way back to the thick woods at the edge of the pasture. Run run run, stop. Run run run, stop. You've got to be kidding.

I tracked him with my muzzle anyway, but I knew it was futile.

Ricky, though, kept calling, and the bird stopped just short of the woods. Then he sprinted straight toward us. Run run run, stop.

My heart started thumping, and I struggled to breathe slowly.

Run run run, stop.

My heart thumped harder. I gulped and tried to hold the muzzle steady.

Run run run, stop.


Was this really happening?

I watched him as he poofed up his chest and fanned out his tail, then took a nibble from the grass at his feet, acting disinterested in the presence of that immaculate plastic hen.

I thought he was close enough, but I'm a terrible judge of distance. Was that 20 yards?

If I waited until he got too close, I'd run the risk being seen. Or if he didn't see us and just kept coming in, my shot might pattern so tight that I'd miss him.

Or he might hear my heart fixing to thump right out of my chest.

Do it, Holly.

I centered the bead on his neck and pulled the trigger.

The recoil threw my shoulder back hard. So that's what a magnum load feels like, eh?

The bird went down and stayed down. Textbook.

Now I was trembling uncontrollably.

I threw back my hood, pulled down my face mask and turned to Evan and Ricky, stunned.

"That was awesome!"

Ricky was happy too, because he'd gotten his first money shot of the season.

We walked over to the bird.

Not a huge old tom, just a jake with a five-inch beard. But the experience had been amazing, and now he was mine.

We all took photos. Evan sent one to the person who had bailed on hunting with him that day, creating the opening for me. Nyah nyah, look what you missed!

And me, I felt like I'd broken in Sarah Connor in fine form - one shot at a game animal, one kill.

We all went out to breakfast at the Ione Cafe, my treat. Ricky, sitting across the table from me, pulled one hand to his face and inhaled deeply. "My hand smells like turkey," he said.

I'd done the same thing on the drive to the cafe. "I know! Mine too!"

It'd almost seemed too easy. No struggle. No sweat.

But I guess sometimes we all get lucky.

Harlequin surveys a bird that's bigger than she can handle.

This bird has especially fluffy down.

Boyfriend breaks him down...

...and tonight we feasted on Turkey Marsala.

© Holly A. Heyser 2010