THE GREAT TURKEY CONQUEST

ARTICLE BY DAN CHASON

Many articles have been written about successful hunts and trips afield. Not a whole lot of articles are written about the jaunts made outdoors that are successful but short on bringing home the bacon. Such was the case this spring as I made my annual effort to harvest a wild turkey.
My first trip was on an invite to Arkansas with my brother-in -law, Wayne Vondenstein. Wayne is my hunting buddy and has been ever since I met his wife’s sister. We have traveled all over the world together as couples. The cruise to the shores of Mexico, trips to the mountains of Tennessee but most notably, our trips deer hunting, fishing and turkey hunting. Wayne and I are alike in our favorite past times and as we have aged, our hunting and fishing styles are pretty much related. Wayne is originally from Duson, Louisiana and the deep Cajun roots he possesses also hold one thing dear to my stomach, the boy is a gifted cook.
Our first trip after turkeys this year was a planned event. With the Covid-19 war raging, we waited until late in the season, did the prescribed “quarantine” routine and set out to look for an old thunder chicken. He has a couple of places to turkey hunt with one being just north of Felsenthal National Refuge in southern Arkansas and the other being in Jackson Parish, not far from his camp on Caney Lake. We opted for Arkansas due to being late to the party and hoped that we would have better luck, as it was late in the season. We had done some “phone scouting” and the only turkeys that were talking seemed to be north and not south. We could not have been more wrong.
The club there is a combination of rolling timber bottoms and cutovers. He had plenty of acreage to look as the 3500 acres holds an abundance of wildlife. At least that is the rumor. The first afternoon, we decided to attempt to “roost” a bird. Easing up the many roads that wind and turn in bottoms that all contained ditches big enough to need a monster truck to cross was our first obstacle. The second obstacle was the birds had been struck with the late season lock jaw. They had already bred and the men had left the ladies’ party. After settling on a choice area on a gas line, we set up a pop tent and comfortable chairs and decided to just sit and see what we would hear or see. We sat that morning and watched the sun rise. It was as if the turkey gods were not on our side again and nothing was moving. Crows screeched and owls hooted but not one gobble was heard. One of the other hunters had put out some cell game cameras to get some more eyes in the woods. About lunch time, we carried it back to the camp to regroup. Our afternoon was spent scouting again. After high centering the side-by-side on a stump and having to be rescued, it was truly turning out to be a normal adventure for us. We opted to go back to our honey hole and sit it out again. I pulled every call out that I owned. I tried soft calling; I tried shock calling; it was as if the turkeys had read the hunting pamphlet. They were not going to cooperate. We did see one gobbler about 200 yards away. Even with a mechanical decoy, he would not even look up. Pretty discouraging but the rain ended this trip. We never saw or heard him, even when the thunder and lightning showed up to give us a hand. They would not gobble. True to course, the game camera sent the picture on our ride home. Of course, big boy turkey paraded past the camera as soon as he saw us leave.
After returning home, very much discouraged and worn out from our walks, we soon started talking about a plan B. I called my friend in Tennessee, Jamie Benson, who is constantly sending me pictures of turkeys. Jamie doesn’t turkey hunt and has invited me up to his place year after year since the late 90s. Wayne and I decided that we would make the trip and see what Tennessee had to offer. We hit the road we on our next optimistic adventure.
The hills of eastern Tennessee are quite different. I will say that Tennessee has more ticks per acre than anywhere I have ever hunted. I am still scratching just thinking about the pure number that succumbed to the constant mashing and scratching from the both of us. Even pure Deet didn’t phase these pesky varmints. We had 6 different properties to hunt, and it was encouraging as you cannot drive down the road up there without seeing birds. The problem was I did not see a single gobbler or jake that had any hens with him. This is not a good sign for an avid turkey hunter. We walked and walked; our run-and-gun method was methodical but ineffective. I did hear one gobble but believe he was hanging out near downtown Memphis. The last day, we did get one hen to cooperate and came into our set up but would not work. She was in a thicket and decided our decoys were not real or our calls were not to her liking. For whatever reason, she left.
To say the word defeated would be an understatement. But we had brought a bag of crawfish with us and after Wayne fired up the cooker, it was all a distant memory. We had boiled crawfish and the second night I made some crawfish etouffee. We fed our hosts some boudin and good sausage to boot. We ate good and slept even better.
I have made many a trip out of town and far away chasing turkeys. I would not say we were turkey experts but we usually do well enough to keep the fire lit to keep after them. But the greatest thing about hunting and fishing is not the harvest. It is the friendships forged, the laughs, the triumphs and the defeats. To share this with a friend and family member builds memories that last forever. Defeat only stokes the fires for future jaunts. And I can’t wait to go back.