Tricks of the Trade

9 June 2009

Within minutes of our first Canadian gobbler, we heard another bird sound off just a few hundred yards away. Quickly, we sat back down and began calling, and in short order, had a small flock of hens headed in our direction. Unfortunately, the hens were between us and the gobbler we'd heard, so we decided to chase them away.

With the girls now gone, we could again turn our attention toward the longbeard, who was now not more than 100 yards off our guns. But a problem arose in the form of another hen, this one actually with our bird. Quickly, Josh moved back and resumed calling, and while the bird would strut and gobble, he wasn't about to leave his hen. All this noise, though, brought a second longbeard into the fray - the problem now was the new bird entered from Stage Left, and cameraman CJ White was on the right. Recognizing the situation, Josh moved once again, this time putting us between himself and the new bird - SUCCESS! The old longbeard came on a string, and would have made his way to Josh if I hadn't have stopped him short.

This bird fell to teamwork, plain and simple. Sometimes two or three callers, with one moving back and forth unseen, is the answer.