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Last week some of us went up north to Mike’s cabin for a spring turkey hunt. We don’t see bucks when we go up deer hunting but we’ve always seen lots of turkeys. This time we didn’t see any turkeys. Oh well!
We did have plenty of fun, though.
And we were actually guaranteed a turkey no matter what happened because the day before I left on the trip I *might* have found a fresh-killed turkey in the road by our house. (DNR laws are only partly sensible as regards roadkill.)
Chris M. and I drove north in what he calls his toy car, a $300 Ford Festiva. It’s so small that when I was driving and went to do a head-check to lane-change I looked out of the rear window more than the side-window. I didn’t know gas had gone up to $3+ but that hardly mattered to us: the fuel-gauge was still almost on full after our 3 hours’ drive north. The car handled fine and held all our junk no problem.
So we had a dandy time frolicking in the fresh green foliage for a few days in our full camo.
It was really nice to go hunting in such mild weather, with all the birds out singing.
I saw a flash of one male turkey on my first stroll after arriving, to check for sign. Was it a ghost? After that we only saw 2 sets of tracks. None of the usual flocks. We saw coyote tracks, too.
But we had great fun anyway, learning how to do the turkey calls (we had a video tape and cassette tape to learn from at the cabin). The mouth call is the neatest, I think, because you can use it while remaining still. Turkeys see and hear the best of all game critters. They see color, too. The slate and box calls are neat as well. All calls come in many flavors—it’s good to use several as it sounds like different birds in a flock. Owl and crow calls are also important, as turkeys like to gobble back at them with bravado, making them great locator calls.
I think that my calling skills made it sound more like turkeys being tortured. But I thought that because they’re curious birds they might show up anyway, to rubberneck at the car-crash. Also, I guess they’re not always super-picky, especially during the first week of hunting.
Turkeys are pretty much the new pheasant of this region. They’re very common now, great sport and great eating. Can’t beat it.
It seems to me also that the sport involves more walking around than deer hunting often does. I may be wrong but one can effectively make set-ups then do some calling and move on in less than a half hour. Perhaps turkeys wander around more as a flock. But maybe I’m off on this.
The flock-feeding of turkeys reminded me of what I’ve read about the rummaging of groups of wild pigs. Wild pigs are another quickly populating game critter for Michigan. They’re smart and propagate so fast that it might be that we get a pig problem like so many other states have by next year. Well, I look forward to eating some free and extra-tasty pork some time soon.
Here’s a wild story… One of the nights Tommy drove out on the 2-track and his lights lit up a big, pale barred owl that was tearing into a ruffed grouse in the road. He drove closer and it flew away, carrying the bird, then landed further up the road. He drove up again and the owl finally just flew away, leaving the bird. Tommy got out and checked out the grouse, to see what had happened to it. He also had the thought of bringing it back as “roadkill” to cook up for dinner. He picked it up by a wing to check it out when suddenly the owl came swooping back at him, flapping near his face. He dropped the grouse and ran back to his car but the owl was after him and he couldn’t get into the car. So he hid behind the car. The owl swooped up again and went back and snatched the grouse and was gone. Wow, what a close call with the big talons! Tommy returned to the cabin in quite a state.
The next day we had a fine time helping out on the property, clearing brush and trees from winter storms off of the 2-tracks. We used a jeep and machetes and hatchets plus a chainsaw. A couple whacks from machete or hatchet was enough to dispatch dozens of bent over 4″ saplings along the roads.
We also raked out muck and old weeds from the spring-fed swimmin’ hole. In so doing we found a couple newts which are now in the kid’s fish aquarium here at home—they’re already gulping down worms.
We had a fine time testing out various firearms as well. We were pleased to discover that our cheap old 12-gauge Stevens singleshots worked best of all. They had full chokes. My fancy autoloader had a modified bore and didn’t pattern nearly as well. The old guns could put a dozen #6 pellets into the turkey-head target at 50 yards! The maximum range is usually 40 yards and the autoloader seemed suitable only out to 30. Interestingly, though, the #4 shot at 40 yards blasted through 1/4″ plywood but #6 didn’t. I wonder if the turkeys would notice the difference…
It was fun walking the woods in full camo. On my first outing I nearly walked up to a raccoon, who just peaked at me curiously from around a tree along the trail.
We acquired some of our camo from a local shop that gets its stuff from China—they have fancy winter gloves there for $4. Fully-insulated camo suits were $20. Lightweight shirts and pants $10 each. Whew. But I mostly used my tattered old Vietnam era stuff. On the last day I dropped my hat and face-net. We rewalked our route but couldn’t find it—darn that camo!
There’s still a bird I want to ID that I heard—it had a sound of tinkling bells or of water being splashed or trickled. Like a “trinkling” sound. Quite a quiet, brief call. Fascinating.
We did a long trail-run one mid-day and got hot then went for a swim in the creek. Cold!
Tommy the wine’n’cheese shop owner brought up plenty of tasty vittles.
I brought up books, mags and pipes and ‘baccy. I enjoyed it when one guy said it reminded him of his grampa and he kept puffing one in the evenings. I only puffed once myself because I enjoyed smelling the other pipe so much. I’m not used to being able to smell it since I’m the only one puffing around our house. Recently another friend whose dad just died said the pipes also reminded him of him and he stood in our house just sniffing the pipes on and off that day. Pipes can be time machines.
I didn’t take any photos, blast it. But maybe it doesn’t matter: you wouldn’t have seen us anyway. Har.
It’s fun messing with camo. At one point I was wearing 4 different kinds. But it’s neat to see if you can pull off a good disappearing trick. One of us tried wearing sunglasses so they wouldn’t see the white of his eyes.
One of the neatest discoveries of the hunt was of how much we liked the old singleshots. These are classic, very lightweight old guns that can be readily bought for $100. The Stevens models were made in all shapes and sizes, I think. In all gauges, barrel lengths and maybe even with rifled barrels. They made them as rifles and pistols, too. Heck, one could readily convert a .410 into a handy pistol today, especially if a rifled slug barrel could be found—but I doubt it—these were old guns. Maybe a newer H&R would have to be used. At any rate, one could saw off a stock to just the grip and saw off the barrel and get a shotshell shooting pistol. Or slug-shooter. It’s just a .45 cal imitation. Illegal but possibly somewhat useful. These would be cheap guns to test out and assemble as kit guns. Another neat thing is how fast they break down—maybe 4 second to snap off the forearm, open the lock and drop the barrel. I got mine from my grampa and another guy got his that way, too. We were proud to stroll the woods with these very easy-to-carry, fast-handling guns. I’m sure I’ve shot more critters with mine than with my new autoloader, because that’s all I had as a teen. It’s such a rugged gun. You’re just not afraid to do anything with them. Perfect, really.
On the drive north we stopped at Frank’s sporting goods store just north of Saginaw (rats, what’s that town?). I was looking for a 2-blade muskrat skinner—I’m doing more skinning these days and nothing beats that knife. They didn’t have one. I probably have to order it from a catalog. Even back in the day that’s where you had to get them. A fine point on a thin blade knife is a handy thing, I’m coming to realize (all over again). And if you’re doing some hefty skinning/boning work your blade might dull up a bit in the middle of the job. Two of the same ideal blades is another smart thing. $15, not bad.
Anyway, while we were there a rifle caught my eye. The new H&R Buffalo Classic. It was kind of odd, but WOW! It actually all came together. A singleshot break-barrel, just like our Stevens. Straight-grip stock. Checkered. Schnabel forearm! Long, heavy octagonal barrel. Peep sight. Curved metal butt-plate. –Be still my heart! Only $315. (The only thing I don’t like is the ugly square break-button, but I could get used to it.) It was in .45/70. A bit heavy for me. But I’ve since seen that it’s also in the revived .38/55—a heavy version of the .30/30—a more effective and more accurate cartridge that’s popular among “cowboy action” shooters, I’ve read. Sounds good!
(Man, if they’re recreating classic styling with a gun like this, who knows, maybe they’ll reissue the sexy Savage 99 next! It’s still ranked as one of the best lever guns of today and it’s not even being made anymore.)
Since I got home I also remembered how much I like the Savage 24—a break-barrel rifle over shotgun rig. I’d like one in .22 mag over 20 gauge. Sounds sweet!
I still think a TC Encore could be made into an amazing 5-gun kit-gun: deer-rifle, .22, shotgun, muzzleloader (rifle and shotgun), and pistol! (The pistol part wouldn’t be legal/approved but it’s all built around the same action, so it seems doable.) And, hey, that’s six guns, actually. Get one case for the action, 2 stocks (regular butt and a pistol grip and pistol forearm) and six barrels! Someday…
So here are some pics and links to the goodies I’m talking about here…
*There’s no real fan page for Stevens shotguns, but this auction site always has them: gunbroker.com
*The Savage 24 fan page: www.savage24.com/
*The Buffalo Classic homepage: www.hr1871.com/Firearms/Rifles/buffalo.aspx
*My previous TC Encore blurb page: www.outyourbackdoor.com/article.php?id=196
*The muskrat knife: www.knivesplus.com/oldtimerknifesc-77rpb.html
Now for some pics:
Stevens
Stevens — action open
Savage 24 — rifle / shotgun
TC Encore Kit Concept
H&R Buffalo Classic
A Nice Knife
