Hello, friends,

This past weekend I had a great time in the turkey blind with my 14-year-old stepson, Joey Dushek.

We hunted in Zone 9, which is where I live in northern Juneau County, and, folks, I want to tell you that after spending 16 hours in a turkey blind, there are plenty of deer and turkey left after the hard winter that we all endured.

Saturday, April 12

High 35, Low 21

Thank God I set the blind up yesterday. Last night, two inches of snow fell on this part of Wisconsin and it was still coming down at 5:30 this morning when Joey and I crawled into our very comfortable home.

The fresh snow on our blind had us blending perfectly with our environment, which was a stand of red pines behind us and a field that had corn in it last year in front of us.

Joey and I had toms that were roosting in the pines gobbling right from the start and thus begun a hunt that would last the better part of two days. It would be an almost nonstop display of wildlife.

The turkeys that were gobbling behind us numbered about 30 when they flew down from their roosts and chose to walk away from the field, which meant no shot opportunity. That did not matter because we had had several deer to watch. But then a lone gobbler entered the field and headed to our setup of a jake and two hen decoys. For the next two hours, that tom offered Joey several chances to fill his tag and me several photo opportunities. I took my shots, Joey, did not.

This tom, which I figured had a nine-beard, is one that I passed up several times last year and the boys and I have named Lucky. For some reason I do not understand, the local flocks of turkey will not allow Lucky to hang out with them. Lucky consistently tries to join other flocks and is always physically shunned by groups of toms before he can join their ranks.

I might add that Joey does not agree that Lucky’s beard is nine inches. We had the pleasure of watching over a dozen deer feed and play in the snow covered field and also watched how interested deer are in turkey, but we learned that turkey seem to have no interest in deer.

Sunday, April 13

High 46, Low 16

It was cold when Joey and I got into the blind this morning, but that did not matter as we had at least 10 gobblers talking to each other from their roosts in the trees around us.

At dawn they began flying down and soon entered our field.

Before we knew it, there were two flocks of turkeys — which all together numbered over 60 birds — that were slowly feeding our way. It took a good hour for the turkey to get into range and it was an incredible experience for Joey and I to watch the flocks feed along with six deer, totally unaware of our presence.

To make a long story short, we could have reached out and touched some jakes and hens and several medium sized gobblers were passed up. A couple of “Super Toms” were even passed up because they were too close to other birds that may have taken stray shot had Joey fired his shotgun.

In the end, the turkey fed into the forest and there was a deep silence in the blind when we realized they were gone.

To take away the dark cloud, I chose the next hour to cook venison steak and eggs and watch Joey pass on a group of jakes. After the jake experience, Joey mentioned that should Lucky wander into range, he might become turkey stew.

An hour later, three jakes and a hen snuck in behind us and Joey was thinking a jake wouldn’t be a half bad target after all.

At 1 p.m., we have been in the blind almost eight hours. All of the sudden, a good sized tom appears out of nowhere, has no interest in our decoys and is making a steady exit, that will soon have him out of range..

I give Joey the green light on an extremely long shot, should a head and neck option display itself. Bang! Joey’s 12 gauge drops that tom deader than a three-day corpse, just like last year.

Persistence leads to a happy ending! Sunset.