I had been home for less than a week after the spring semester ended when the phone rang while I was watching television after dinner. The caller ID showed it was a farmer who I had gotten to know well through hunting and trapping on his property for a few years.

When I picked up, Tom asked if I was planning to turkey the following morning. I said I was thinking about it but hadn’t decided where to go yet. He replied, “Well today I went to spread manure in one of my fields down on Hall road at 10 o’clock this morning and there was a big tom out strutting by himself down there. It might be worth giving that a shot.”

I had to ask where the field was because it was about a mile down the road from his barn and milk house. With the directions on where to park and exactly where the bird was seen, I made plans to go roost the bird at dusk. I talked to my sister about it and convinced her to come with me to check out the spot and listen for the tom to gobble from his perch. When it was time, we headed to the field.

After parking by the old barn, we walked back to the edge of a small woodlot and stood there to listen. We listened for what felt like an hour and didn’t hear a single turkey call. I threw a couple loud caws on my crow call and a bird gobbled instantly! He couldn’t be more than 150 yards away. With light pretty much gone, I scrambled to pick a good tree to sit against in the morning. Then I paced off 20 yards into the field and made a small pile of stones so I could find where to put my decoys. We walked back to the car and headed home.

I didn’t sleep overly well as I was excited about knowing how close that tom was to where I was going to set up. The morning came and I got to the field earlier than I usually do. I carefully walked through the old cornfield so I didn’t step on dried out stalks on my way in. When I got close to the wood line, I started looking for my rock pile. I found it and put out a lookout hen decoy and a full strut decoy at the pile. I also put a feeding hen decoy another 5 yards farther away from where I wanted to sit.

I scampered to tree and sat down. I quietly got out my Thermacell insect repellent device and sat it down nest to my leg in case the bugs got bad later. I also fished out my shells from my vest pocket and loaded my gun. A few minutes after thinking it should be light enough out for that turkey to start gobbling, he sounded off for the first time. I put a diaphragm call in my mouth and got my slate pot call out and ready. I let him gobble a couple more times on his own before starting to make soft calls with the slate call. Once I started to raise the volume up a little bit, he finally gobbled at me. However, at the same time, I heard a hen start to call and she sounded like she was right with the tom. I began to worry that he would just follow her and not come to my calling. I continued to call sparingly, hoping that even the hen might be curious enough to come check it out (and bring the tom with her).

Minutes later, I heard wingbeats as one of the birds flew down from the roost. Then came some soft yelps and clucks. It was the hen that pitched down first. But her calls were getting harder and harder to hear. She was headed in the total opposite direction of my setup. My fears were becoming reality. I grabbed my slate call and let out a loud series of yelps. I was answered with a gobble about 80 yards to my left. I looked down the field edge to see a bird in strut just a few yards into the field. I watched as his head popped up when he saw the decoys and his demeanor changed drastically. He quit strutting and almost ran straight to the strutting decoy. He came in so fast that I could only put my call down but couldn’t get my shotgun ready before he was standing face-to-face with my decoy.

Fear of being seen moving my shotgun up to my shoulder led me to watch as he started to beat my decoy senseless. After a few good whacks, the decoy stake tipped to the side and the tom spun around the decoy. As he did, he started to strut and his tail fan blocked me from his sight. I quickly shouldered my shotgun, turned the safety off, and aimed at his head. When he came out of strut, I pulled the trigger and the turkey fell in a heap. I ran out to make sure he wasn’t going anywhere and started to look over the bird.

He was an older bird with monster spurs, over one and a quarter inches! I filled out my tag, put it on one of his legs, packed all of my decoys, and headed to the car. I stopped briefly at the barn to show off the bird and to thank Tom for letting me know about it the night before.