Seeking connection to ‘Give Away’ bird yields bounty

Before I went to bed last night, I sequestered myself in my den where I perform a native ritual asking for a blessing for my hunt tomorrow. I prayed that I might witness the Give Away bird the next day.

I won’t detail the entire ritual because some might take offense that I am just a privileged white man who could not possibly understand native worship. The fact is that I am just a white man who has never had his lands stolen or been persecuted for his appearance. But in my heart of hearts, I embrace the Indigenous beliefs and practice them in solitary reverie.

Each year, in May, I seek to make a connection to the “Give Away” bird — the Eastern wild turkey. I learn their habits, watch their patterns, their roosting preferences, their mating rituals, and most importantly, their way of communicating. I have listened to hours and hours of dialogue amongst a flock. I have learned their way of signaling danger, their seductive mating clucks, purrs and drumming.

The males, known as “toms,” are divided into two social groups: “jakes,” which are the young of the year and fully mature toms, which claim dominance over the jakes and hens. Their dominance is displayed by long, thick beards that protrude from their iridescent, feathered chests. Their tails are displayed as “full fans,” unlike the jakes with the fan’s center feathers higher than the sides of the variegated golden-brown arch.

And finally, their lengthy spurs on the backs of their armored, scaled legs, which can grow to a sharpened point of over 1 1/2 inches. These spurs are used to fight other males for the mating rights of the hens in the flock, and in a naturally cruel way, spike into the female’s back to hold them still while breeding them.

Clearly, we have evolved as a society in which this character trait was left behind in the Pleistocene epoch, before mankind began finding more courteous ways of recreating. To watch and learn all these attributes, one finds oneself fascinated, and the more we study these birds, the more we learn to love them.

And so it was, the following day, I awoke at 4 a.m. and, bleary-eyed, wheedled my way into my camouflage suit and hat. Everything had been laid out the night before because I don’t like to forget anything in the fog of four hours of sleep.

I reached down to grab my trusty 12-gauge in front of the back door (this, because I have driven long distances to my hunting spot and realized that I had left my firearm at home). But this day, I planned to walk the half mile to a spot where I had known birds to roost in the past.

I sat down in the dark and closed my eyes to emphasize the importance of hearing a gobble in the distance. When I reopened my eyes, I watched the sun struggle to rise from cloud cover that seemed as though it was trying to hold the sun down below the horizon. A gentle southerly breeze carried the smell of someone’s lawn that had been mowed the day before. The sweet fragrance of the lake’s water caressed my face as it drifted inland.

I sat for an hour, but did not hear the sound I hoped to, other than the cheerful chirping of robins and cardinals. I got up and walked the tree line staying in the shadows of buckbrush and thorny shrubs. My arms were being torn up through my sleeves, and I finally whispered aloud, “The heck with this!”

I walked along the outside of a high-tension fence and followed it down into a small depression that quickly made its presence known by sucking on the heels of my rubber boots. I might point out here that, except for beginner’s luck or professional guide services, hunts are about challenging the spirit of the hunter who is willing to suffer for their prize. Very few “successful” hunts are without struggle. It is the price one must pay to honor their prey.

As such, I continued into a swampy area, pausing every 100 yards to call out, pleading with an excited clucking cacophony of love. Nothing. Over and over again. Nothing.

I spent an hour setting up my decoys and finding the most likely path of a lovesick bird to lure him into my trap. I did this four times to no avail. I looked at my watch and noticed it was now 10:30 a.m. I had just an hour and a half left before the noon deadline for shooting ended. I was getting discouraged.

I crossed a small stream. (Turkeys don’t like to cross any obstacle that impedes their breeding tactics. Nature dictates that the hens are supposed to come to the males, and when calling to them, we are asking him to make an exception to walk toward us.) I turned into a field with tall, brilliant green grass and headed toward another tree line.

What the heck is that?!!! A bird jumped out of the grass in front of me. My eyes immediately scanned the body for a red head. Confirmed. Shot taken. Bird down!

I had never seen a tom hide in the grass before. I knelt beside him as his body began relaxing and accepting his end. I prayed over him. The same prayer I had said the night before. I thanked the Great Spirit for this beautiful bird.

I tagged him and hefted his body over my shoulder as a soldier carries his wounded comrade and began marching home across the long fields. I crossed a road and entered a second field in the same direction when an eruption tore the long spring grasses to the side.

A larger tom beat his mighty wings to lift his heavy body. But before he got 20 yards from me, I dropped the jake with my left hand, shouldered my shotgun, verified that it was another red head and fired. The big bird dropped at the edge of the tree line.

I ran to him and, again, kneeled to pray and thank the Great Spirit for this incredible abundance. I sat in the cool grass, still wet with the dew in the shadows of the pine trees and shook my head. It is one thing to be blessed with one bird in a season, but here I was with two nice turkeys, accepting that my season ended as quickly as it began — two bearded birds being the spring limit.

Now came the more serious outcome, I was half a mile from home, and after trying numerous methods to carry the two birds and my shotgun, I recognized that it was futile. I called my friend and fellow hay-tosser, Hunter Kehoe, who picked me up with my prizes on his four-wheeler and gave me a ride home. I thanked Hunter and promised him a just reward — maple teriyaki smoked turkey breast.

Once home, I sat exhausted in the yard full of gratitude for the hunt. I deserved some rest. And then my lovely wife came out and said, “C’mon! Get up! We’re going fishing!”

How lucky can one man be?