"What is wrong with me?" I said to the sleepy cur dog nodding off on the couch. Spring turkey season was coming toward us at light speed, and I couldn't seem to generate the proper level of enthusiasm. Is it the aging process, inherent laziness, or am I just losing interest in something I have loved doing for more than 40 years?
What was wrong with me?
I turned away from a couple of shotguns and two turkey vests that needed my attention badly. I should have been shooting the shotguns to determine patterns, putting a red-dot optic on one of them and going through the turkey vests to clean out and reorganize. (Never one of my favorite jobs.) For some reason, I just couldn't seem to get it in gear. Always the procrastinator, I walked away and grabbed the coffee pot. I poured another cup of old, exceptionally bad brew and went back to address the Cur dog again: "So what do you think?"
Contributed photo / Larry CaseCur dog opened one eye and gave a little half-sneeze.
"Humans," she said with a toothy yawn. "Always tied up in knots about something when the answer is right in front of your nose."
I took another swig of bad coffee and gave her a look that said "Well?" Cur dog looked down her nose at me, reminiscent of my high school algebra teacher.
"It's really very simple," she barked. "You need to hear a turkey gobble."
The answer rocked me backwards. I knew cur dog was right. Why had I not seen it? I really am slipping.
There are certain rites and traditions hunters have with each season, and springtime can be very important. Most of us are coming out of the clutches of a cold, hard winter. Going forth into the field to hear the first turkey of the year is just as much a part of your spring tonic as collecting the first mess of ramps (wild onions, for those of you not familiar with the West Virginia favorite) and fishing for native brook trout. It is one of the most important rituals of spring, so that we may be released from the cold and barren and enter into warmth and new life.
The first turkey gobble cracks the ice.
Somehow, long before daylight the next morning, I pulled myself from a warm bed and the haven of sleep. More bad coffee and the old Jeep somehow got me up on High Head Mountain. Aptly named, this little chunk of dirt and rocks towers high enough for a good listening post. I knew if any turkey in this zip code felt like yodeling this morning, even I should be able to hear it. (Let's not talk about the hearing loss, OK?)
I parked the well-worn Jeep and started out the path in the cold and the dark. No birds were singing yet; the only sound was my labored breathing as the trail climbed High Head. The trail seemed steeper than before. What was up with that? I made my way around the huge boulders on the crest and tried not to think about it.
The boulders on the ridge line seemed to stand in mute amusement of my little quest to hear a turkey. How many frail men had they watched travel this path in the past? Indians, hunters, settlers, wanderers - they had all walked this ridge before, all on their own journeys, some of them knowing what they were looking for. Some were simply looking. The boulders on top of High Head watched me pass as they had all the others, but they never said a word.
Standing on the peak, I can see the farmland and houses far below and wonder if the folks are still in bed, which is probably where I should be. The glow from the east begins to brighten, and a new day is delivered to the world. After the first cardinal and then an outburst of crows, I just know a wild turkey gobbler will sound off, but it is not to be. I am torn between marveling at the view from here and kicking myself for getting out of bed for nothing.
A cold wind tells me to head back down to the Jeep, and I don't argue.
I have the vehicle in sight down the ridge, and I hurry through the woods thinking of the heater and getting back to camp for breakfast and coffee. What was that? Did I hear something as I stumble down the trail?
Now I can plainly hear a hen turkey yelping below me. It's now or never, I think, and then it happens. A turkey gobbles 200 yards down the ridge. I wait for 30 seconds and he gobbles again, and then he breaks the last grip of winter with an unruly double gobble. Did I imagine that a ray of sunshine came through the gray clouds?
Back at camp, I find cur dog on the couch where I left her. She looks over and waits for my report. The brindle-colored canine sits through my story of the morning and hearing the turkey, something I know she has little interest in, though she is too polite not to listen. With breakfast and coffee going, I tear into the first turkey vest with a vengeance and tell the dog how good that turkey sounded.
Cur dog stretches, does her customary turn of three circles and lays back down.
"Humans," was all she said.
"The Trail Less Traveled" is written by Larry Case, who lives in Fayette County, W.Va. You can write to him at larryocase3@gmail.com.