The Draw

DROUGHT TURKEY

In lean years, one gobbler is enough

By Brandon Ray

Brandon with his 2022 Texas gobbler. Gear included a Prime Inline 3 bow, HHA Optimizer sight, QAD HDX drop-away rest, Bee Stinger stabilizer, Victory VAP TKO shaft, real barred turkey fletchings and a 100-grain Magnus Bullhead broadhead.

The calendar said April 6, but the landscape looked like the middle of winter. The grass was dry and brown. It was cold, 40 degrees with a wind chill of 35. The soil was powdery like dust. In the spring of 2022, the drought continued its wrath at the top of Texas. I sat in the dark in my ground blind, listening to turkeys gobble and chatter in the cottonwood trees just 150 yards to the west—a sound that has hypnotized hunters for generations. Why else would a guy get up at 4:50 a.m.? I waited for the day to wake with an arrow nocked.

A year earlier, drought conditions meant few turkeys were in my favorite Panhandle creek bottom. I decided to let the riparian strip rest that year. No turkeys were shot in the spring of 2021. Some timely rains in May and June no doubt helped the poult hatch. In winter 2022, scouting for the upcoming spring turkey season, I saw six jakes. Proof that a few poults made it through the previous dry summer.

More scouting before opening day produced a sighting of seven longbeards together. That was encouraging, but by early March 2022, the seven longbeards had dispersed up and down the creek. Now only three mature gobblers were on my trail camera. A flock of 16 hens and five jakes were a common sight near my corn feeder.

Knowing it would be a lean year, I decided one turkey would be my limit. Even though every Texas hunting license comes with four turkey tags, I would only use one. Making sure there were birds for the future seemed more important than filling tags. And even though I could hunt other places, word from other turkey friends was the flock numbers were

Abundant turkey tracks and strut marks in the sandy road near the cottonwood trees.

down in most places across the Panhandle and North Texas. The drought was so bad in northeastern New Mexico, the rancher where I lease land to hunt Merriam’s turkeys agreed it was smart to sit out the 2022 season. Moisture is important in the spring for turkeys. Turkey hens need tall grass to conceal their nests from predators. For this reason, we do not graze cattle along the riparian strip on our ranch. So even in good years and bad ones, there should

always be some grass cover for nesting hens and for does raising fawns. Spring rain also means forb production. Those forbs, “weeds,” are good for both deer and turkeys. The weeds and the water along a creek foster insect production. Newborn poults rely on insects to grow. Hen turkeys get their wings and bodies wet to regulate nest temperature. As you can see, rain is important to grow new turkeys just like it is to grow big antlers on bucks and raise fawns.

One and done

The birds flew down from the trees on the creek and the gobblers went silent. I called a few times with a box call and a mouth call. The lead hen answered me, a good sign, but the boys had laryngitis. Through a slit in the side of the blind, I could see the tops of three big tail fans strutting down the road that parallels the creek. Six hens and four jakes were also with the three amigos.

The hens entered my shooting window first at 7:30 a.m. I stayed in the back of the blind in the shadows, my release hooked to the string. Next, two fluffed-up gobblers came from the right, moving to the left. Both were wearing 9-inch beards.

I eased the 59-pound Prime Inline 3 bow to full draw. When the lead bird hesitated at nine yards, I sent a 455-grain carbon missile tipped with a Magnus Bullhead broadhead at his neck. The gobbler flew straight up in the air and back to the west, just out of my limited view out of the shooting window. Did I miss?

Dumbfounded, I sat wondering what happened. Then, I heard the unmistakable sound of heavy wings beating the ground, the death flop of a wild turkey. I poked my long-lensed camera out the side blind window to find my gobbler flopping with the rest of the flock staring and prancing around him. I could have flung another arrow at a second big gobbler, but two birds was never part of the plan. I snapped a few pictures as one of the other gobblers pecked and jumped on top of the dying bird. Turkeys are so weird!

My gobbler had a 9-inch beard and 1-inch spurs. I would guess he was a 2-year-old. I propped him over a log for some photos as the sun chinned itself higher over the canyon walls. Knowing this would be my only bird of spring 2022, I took in all the sights and sounds.

His barred wing feathers would be saved to make new fletchings for next year’s turkey arrows. His tail fan would adorn next year’s decoy. The iridescent colors on his breast feathers flickered in the morning sunshine like a rainbow. His scaly legs looked more like something on a lizard than a big bird.

As I clicked off photos with a tripod and self-timer, I could hear the same flock I’d shot my bird from, talking just across the fence, south down the creek. As the hens chattered and the jakes and gobblers sounded off, I loaded my gobbler in the truck. I left the birds alone for the rest of the season.

So, it was a one turkey season for me. I’m thankful for that memorable morning last April. With rain and time, there will be more birds to hunt in the future.

This was part of the flock of Rio Grande turkeys that walked by Brandon’s blind on April 6, 2022.