We have this guy that lives down the street in a shack with about 500 dogs... Ok, maybe only 7 or 8... But way to many for that little shack. Anywho, he is always coming over here pestering me about hunting... He will probably be the 1st one to read this post too, but he still can't figure out how to press the "submit" button to post so he will likely drive his truck ( the one with different colored hood and doors like its pieced together ) over here and answer this post... So anywho, he tricked me into promising to take him turkey hunting today after work. I really was not looking forward to it because of all the issues with Ma and such... But I knew he was really looking forward to it. So I agreed... I was a little scared, cause most of the time anything he does ends up in someone almost dieing, but he bet me his truck I wouldn't die, and dead or not, I know he wouldn't want to give me his truck... He got here right after I got home from work, and we went over to a farm he had gotten permission to hunt on where no one else hunts, and he knows the neighbors, and they don't turkey hunt either... He assured me this was going to be great cause he has been watching the same two turkeys hang in the same corner of the field all day... And he said he was there shooting his gun and every time he shot, a turkey would gobble... I am not to sure he knows the difference between a sandhill crane screeching and a turkey, but he claimed he saw the turkeys, so I believed him. So off we went in his 1987 truck ( except that the hood is a 1988, and one of the doors a 1986 ) When we got to the farm I had him cruise by slow so I could see what was out... Sure enough on the far end of the field were the two big Toms he had been watching all day! He wanted to pull right into the farm being that he was new to hunting turkeys. I explained we can't just walk across an open field up to them... He said really? Before coming over to get me he had walked 1/2 way across to make sure they were turkeys and they just watched him and clucked... So, I said lets see if there is any place to park up the road near a river that borders the property to see if we can sneak along the river up to the birds... We get over there and I said, it don't look like we can get far enough off the road here, we will need to go farther down... Nope. Like usual, he needs to prove his truck will fit on the two foot wide shoulder with the 5 foot drop... As you can guess, the truck slides off the edge and my side of the truck slams into the earth with him landing all on top of me... So the truck is kind of teatering and trying to decide if it wants to roll into the river so I say it feels like it is going to roll into the river don't make any quick movements, so he jumps up standing on my head and crawls out the drivers window as fast as he can making the truck rock back and forth... Finally I get out of his window and say it looks like your hunt is over, but he is not listening and is reaching down into the truck window getting his shotgun... He says "there are workers at the farm they will pull me out when we get done, lets go get that bird! About 200 yards into the stalk we run into a turkey blind... 50 more yards and there is another... I say, I thought you said no one hunts here? He says, I didn't "think" anyone else hunts here... So then I see a big tom out in the field heading toward us. I call but he ignores and veers to the tree edge in front of us.. After trying to coax him in for a while we decide to try and sneak up closer... We get about 50 yards away and the guy tries to peak into the field and gets busted. But the other two toms are still in the corner so we continue the stalk... We get to a point where we either have to call the birds a long way, ( and they didn't budge or gobble when I called to the other bird ) or we would have to cross a shallow creek to retain cover... Well... The great creek crossing adventure started out good with a nice sandy bottom, but further down as we entered a floating bog, we had to cross back, and thats where the fun began as it was silt bottomed. I walked across some logs on the bottom to avoid sinking, but not Greg the 500 dog master... Nope. I had told him to stay on the logs, but he waited till he was at the worst spot and said it looks pretty solid, and stepped off the log and sunk to his waist and dropped his gun. Well, fishing the gun out of the muck was the easy part, but as Greg kept panicking he kept sinking deeper... I tried pulling him out but he just pulled me in... Being used to that crap, I pulled myself out pretty quickly, but was now soaked and covered head to toe with awful smelling black muck... He kept struggling and pretty soon he was down to his shoulders. I gave him some big sticks to use to get out and he was really getting scared, a piece of the ground about 1/2 the size of a car broke off and floated towards him so I told him to grab onto it and pull himself up. He said "I can't my boots will come off" I was like "really? REALLY? Your now up to your chin and about to have your head go under and your worried about your freaking boot?" I think that was a wake up call cause he suddenly pulled with all his might and came out... He looked like a dinosaur turd... But he was still alive... I said quit your crying, the birds are still in the field. So we quickly disassembled his shotgun and got as much muck as we could out with cattail stems then reassembled, loaded and restarted out stalk... We stopped about 100 yards from the area we had seen the birds and called... We could hear a hen answer us, but nothing ever showed so we started crawling closer. We got about 45 yards from where we last saw the birds and we slid up to our knees to see thru the grass. I quickly saw the turkeys... Or should I say, I quickly saw the "DECOYS" we had been stalking and driving into ravines for. So we walked back to the farm and no one was there... I said where are all the workers you said would be here to pull your truck out? He said "is it after 5:00? they must be done working... I said Greg it was 4:30 when we got here, if they only work till 5:00, you should of known they would be gone... Lets go to your truck and get your cell phone and call for help. He said, cell phone is in my pocket. I didn't want to leave it in the truck and have something happen to it. Then he proceeds to pull out a ball of muck that is one shorted out beyond repair cell phone. So now what we going to do? He goes into the farm ( with no one home ) and found a phone and called for a truck... Just another turkeyless day in the woods...
I would say that a bad day in the woods are better than a good day at the office. But after that I think I would pull some overtime. Sorry for the luck, but at least this neighbor won't ask to going hunting with you again.
