"Lost Call"
Over the past nine to ten years of my young turkey hunting career, I've lost a countless number of calls (mostly mouth yelpers) in the woods, by simply leaving them behind, dropping them out of my pockets while cutting through brush, or belly crawling to get a better position on an "Old Tom". Never thought much about it, simply because I had more in my pack, and also have the gift of a "natural voice call" for backup.
This past spring season I was setup on the end of a finger ridge, that rolls over into a large bowl, just up from a creek area in a two year old select cut pines. My Dad and I have managed to take several birds on set-ups just like this one. I was real familiar with this area of the property, as the hens frequented this area often. I've found that "Early Morning Hens" sometimes lead to "Early Morning Gobblers". The gobblers sounded off a little farther down the creek than normal, but with all the hen activity I was confident that they would work their way to me.
I made a few soft purrs and clucks and got the attention of an "Old Raspy Hen". With my back side covered well with natural cover, I decided to try and keep her around as long as I could.
She would work her way to the edge of my sight, and I would call just enough to bring her back around. Soon enough, she and I had talked up another hen that was just out of sight, and just to the right on my line of sight. The "Old Raspy Hen" would drift toward the "Other Hen" and I would "purr" a little and she would ease back my way. This back and forth went on for a while, and I thought I heard what sounded like a cough in the direction of the "Other Hen". The "Old Raspy Hen" wasn't alarmed by this, so we continued with our little talk. Soon the coughing wrung out again in the direction of the "Other Hen" (Other Hunter) and that had all my attention now. Then the "Old Raspy Hen" bolted toward me, took flight, and disappeared out of sight. More coughing and hacking now, and it sounds more like someone choking or being strangled by something. Then to my amazement, from out of the bushes ,rolled the sqrawniest, scraggiest, mangiest coyote that anyone has ever seen. It struggled to free it's airway and flipped and flopped around until it appeared to cough up something solid.
Before I could shoulder my shotgun,and while it gazed in my direction, it disappeared into brush.At this point my curiosity is aroused to try and find out what it may have been choking on. As I made my way over to the area where I thought it was, I spotted what appeared to be a gooey hairball substance. Upon closer inspection, I discovered the most chewed up, bleached white, Split V-3 mouth yelper that has ever existed . As it lay there glistening in the morning sunlight, it occurs to me that the rabid saliva of the "Beast" has somehow preserved the latex of this call to "Pristine" condition. Should I pick it up? Well, I am most certainly not going to leave it for that "Street Wise Coyote" to retrieve. They are good enough hunters without the advantage of a call. It just so happened that I had a pair of latex gloves in my turkey pack. I carefully picked up the piece and tucked it away. The worst part was not having anyone back at the camp to share the story with.
Upon arriving back at the camp, I recovered the "Lost Call" out of my bag. Should I clean it? Most certainly not! That may damage the integrity of the rabid saliva coating that has preserved this piece to its pristine condition!
AnyHoot, I was able to bag the last three birds of the season using it. And just in case you were wondering, I hid it in my fish pond out back to keep it from drying out during the "Off Season". I hope to recover it from the pond this "Spring" and continue the legend of the "Lost Call".
P.S. For some reason, my mouth keeps foaming up.
Thanks for reading,
Scott T.
