Photo by D. Toby Thompson

By Bruce Ingram

The rotten stump was the key. As I headed up the forest road through the Potts Creek Wildlife Management Area (WMA) of the Jefferson National Forest, the old, decaying stump was all that I was focused on. For if I could find that Monroe County stump in the darkness, I would know to immediately make a hard left and ascend the hillside to the listening point where I wanted to be right before dawn. And if I reached the listening point in a timely fashion, I would be able to hear gobblers in any number of directions that chose to greet the onrushing dawn.

Slowing my pace as I neared where I thought the stump would be, I switched on a flashlight. A few paces more brought me to the tree remnant, and I made the turn to tromp upward into the woods that were rapidly beginning to become more visible in the gray light of pre-dawn. As I neared the listening post - which had been marked for years by, of all things, an old, dilapidated gas can - I worried that perhaps I was a minute or two behind schedule. A foolish thought, for just then a tom announced his presence - followed by a second . . . then a third . . . and finally a fourth gobbler.

Each member of the quartet was less than 200 yards from my position, so I quickly scudded to set up against a venerable red oak that grew at the far side of a hardwood glade. Positioning a decoy some 20 yards out in front of me, I began to call. All four of the longbeards responded in a paroxysm of gobbling.

Twenty minutes later they were all on the ground and continuing to gobble. One bird was especially close, and he was also the one that was most vocal in his noise making. Another 10 minutes then passed and the other three males apparently had decided that the better part of valor on their part was to let the one tom run the show. And so for the next hour, that male replied to most of my clucks and yelps, but remained rooted to what was apparently his strutting ground some 100 yards away.

Finally, I decided to cease calling altogether and for some 20 minutes silence reigned across the woods. I then emitted a hard series of cutts, three gobbles ensued, and immediately I heard the sounds of a turkey sprinting toward me. I had "unglued" the old boy.

I first saw him at 50 yards out, galloping at a breakneck pace right toward me. And the nearer he came, the faster he ran. So fast that he was on the verge of running right past me. I pathetically tried to raise my gun when he disappeared behind a small mound that was only 10 yards away. But the speed of the gobbler was such that he had passed the mound just as my 12 gauge became cradled against my cheek. A single putt and the flapping of wings - and the duel was over.

Oh, of course, there were some random gobbles that occasionally destroyed the morning's peace over the next four hours. But they appeared to be the sounds of longbeards happy with the lady friends they had, and it was obvious that they were not going to come my way. I had blown my best chance to score - and I knew it.

This past spring, there were a number of West Virginia outdoorsmen who did not blow their opportunities to tag a tom, as 12,544 turkeys were checked in. This total was 6 percent lower than the 2002 tally of 13,385, which was the sixth highest on record; the 2003 harvest was the ninth highest kill in state history.

According to Chris Ellis, wildlife-marketing representative for the West Virginia Division of Natural Resources (DNR), rain was a major factor in the turkey harvest drop in 2003. Ask just about any veteran Mountain State turkey chaser about the effect of rain on spring gobblers, and that individual will likely proclaim that precipitation has a "dampening" effect on a longbeard's ardor.

Turkey biologists often avow the same thing, and all concerned have little doubt the rains that hit the Mountain State last spring cooled off the gobblers and kept many hunters at home as well. Another negative factor of all that precipitation was it even prevented hunters from hearing birds that were sounding off.

Some hunters were also concerned that the winter of 2002-03 was so harsh that some mortality occurred in the state's turkey contingent. I recall having a friend in Randolph County say that he feared just such a result. However, the decline in the 2003 harvest in the mountain counties (Nicholas, Pocahontas, Preston, Randolph, Tucker and Webster, for example) was no greater than it was in other areas of West Virginia. Turkeys are amazingly resilient and can survive many days on the roost.

However, even Preston experienced a drop in its harvest, as the kill went from 499 to 454. Other counties in District I with impressive harvests are Harrison (312), Marshall (361), Monongalia (350) and Wetzel (235).

I am never surprised to read about Preston leading the way in District I or being at or near the top in statewide turkey harvest. With its mixed hardwood wood lots, agricultural areas, orchards and stream bottoms, Preston County features as high-quality turkey habitat as exists anywhere in the Southeast.

Hampshire County (222) led the way in 2003 and was second in 2002. Hampshire flip-flopped with Hardy County (165). The big jump in the harvest in Hampshire really stands out, as most Mountain State counties experienced either a small or a significant decline in 2003. For a county to enjoy a harvest jump of 41 birds (an increase of over 20 percent) augers well for the turkey hunting possibilities in Hampshire come this spring. Hampshire seems to be the rare case of a county that is not only a sleeper in terms of the potential for a rising harvest, but it is also the reigning harvest champion.

Other District II counties with solid harvests the past two years include Grant (156), Mineral (123) and Pendleton (133).