The Western Season...
Well, my rib stopped hurting sometime in the last two weeks, my hip only hurts when I roll over on it just right when I'm trying to sleep, and the only lingering injury from my Eastern turkey trip fall in Fairfield Co. is my jammed or cracked left pinky finger...so I'll take it!
As hoped for, I made it through my second season out here in Wyoming without injuring myself or sitting or stepping on a rattler, but it did start out with some near drawers-staining drama.
After recovering from my fall, working two weeks in Montana, driving to Northern Maine to tour the hospital I'll be working in and securing a place to live, and driving back to Wyoming, I finally got rested up enough to want to take the family out to fill their turkey tags. The afternoon before I was going to allow my oldest, Holleman, to play hooky for a day of hunting, I decided to go out to a hunting spot that has wild asparagus growing under the cottonwoods that flank the river there. My plan was to pick asparagus for a few hours, look for morel mushrooms and sheds, and head up on the ridge just before sunset to find and roost a longboard for the next morning's hunt. Great plan; sounds like fun right?!
So, it being a nice, calm, warm day with river crossings likely, I headed out there in a pair of shorts and a T-shirt wearing an old pair of Chacos; all I had with me was a sack for the asparagus, as that was all I really needed. So about an hour into my lazy walk and toting a heavy sack of fresh spears, I'm walking along with my head down now trying to find an elusive morel patch when I hear "Uuuha," "Uuaaaha," "Uuuaaaha." I thought, "that sounds like a Moose...I think." And it did sound kind of like an abbreviated version of what I've seen hunters on TV do when calling a moose. That said, if a moose were in that creek bottom, it was a long damn way from where the nearest moose in Wyoming should be...like 3 hours by car hauling ass and near mountains that supposedly have no Moose.
So I'm looking for what's making the noise and not seeing anything, and its a fairly open big cottonwood flat that is only 100 yards deep at its widest point...I should be seeing whatever is making this noise. Then I see it. It was a black bear that walked out from behind a downed cottonwood tree that laying flat came up to just above my belly button...big ass tree/log. I thought, "how cool! OOH, spring bear season is in and I need to go buy a tag and come kill this thing! Naaa...that's too small to shoot.................Oh shit! Thats a really small bear!" So I started easing backwards hoping to get back to my river crossing without it or any other bears that might be there ever seeing me. The wind was blowing straight from me to it. I took one step back watching the little one before noticing MAMA as she stood up on the other side of that downed tree on her hind legs.
Ok...I thought black bears were small. Always kinda thought I could fend one off if need be. Nope. That thing was a solid two feet taller than me standing on its hind legs and looked like a freaking morbidly obese 8 foot tall NFL offensive lineman with a nasty, mean face. My only thought was "if she decides I'm too close and a threat to her cub, I'm dead as fuggg. There was no fleeting idea that I could win...at all. She stood there staring at me from 45 yards away moving her head back and forth but never taking her eyes off me. I grabbed a pretty stout stick that was beside me as I backed up saying "hey bear" because supposedly they understand those words, as that's what everyone says to say. I'm trying to figure out whether I'm supposed to stand my ground, fight, play dead, look big, make noise, whistle and pretend I don't see it....I can't remember what I'm supposed to do for grizz vs black...all while pushing the tormenting thought of "why am I out here without my gun" out of my brain. I bought a 10mm to carry for this very reason, and here I am with a freaking stick.
Fortunately, she just stood there and watched me back away saying hey bear and whacking the stick on anything that would make noise until I got to my creek crossing and skipped across that water and hauled ass back to my truck.
I went and bought a bear tag, and despite several evenings on the ridge overlooking that area and one stalk into the wind along the creek bottom, I never saw that or any bear again. During the one turkey hunt, the one bear stalk, and one more asparagus picking trip, we could smell the bear at various points along the creek, and there was plenty of sign where it had pulled big rocks up and turned them over looking for grubs and such...but no sightings with gun in hand. So...another lesson learned...I will not walk anywhere in any woods in Wyoming without at least my pistol.
I ended up roosting a gaggle of longboards, jakes, and two hens that evening. They were in a bad spot, and we would need to be there very, very early to get anywhere near them without being seen. We, of course, were very late the next morning and our best chance was to set up about 900 yards away and facing into the rising sun.
They were gobbling as we set up, and once they hit the ground, all but two or three worked away from us. We could not see them, but we could hear them traveling in the wrong direction. They would not answer my glass call, so I hit the wingbone, and at least one was hammering back every time I'd yelp. I kept at it pretty aggressively for 30 or so minutes as they would answer every call I threw at them. So, I look over at Holleman and say, "they love the wingbone." I'm shielded from a stump in front of me, but he's fully exposed to the sun thats just peaking over the crest of the rise in front of us, and his face is lit up like a bulb. He's wearing a head net that has a hole from above his eyes to below his nose, and he's glowing, so I reach into my vest and pull out my triple camo makeup tube and go to work on his face...as you can see in the pics...which resulted in about 3-4 minutes of not calling, and that break got them on the move.
Once my boy was painted and re-situated, I called, and they hammered it from much closer. There was a rise between the birds and us with the sun just over it, and I couldn't see anything. Holleman said he could sort of see if the birds came over the hill between the sun and the river, but it was a bad setup. I called again and they were just over the hill and close. I switched to my diaphragm call and just started "whep"-ing, because the hens whep out here like eastern cut. They loved it so I kept whep-whep-whep ing and they freaking gobbled every breath for a solid minute until I ran out of breath and needed a break...it was awesome! I've never had birds lose their mind over calling like that...over anything like that. Holleman cut his eyes over at me and he does not cuss, but I think he came real close to saying "daaaaayyyum!"
He says, "I see them." I ask how far and he says he can't really tell and that they are moving into the sun. He's squinting hard and can't see anything anymore. I'm looking left of sun trying to see something. Then all of a sudden, they were well right of the sun and standing 25 yards away. I figured they saw us when they all three stopped, but then they all double gobbled and started walking closer. Longbeard in the front, Jake in the middle, and longbeard in the back. I tell Holleman to ease the gun over and shoot the front bird. He tries to move the bipod the gun is resting on. I tell him to just swing the gun and the bipod will bend out of the way. He isn't understanding, and he's trying to move the bipod with his foot all stealthy like. Finally he kicks the bipod to the right which alerts the turkeys, and they start putting and going back the way they came in a hurry. Holleman swings the gun over and asks "Which One?" By that time, I'm blinded again, so I say "Back One" as it would be closest and all three are legal birds.
"Blammmm!" I can't see the bird, but I can hear him flopping! I'm not sure how he pulled the shot off as blinded as we were, but there was one hole in the upper back part of the near side breast and the neck was destroyed. He was using my Benelli, and he is now wanting me to make him his own wingbone call, he's taken over my glass pot call, and he now wants his own 12 gauge shotgun; I'll gladly accommodate! Trying not to think about the fact that he will soon be choosing to hunt with his buddies, but that's the way The Wheel turns!
My youngest and my wife never got fired up enough to want to get up at 3am, so that is it for 2026. Two turkeys, one hog, one rattlesnake, a pile of ramps, a sack full of wild asparagus, one pair of stained underwear, and a lot of pain from things that will heal or already have.
God is great; all the time!
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Last edited by WhitewaterDuck; 06-05-2026 at 10:28 PM.
“I can’t wait ‘till I’m grown” is the stupidest @!#* I ever said!
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