John Flores: Spring approaches, so it's time for a turkey quest

Earlier this week I received an e-mail from a dear friend in Lafayette with a picture attached. It was of a vase sitting on his desk and in it were two turkey feathers.
Feathers I had given him.
In his e-mail Danny said, “My feathers keep telling me that I promised a new brother was soon coming. They say I promised this years ago. What do I tell lonesome feathers?”
Danny, 17 or 18 years older than me, over the years has not been just a friend, but a mentor in a lot of ways too. The year I turned 57 I decided to take up turkey hunting, sharing with him how I wanted to try and get the grand slam. It meant harvesting four species of turkeys, the Eastern, Rio Grande, Merriam and Osceola.
Danny listened to my excitement while visiting one day and encouraged me to do it. Moreover, give him a feather over the course of the odyssey.
First came the Eastern in a bottomland hardwood forest in Mississippi. It was not far from the county and setting of William Faulkner’s classic coming of age story, “The Bear.”
Since I was green and new to this type of hunting, I connected with a guide in Natchez and booked a hunt called “Gobblers and Gardenias.” The hunt was part of a getaway package, where guests stayed at the Briar’s Bed and Breakfast, an 1818 Antebellum home located on the bluffs above the Mississippi River.
While I hunted in the morning, my spouse was pampered and treated to a massage and fine breakfast. Thus, the Gardenias part!
The hunt was textbook. While the stars overhead were fading, my guide made a few soft hen clucks on a slate call in the twilight. Off in the distance a gobbler answered from his roost. We walked perhaps 200 yards towards the bird and set up on a little knoll, placing a few decoys below us and waited.
My guide softly called again. Only this time the forest rang out with a loud booming gobble that lifted the hairs on my neck. It was like nothing I’d ever experienced.
I briefly saw the amore-swollen red head of the gobbler before it locked onto the decoys and sprinted towards them. In my excitement, somehow my shotgun got tangle in the brush in front of me that I used to break up my silhouette and I couldn’t get a shot off.
In the process I managed to spook the bird and he flew off escaping the ambush. With my head down and chin on my chest disgusted, my guide simply said not to worry, we’d go get another one.
And we did. Much like the first bird, we followed the same script. Only this time I connected on my first ever turkey. A big Tom with a 10-inch-long beard.
The next year came the Rio Grande species from the panhandle of the Republic of Texas, where farming and cattle ranching share the landscape with the wilds of the southern prairie.
This time I decided to go semi-guided, where you’re provided a place to hunt with a few starting points, but you’re pretty much on your own. This time my wife accompanied me on the hunt and after a few days of learning the ropes, I connected on a nice Tom that came out of some plum thickets and followed a little cottonwood bottom, where we had set up.
As such, the disease of the turkey chase had cut my skin from the spurs of two Toms who’s feathers and beards lie in repose on a stand in my office. However, today the agon within myself remains only halfway measured.
Year three found me chasing the Merriam species with my wife once again. This time we hunted the northern prairies of Nebraska. Only, a spring snowstorm caused turkeys to silence their amore until another more pleasant week occurred of which we were unavailable.
We were invited to come back the next year by our host as a result. And year four I connected on a good gobbler, but when I passed my hand over the beauty of its feathers, I noticed creamy brown tips instead of the pure white ones a Merriam is known for. When I asked our guide and host about the northern Nebraska birds, he said, “Yes. Some of our birds are hybrid Eastern-Rio-Merriam cross.”
I felt like I ended the life of an imposter!
The next year (year 5) would take me further west to the Black Hills of South Dakota trying yet again for a “pure” Merriam this time. One could see why the Lakota Sioux would fight so hard to keep this land.
For three days I hunted this sacred country hard. Perhaps even retracing the steps of the Indian boys who pretended to count coup on each other, like their fathers did in battle with their enemies.
On the last day I would be within 20 yards of a beautiful Merriam Tom. But alas, to shoot where he stopped in a patch of tangled brush would have decapitated my young guides head. The old Merriam retreated when he detected my hesitation to live another day.
Year six found me in Sun Spot at the top of the Sacramento Mountains near Cloudcroft, New Mexico, with a friend who stood as my best man when Christine and I married. We hunted 8,000-foot elevations morning till dusk only once hearing the call of Mr. Merriam.
That morning he called from up the slope and seemingly laughed. In vain we tried to keep up with this mountain bird, but, like a ghost, he vanished.
During the spring of 2020, we were in the beginning throes of a pandemic, and Toms everywhere for the most part were able to call their girls in peace.
This week the 2021 Spring Turkey season began in parts of Texas and Mississippi. The first week of April both Arkansas and Loui-siana’s will open their season.
Louisiana has plenty of public land to hunt turkeys and March is a perfect time to scout places like Kisatchie National Forest, Fort Polk WMA and Peason Ridge WMA (Note: the latter two owned by the Department of Defense and subject to closures).
I’m ready to continue the quest of the grand slam but have to admit the fire in my bosom has given way to the condition of a waning prime with each passing year. I’ve learned time is never on the side of mortals. As such, this pursuit must be taken up again sooner and not later.