Gabriel of South Ridge

By By Otha Barham / outdoors editor
April 23, 2004
Editor's note: This is the first of two parts from Otha Barham's award winning article published in Turkey Call magazine.
The first time I heard him gobble was on opening day of Maryland's spring turkey season. He and a companion gobbler were sounding off on a high ridge, responding to another hunter's calls. We were over a mile from the nearest woods road and the hunter had to have walked there and climbed a steep ridge in the dark as I had.
Presently the hunter shot and I marked one gobbler off my mental list. But within a few minutes the other bird resumed gobbling, not far from where his partner had just bitten the dust. "He's a gutsy one," I thought. I sent a few yelps his way from my spot on an adjacent ridge and he answered. But it didn't surprise me that he would not change ridges and come my way. He went silent as the sun flooded the woods.
I made my next hunt in the same area to try for this vocal gobbler. A bird bold enough to gobble in the face of his enemies was a worthy quarry. I was to find out just how worthy.
I had found this spot by choosing the most remote area on the map of western Maryland's Green Ridge State Forest. Fortunately there were turkeys there, as I had hoped, and they were not disturbed by hunters who stayed close to the roads.
The battleground
On my second hunt I discovered a small elongated hill nestled between two huge parallel ridges. The southern ridge was where the two gobblers had been sounding on opening day and the northern one was where I had listened and called from. I would later refer to this diminutive rise as "My Ridge," because all my successes for the four seasons I hunted there would occur here between South Ridge and North Ridge as I called them.
I set up on My Ridge and called when I heard no early gobbles. Immediately the bird answered from atop South Ridge and began coming my way. I stayed put and when I went silent he stopped gobbling. I got ready, but didn't have much confidence he would cross the ravine between us. Minutes passed. Suddenly I heard a step in the leaves behind me. "Darn!" I exclaimed. "That smart bird has sneaked up the hill behind me." Thinking I had been out maneuvered, I whirled hard left and shouldered my gun. The gobbler turned at the sight of me but hesitated a second and I rolled him.
When I picked the bird up, I saw it was a jake. This young gobbler had heard the calling and came in silently to avoid a fight with the boss bird. I should have known the big one would not have hesitated and offered me a shot. I now had further educated the old turkey.
With a season limit of two gobblers, I still could try for the South Ridge bird, and try I did. I spent the whole season after that one tom. He eluded me time after time. To make matters worse, he gobbled more and more as the season progressed. He gobbled every day I hunted him. His gobbling brought other hunters from their listening spots along the distant roads.
One day I was calling from my ridge in the rain at mid-morning. He answered. With the wind blowing in the downpour, I tried to gauge the bird's distance and ran in that direction to set up. We met in the rain and he spooked. I only got a glimpse. I now had a bird who was learning that my calling meant danger.
Once I could hear several other hunters yelping to the bird hours after sunup. The tom gobbled at all of us and then simply walked right out of that part of Maryland, gobbling every step. I believe he knew we were fake hens and wanted us to know he was insulted.
Futile attempts
I would walk in well before daylight and work him early. He would not come but he would wake up the dead with his gobbling. I would set up high above him and could hear other hunters closing in from the roads, owling and calling while coming to those booming gobbles.
I began to call the talkative bird Gabby. By now he was dominating my thoughts. I had to drive 150 miles from my apartment in Washington D.C. to these woods and the drive gave me plenty of time to lay strategy. The tom had heard every type call I and the other hunters had.
He was now fully educated.
On the other hand, I knew a lot about Gabby and his habits. He always roosted in a giant pine tree which rose from a small streambed at the western end of My Ridge. He would pitch from a high limb to a bench on South Ridge where he would work his way to its crest to gobble. I could have hidden in the dark on South Ridge and ambushed him, but this was not an option for me when dealing with such a worthy gobbler.
On one long drive to his woods, I made a different plan. I would feel my way through the black woods in the dark and get on South Ridge far to the east and try calling him along the hill away from his normal path. This would be the day I would call Gabby in.
(To be continued next week).