by Greg Koelker
For several seasons there has been a 40 foot tall cherry tree, maybe 2 feet across at the base that has succumbed to wind and the erosion of the clay it is growing in causing it to gradually fall over the ridge road and get a little lower each year. Its tree top has held it up. The wind – maybe you recall it – this winter/spring has piled on an elm tree right on top of the cherry. The elm was uphill across the road leaving limbs down to the road. I was driving Sherman up the hill to try and fill a turkey tag yesterday when I came across the impasse. We’ll call it Problem one. I parked the Ranger and grabbed my shotgun and decoys and waded through the downed timber. Just above it I found Problem two. The clay ridge road was deeply rutted by the recent rains – you may have noticed them too.
Anyway, Sherman probably could have straddled the ruts and traversed the twenty yards or so of bad road given a chance. I trudged onward and upward. I made it to the field on top and hiked over to our ridgetop hay barn. Whenever I approach it these days I remember the day in 2019 when mountain kids Ben and Christine had their formal wedding pictures taken by it. I suspect that was something new that spiced up the long mostly boring experience of that way over a century old building.
Anyway, I put out my decoys and made an aggressive turkey call and retired to the shadows of the inside of the barn. It was then I realized Problem three: my fold up hunting chair was not where I left it last fall. Grumbling at myself for not checking if the chair was there earlier, I managed a spot on the edge of a fast deteriorating round hay bale. A tom gobbled in the distance and then another! I just kept quiet. My decoys started causing double-takes for me though. The jake deke was on a swivel stake and was moving in the growing breeze. Eventually, I was looking around the interior of the barn when I spied a rounded something in the hay. As it happened, it was part of the frame of my chair sticking out from under a hay pile. I retrieved it and took a seat. As the sun rose, I had to move back into the shade behind the barn. I heard a yelp in the woods, and a gobble and I got excited. I enjoy talking to turkeys. I have been called one often enough I guess. Anyway, I used a yelp call and then my cell vibrated in my pocket. We’ll call this Problem four; it was a text warning that there was a tornado/thunderstorm warning for the area. @#$! I waited a little while longer as the breeze grew up into a full blown wind and made my way back to the ranch. Later, El and I were talking to mountain man Mark in Colorado when she laughed and pointed out the kitchen window. There was a turkey. Now that’s just Ma Nature being mean. It was a pretty hen that was dining in our yard.
I heard Dan Small on the Larry Meillor show talking about Wisconsin turkey hunting on Thursday. Dan has turkey hunted here at Grouse Hollow one time. Anyway, he nailed how I feel about turkey hunting. Basically, forced to choose between spring turkeys and deer hunting, turkey hunting would get my vote. I love the weather (usually), the new growth in the woods, the possibility of finding a bonus morel mushroom dinner, the birds and animals including deer and coyotes and foxes, that mostly ignore you while camouflaged and sitting still in the woods, and the turkey talk. I have been fortunate to kill a tom turkey or two in the fifty years since they were reintroduced to Wisconsin, the year before we moved to the farm.
Until next time, get out – I am sure many of you remember the great Pearl Swiggum and her Stump Ridge columns. Ellen and I got to meet Pearl at a Christmas party for the Vernon County Broadcaster back in the day. We had a great visit. She complimented me saying she enjoyed reading my column – at that time called just Outdoors. The Readstown Public Library invites the community to a special program, “A Rare Pearl: Honoring the Legacy of Pearl Swiggum,” on Saturday, May 9 at 1:30 p.m. at the Advancement Building (208 W. Center St. in Tourist Park, Readstown). See more on VernonReporter.Com
Pray for peace.
Greg Koelker is a lifelong resident of the Driftless region along the Mississippi River. He is the acclaimed author of the “Grouse Hollow Journal,” a column that celebrates rural life, nature, family heritage, and the traditions that bind communities together. While technically focused on the “outdoors,” his writing often explores broader themes of community values and education.
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