“Spring Strut”

A beautiful morning, the bus glides smoothly down into the valley. We approach the river and off to my left I notice a flock of turkeys in a clearing. It’s spring and the Tom has his feathers all spread out strutting his stuff to impress all the hens.  We continue on and this picturesque view of nature fades from sight, I look in the mirror and there he is on my bus, a Tom, with his sleeves rolled up flexing his biceps trying to impress the hen across the aisle. The hunter instinct in me goes to work. First, distract the Tom from the hen with a call. So I call in a very worried and concerned voice, “Tom, are you alright?” Good, hearing the concern in my voice he now turns his attention to me and asks, “Why, what’s wrong?” I take careful aim and fire, “Well, I noticed a mosquito bite on your arm and I wanted to make sure you were ok.” A cackle from the hen and he went down in a cloud of smoke with an “Oh, man!” I love turkey season.