A favorite scouting experience was when a gobbler challenged me to a fight. If I didn't have a camera, I wouldn't tell the story. Took place in '96:

I took my wife on a morel hunt on a Sunday into a new patch of woods that I could hunt, thinking of scouting and finding a few shrooms to boot. (no Sunday hunting in MD). About 10 am, I give a toot on my tube call and got a hard gobble. The wife is a non-hunter, but an understanding soul, so I decide to give up the gob (never call in a gob that you want to kill later) just so my wife could see what it's all about. Two gobs came running in, one spooking right off the bat as we were not in camo. The other one came in and gave us a great display:



The one gob strutted, and kept coming in closer and closer and closer. The wife knows to sit still, and the bird came in and circled the two of us, so close I could have kicked it - that is my knee in this pic.



After circling us, gobblin' his brains out. I slipped a mouth call in and did aggravated purrs to get a reaction. He got so close I was getting nervous:




The bird gobbled, but tired of the game and continued on his way; I told the wife I was going to "educate" him: I ran at the turkey when he was ~35 yds away and he unexpectedly went back into strut!


The bird started aggravated purring, I continued my purring, and we started to circle each other. Well, I've seen knock-down turkey fights and knew what was coming next - wing beats and spurring. I've wrestled cannon-netted gobs before in trap-n-transplant operations, and I did not want to engage in a fair fight. I ran to a tree and the bird kept chased me around a tree as I snapped pics:



I had snapped most of a roll, and I yelled to my wife to come and get the camera. When she stood up, the bird stopped in his tracks, gave a loud alarm putt, and ran away. I was wearing a black T-shirt at the time - he no doubt treated me as a rival. When I suggested to the wife that I'd come back with my bow the following day, she told me that if I killed that bird, she'd never eat turkey again. I never did go back...

-fsh