On Tuesday, April 5th, I phoned the Pierre office of SD Game, Fish, & Parks. My turkey tag hadn’t yet arrived, and opening day was the coming Saturday, April 9th. I was a wee bit concerned. “Don’t worry,” they said. “There’s a glitch in the system, and your tag is in the mail.” Guess what. No tag in Wednesday’s mail. I next emailed SDGF&P about my turkey tag. Their reply? Same as Tuesday’s. “Your tag is in the mail.”

Guess again. No tag in Thursday’s mail. This time I called the Ft. Pierre licensing office. They in turn referred me to the Chamberlain office. “Would I drive to Chamberlain and pick up my license?”

“No I wouldn’t with today’s gas prices. How about emailing me a note saying I can hunt. I’m going turkey hunting on Saturday – tag or no tag.” That idea didn’t fly with Game & Fish. Now they offered to hand-deliver the tag to my door step. Around 6:00 P.M. an attractive conservation officer named Diana delivered my tag. I could have hugged her. I was that happy!

I would love to embellish Saturday morning’s hunt – ultra wily toms, our expertly camouflaged blind, camouflage clothing, face paint, Chuck’s provocative calling…..but it wasn’t that way. It was far easier than those wily gobbler stories one reads about in outdoor magazines.

I pulled into Chuck’s Missouri River bottom yard around 7:30 A.M. Chuck was feeding cattle at the north end of the yard, and as I walked toward his tractor, I could see a few gobblers milling about beyond the feed lot. When chores were finished a few minutes later, Chuck led me to our blind – two round bales. A piece of burlap sack with two pie-shaped peep holes was stretched between the bales. We would sit on the five-gallon buckets between the bales and ambush a tom as it strolled by. Chuck, in his on-going effort to assist me, had acquired an adjustable tripod with gun rest yokes on either end. We adjusted the shotgun to lineup with the port holes.

Last year Chuck had placed a blind north of the feedlot, and he called in the gobbler I shot with my 125 year-old 16 gauge with side hammers and Damascus twist barrels. I had custom loaded my ammo with black powder. This year I would use my modern over & under 12 gauge. When we were seated, Chuck said I could shoot the first gobbler that came along, or we could watch them strut around for a while. I liked his confidence.

Almost immediately hens started running by from the north or left to right as we faced the east. As the hen parade continued, I began to worry. Where were the toms? Would they be running like the hens? Could I hit a running gobbler in the head?

Tension mounted as 15-20 minutes passed. Now the sun presented a further problem as it shone in my eyes. And then three young gobblers came in from the right that had snuck in around behind us. Just what I wanted. They were close…..almost too close. The middle bird stretched his neck as he strutted around the others. I selected my more open choked barrel and fired.

Picking the bird revealed a perfect shot. Not a pellet in the body – not even the neck! I was the world’s luckiest hunter as Grandpa Chuck (where did the time go?) once again guided his old high school principal to a great time plus a turkey in the freezer. We talked as we plucked the bird. Chuck suspected that the toms were edgy as archery hunters had disturbed their roost earlier in the week.

In my recent “Tulsa Trip” column, I blamed President Biden for the surge in gasoline prices. Readers, my own daughter included, informed me that supply & demand, not the president, determined gas prices. Production diminished on account of the pandemic, and the pre-virus production has not resumed. This drove up the price of crude oil. It appears that the big oil companies are setting the price. I stand corrected. Maybe it’s time to hit them with a windfall profit tax.

The president did shut down the Keystone XL pipeline project. At the time of President Biden’s taking office, XL Pipeline production was still two years away. Today we’d be there if he had left things as they were. Might this have affected the price increase? I don’t know. I do know that we will be dependent on oil for the next 20-30 years conservatively, and I suspect we’ll one day see that pipeline.

See you next week with an incredible hunting adventure.