Bear Grease - Ep. 207: This Country Life - The Gift of Time

Episode Date: April 19, 2024

The gift of our time is a valuable commodity, as it's the one thing none of us know with certainty how much we have left of it to give. This week, Brent talks about how he values time and tells a story about how he and his brother occupied theirs on a turkey hunting trip to Kansas. Put on your deerstalker hat, like the one Sherlock Holmes made famous, and crack a case to win a Case pocket knife. Listen to the show for details on how to participate, as well as on how to get your favorite story told on a future episode of MeatEater's This Country Life podcast. Connect with Brent and MeatEater MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop Bear Grease MerchSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

First Lights fieldwear collection is made for the work that happens long before opening day and continues when the season ends. Products built for early mornings, full days in real use. Hard wearing where they need to be versatile where it matters. No shortcuts. Just gear designed for the work that earns the season. Built to perform, built to last. Check out. First Light's new fieldwear gear at firstlight.com.

Welcome to This Country Life. I'm your host, Brent Reeves. From Coon Hunting to Trotlining and just general country living, I want you to stay a while as I share my stories and country skills that will help you beat the system. This Country Life is proudly presented as part of Meat Eaters Podcast Network, bringing you the best outdoor podcast the Airways have to offer. All right, friends, pull you up a chair or drop that tailgate. I think I got a thing or two to teach you.

The gift of time. Time is a precious gift and one that shouldn't be taken or given lightly. We've only got so much of it. Time is a blessing and a thief, and I'm going to talk about that today. I've got a special announcement coming up at the end of this episode, so be sure to hang around at the end. But first, I'm going to tell you a story. Nine years, 11 months, and five days ago,

my brother Tim and I were in Kansas, turkey hunting at my friend Clayton Dick's place up at Northeast Kansas. Now, Clayton is a coyote hunter and hunted with my dad here in Arkansas along with a lot of other folks. And Clayton had invited me to come up and hunt on his land and said it was covered up in turkeys. It was a heck of a drive up there and I didn't want to drive it by myself. It took several attempts, but finally, after buying his license and tag, my brother Tim

agreed to go with me. Now, if you're a new listener to this country life, Tim was my older brother. If you're a regular listener to this country life, you should know that among all the wonderful qualities my partner in buffoonery, mentor, and hero possesses, being away from home ain't one of them. He's a lot like our dad was.

He likes to go and do stuff, but at bedtime, he prefers to be at home. And bedtime for him is usually not long, after dark. He likes things the same way all the time. No deviation is his policy. He goes to bed early. He reads for a while before cutting out the light and going to sleep. Regardless of the outside temperature or time of the year, he keeps a window, he keeps a window cracked, a fan blowing, and both of his feet sticking out from the bottom of the covers. For the rest of his sleeping habits, you can refer back to episode 119 of Duck Camp Etiquette of this country life.

Anyway, fact, Tim doesn't like to travel. He wants to be somewhere and do whatever he does there, but then he wants to be home. Nothing wrong with that, but for a cameraman trying to make his mark in the outdoor business, I needed someone to film, and I didn't want just anybody. I wanted Tim. So I bribed him with his turkey tags and the romance of traveling out of state to hunt a turkey. We were going on safari all the way to Kansas.

After almost 12 hours of driving, of which Tim did zero, we finally pulled into Clayton's house. He got us lined out for the next morning's hunting by daylight the next morning we were listening to turkeys blowing the bark off of trees and watching them strut away in the distance with a harem of hens. Set up after set up had us on turkeys. And we weren't lacking for finding them. They were everywhere.

Clayton was right. His property was covered up in them. And those goblers, man, they were covered up with hens. No big deal. With that much action going on, it was only a matter of time before we accidentally sat down in front of a bunch of turkeys that were walking in our direction rather than away from. from it. We were driving around glass and fields and prairie for groups of turkeys and spotted a group of

a dozen or more, a mile or more away that had several strut and turkeys in it. We studied them, the terrain that they were moving across, and the direction they were traveling with my camera and a little known mapping app that had just come out the year before called Onex. That would be the first time I would use it to get in front of a turkey. We hatched a plan, loaded up in the truck, and started easing that way down Tumbleweed road in the middle of Clawhammer, Kansas. I was driving in the middle of this gravel road, taking my time and looking at the map for the place we'd planned to park to get after those turkeys.

We met a couple of cars and moved over, and we were getting close to where we were going to make our play when Tim said there's a car coming up behind us. Well, I glanced in my rearview mirror, and I saw the weirdest contraption I'd ever seen. It was a little car with a periscope-looking deal mounted to the roof, and as it got closer, I saw it it was a Google Maps car coming up behind us. I moved over, and Tim and I did our dead-level best to show the world through Google Maps that we're a couple of clowns. We were waving our arms out the windows like we were karate fighting the swarm of yellow jackets.

The little car shot on past us, I told Tim, too bad that Joker didn't come by 30 minutes from now, and he asked me why. I said, because it could take a picture of the turkey you're about to kill. We laughed. 28 minutes later, Tim pulled the trigger on the first and only turkey he's ever taken out of the state of Arkansas. Plus, we just had our picture taken by the Google Car. And that's just how that happened. But wait, there's more.

You didn't think that's how this story would end, did you? you with some anti-climactic ending. Come on, man, y'all know me better than that. I've given you every clue you need to win a brand new case pocket knife that I will send to you from my personal collection for the first person to find mine and Tim's picture on the hunt I just told you about and send it to the email address. I'm going to give you at the end of this episode.

Don't send it to me. Send it to the one I give you at the end of the show. screenshot it and send it in with your information. The first person that does it wins the knife. Trust me, it's there. I just looked at it. The gift of time. Inviting someone on an adventure can mean a lot of things

and encompass a whole lot of different opportunities. It can be as little as offering a seat to tag along, paying for a hunt or a fishing trip to go with a guide, or maybe working on a strategy yourself to set someone. someone up for success, running trail cameras or baiting a bear, scouting online, on foot, getting permission, planting food plots, brushing blinds, hanging stands, whatever the case may be that has you doing all the legwork only to hand it over to someone else to reap all the benefits of your labor.

Given anyone anything shouldn't be done lightly and in return, the person receiving it shouldn't take it for granted either. I know there's not a lot of thought that goes. into saying, hey, want to go fishing if fishing for you is walking out behind the barn to the pond. I'm not trying to make more out of something that isn't there. I know my way of thinking probably isn't mainstream, and I may put too much emphasis on the invitation, but consider this. The vast majority of the memories that I've related on this show have culminated from an

impromptu opportunity to share the wilderness with someone that got me to thinking about the importance and the value of giving someone an outdoor experience and how it's received. Now, these thoughts wouldn't have entered my mind a few years ago, and I catch myself now thinking back to times when I should have asked someone to go with me. I always talk about the joy of shared experiences being multiplied, and I firmly believe that's true. But in the early stages of my outdoor life, the outcome of that trip was what I based my success around. I actually had to wait until it was over to know whether I'd enjoyed myself. My value was placed on the contents of my game bag or the fishing crib.

I think back now on times when I was a kid and even a young adult hunting with my dad, family and friends, and nine times out of ten, the harvest is a little foggy. But the interaction with them are what is crystal clear. Last spring, Clay Newcomb and I collaborated with Jason Phelps at Phelps game calls and building each of our own favorite turkey diaphragms called prime cuts. Now I'm going to tell you, I love mine because it's easy to use. I'm not going to go, I'm not going to win a turkey calling contest. It's just not going to happen.

But when I run this call, I get the sounds that gobblers are looking for. I have a great turkey hunting track record. If you go listen to real turkeys out in the woods, they're not going to win calling contests, right? That's who I listen to. I can make those sounds. on my cut. I also hunt with Phelps's cut

and I hunt with Clay's cut because they're all three great cuts. Check out Prime Cuts at Phelpsgamecalls.com. I think you'll be glad you did and you'll find out that the Steve Ronella cut is an easy-to-use cut for beginning callers

who just want to start making good turkey noises and getting action. A couple weeks ago, I was in Mississippi turkey hunting with my friend Jordan Blissitt. Jordan and I had been burning gas and boot leather looking for turkeys that had a chronic case of the lockjaw. We couldn't find a goblin turkey with a search warrant. Sometimes it'd be that way. But it certainly wasn't for a lack of trying, and we found a little comfort in that no one else was hearing turkeys either where we were.

Misery loves company, and there were seven of us in camp. We were all suffering together, and then keep you. Keith Polk called Jordan and said, I heard three this morning, you and Brent, come on. Man, he didn't have to tell us twice. After two and a half days of listening, walk, and call and driving, and repeating it over and over again, Keith had thrown us a rope before we drowned in a sea of despair and disappointment.

We met Keith at the appointed rally point after some highly original navigation by Jordan. We were six minutes late. Now, that has nothing to do with the story. Just thought I'd throw that in. in there for Jordan's benefit. Anyway, I jumped in the truck with Keith, and away we went, Jordan following close behind. Soon, we were all standing together after slipping behind Keith to a point of an oak ridge facing north and waiting for goblin time.

They commenced a hoot, and soon enough we heard a turkey. I dang near gobbled myself, listening to their high-pitched squeal and low-end owl hoots. I can make a turkey gobble with my rendition of a barred owl, but that's a dang nearer gobble. That high note they and others I know use absolutely alludes my vocal range. Those boys are flirting with falsettos that would make the BGs jealous. Anyway, the goblin was music to our ears and away we went. We sat up in our first location and had a gobbler entrance several times. We heard a hen yupe-y-uping back at us, and we knew we were probably in for a long hunt,

which was not what we counted on. Jordan and Keith both had businesses to attend to later in the morning, so if it was going to happen, it needed to happen quick. A gobbler with hens hunt isn't usually very fast or successful, but it was the only game in town and we were in it. Then we realized we were here in a second turkey moving in from the west, and the gobbler we'd initially sat down on wasn't getting any closer. We could hear drumming, and while that sound is subtly subdued,

can hear it a long way if you know what you're listening for, and the conditions are right. Keith knows that property inside and out, and he showed me his own X map of how the property laid out, and it made sense that while we could hear that turkey drumming, it was obvious he was in a small opening at the edge of the property, just strutting back and forth and gathering up hens for the daily spring singles mixer he was hosting. For the hands we could hear, and the addition of gobbler that was easing away, it seemed like the place to be. So we got up and we moved closer. Keith took us on a roundabout course that got us within 125 yards of the dance party.

Now, we may have been a football field away from the band, but we were on the dance floor for sure. In addition to that, there was a small wood road that wound from where we stood to where that gobbler was dropping them sick. beach from behind the DJ booth. Jordan and I grabbed a tree on the east side of that little road and the edge of a pine thicket. Keith picked one a few yards south of us. Tare media at west and north was hardwoods and the extra turkey that was gobbling his way closer to the shindig being hosted

in front of us. We called and both turkeys answered. First turkey is still in his spot and the other turkey getting a little closer to him. We weren't battling turkeys now. I felt good about what lay before us. These turkeys had had very little hunting pressure on them. They weren't call shy.

They didn't get any outside influence in this place that Keith had developed into a little turkey sanctuary. I felt good, great even, about my chances of killing the turkey. The turkeys weren't the issue. Time was. Normally, faced with a scenario, like this, time is on my side. I just sit and wait for the hens to slip off, and the turkey I first started messing with comes in like he owns the place,

strutting and gobbling when he gets close enough, I send a dip of lead shot for him to put between his cheek and gum. Or old sneaky Pete that was occasionally gobbling from the west, he'll shut his pie hole and slips in in stealth mode, looking to elope with the cause he's been here, and that sounds like a hen turkey, but looks a whole lot like gnarkey, me with a shotgun.

Now this day, time was not on my side. I was hunting with a couple of fellas that look at life responsibly and take their work seriously. They're not going to miss appointments. How I got hooked up with them, I have no idea. But the sand and the ironglass was running out, and when it did, regardless of what was taking place in the hunt, they both had to go. And I understood, after all, I was the guest.

The goblin had gone silent for a couple of minutes while we were. waited to see what would happen next. Now, in my mind, I had already played it out about a hundred times. The pine thicket to the east wasn't too thick for that turkey to approach from, but he would have had to work a lot harder to get there. If he chose to come that way, when he got close enough to realize that he'd been tricked, he'd been close enough for me to reach out and grab him and take him hostage. If he came down the road from the north or through the oaks from the west, he was doomed.

A Kevlar vest, combat helmet, and Whalen's vet, Dr. Bradshaw, couldn't have saved him. I was excited and nervous with anticipation of what I felt was about to happen. I glanced at my watch. We were looking at about 20 more minutes before we had to skedaddle. Keith called from behind me and that turkey that hadn't gobbled in close to three minutes cut him off with a gobble. Here we go, I thought.

Twenty seconds later, boom! Someone across the property line put an end to the whole party, and a hush fell over the crowd. I knew what had happened immediately, but it was the one thing I hadn't counted on happening. It took me a few seconds to do all the math in my head, remembering how close we were to the property line in the corner from the map that Keith had showed me and estimating where the shot had come from. It seemed that that guy was about the same distance from the turkey that we were.

he just happened to be where that rascal wanted to go. The fact that Jordan and Keith were jumping up and charging in the direction of where that turkey just got smashed, validated my assumption that nobody was trespassing. That turkey died across the property line. I started laughing. I turned and looked at Jordan. He was laughing too. Keith eased up to where we were sitting and he was laughing. what else what else could we have done what would getting upset accomplish i'll admit in my younger days

i probably wouldn't have taken that roller coaster swing of emotion in such good stride but those younger days have gone and there's there's validity to the tired old adage of hunting isn't about killing i've said it and i've read it and it's the easy phrase to utter when you're unsuccessful or trying to explain to a non-hunter or even an anti-hunter while we do what we do. I didn't get up hours before dawn to go out there that morning, toting a seven-pound shotgun, enough calls to stock a small sporting goods store, and risking the West Nile virus, malaria and heartworms to listen to someone not in my hunting party shoot to turkey that I'd been frying in my head for the past 15 minutes.

So why was I laughing? It's because the gift had already been given to me that morning. I've said it before and I never tire of saying it. If it's not incoming gunfire, it ain't that big a deal, along with my dad's mantra of saying, If you ain't having fun, it's your own fault. Now you stir that up and you got yourself a recipe for laughing when your turkey dies at the hands of some nameless individual across the fence line.

Keith whipped out his phone and sent a text to his friend who hunted property next door. A minute later and, King. Keith gets a picture of a rubber boot on the neck of my Mississippi long beard. Or was it? I thank Keith for the invite and Jordan for hosting me while I was there, and they each tried to apologize for how that hunt unfolded. Now, they already knew because they were turkey hunters just like me, but I told them it didn't matter because it really didn't matter.

I've killed way over 100 turkeys in my life and watched at least the same number get thumped by folks. I was calling for or filming, and that one getting hauled out by someone else wasn't going to hurt me one bit either way. I told Keith that I appreciated him and Jordan for inviting me there and giving me the opportunity to experience the beauty and the drama that is spring turkey hunting. That's the gift. That's the gift that shouldn't be taken lightly or received as such.

For the folks like the three of us that were there that morning, four counting the dude across the fence, the interaction with the goblin turkey during the spring ritual is second to nothing. But only to those who value it as we do. It may be brim fishing to the next person, or deer hunting or frog gigging. It could be anything. That's why when I see an expensive paint described as a work of art that to me looks like a monkey with a box of colors did it in the dark, I have to let it go. beauty and value truly are in the eye of the beholder,

whether it's a big boss gobbler strutting in the gun range, a trout rising to a perfectly cast dry fly, or a piece of art that looks like a primate did it in the dark. Who are we to tell them they're wrong? They certainly can't tell us we are. We should appreciate even the smallest of gestures and gifts from our friends because if you really look at it and see what the true gift is in each event, It's not a freezer full of elk meat or a live well full of fish.

It's their time. Their time and your time. And there's only so much of it to go around. That's why it's important and that's why I value the outdoors so much. At least in my case, it's to share that time with someone I value, experiencing an event I value. Time, that's the most precious gift we can give.

I thank you for giving me your time each week. Now pay it forward, grab up a pal and go hunting, fishing, or shopping for monkey art, just spending some time with someone you value, and the rest take care of itself. We were almost all the way back to the truck when Keith got a second text from that cat that shot my turkey. Bing! Here's what it said. Y'all's turkey's still there. The turkey I killed came in from the west,

and fought the one y'all were working for about two minutes. Biggest fight I've ever seen. I called to him when it was over and he came running to me and I shot him. Well, dadgum, I forgot all about the second turkey. Time. There was a time when I would have turned around and went back after that Joker. But this time, our time, had run out. There was no more time.

and that's how it happens. What seemed like a cut and dried moment turned into something different. It went from fixing to kill a turkey to thinking that turkey was dead to learning that there'd be another time. Keith invited me back. And the hope and promise of another time? Well, that ain't a bad gift either. All right, y'all listen up.

Here's the announcement. I'm known for telling stories, mostly true ones. And through the feedback from my podcast listeners and meeting some wonderful people since this endeavor started, I've heard some great stories from them too. Some are too good not to tell.

And I think y'all will agree. So here's what I want you to do. If you have a story that you'd like me to share, send it to my T-C-L story at themeatater.com. We're going to give them a good once over and select a few occasionally for me to read. Not all of them. I can't do them all. But the good ones we're absolutely going to put out there.

I think it's a great way for us to interact and for me to get to know y'all while we're at it. Write out your stories as clearly as possible. There's no such thing as too much detail. You all just have to trust me to whittle them down to fit and I'll tell them. Send your story and don't forget that picture of me and Tim if you want that case pocket knife to my TCL story at the meat eater.com. Until next week, this is Brent Reeve, signing off. Y'all be careful.

First Lights Fieldwear collection is made for the work that happens long before opening day and continues when the season ends. Products built for early mornings, full days in real use, hard wearing where they need to be versatile where it matters, no shortcuts, just gear designed for the work. that earns the season. Built to perform, built to last. Check out.

First Light's new fieldware gear at firstlight.