Bear Grease - Ep. 317: This Country Life - Brave Turkeys and Squeaky Fences

Episode Date: April 25, 2025

Certain animals are known for certain behaviors, and the only safe bet in Nature is that there are no safe bets. Today, Brent’s gonna tell you about some out-of-the-ordinary events that involve wild turkeys. It's time for MeatEater’s “This Country Life” podcast. Subscribe to the MeatEater Podcast Network on YouTube Connect with Brent and MeatEater MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, and Youtube Clips MeatEater Podcast Network on YouTube Shop This Country Life Merch Shop Bear Grease MerchSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Welcome to this country life. I'm your host, Brent Reeves. From coon hunting to trot lining and just general country living, I want you to stay a while as I share my experiences and life lessons. This country life is presented by Case Knives on Meat Eaters Podcast Network, bringing you the best outdoor podcasts the airways have to offer. All right, friends, grab a chair or drop that tailgate. I've got some stories to share. Brave turkeys. and squeaky fences. I'm all about some turkey hunting, and this week we've got two great examples of the crazy things that go on chasing what the $100 bill guy wanted for our national bird.

Pay attention when you're out amongst them and you'll see some wild things. And I'm going to tell you all about it. But first, I'm going to tell you a story. The first offering is from TCL listener Nick Sorensen. Nick lives all the way up in northeast Iowa and has a great turkey story I want to share with you. So, in Nick's words and my voice, here we go. I just recently moved into a new area and was looking for places that were close to my new home to hunt. I stumbled upon an unlikely piece of public land that was not too far away, but it seemed kind of hard to access due to a river.

I had seen turkeys in that area, but most of them were on. private land. I figured out there was a small section of public that you could access by waiting through an oxbow. So I made a plan to do that on opening day. I showed up early since I didn't have time to roost the birds the night before. When I say early, I mean like two or three hours before shooting time. This gave me enough time to get a little blind built and hopefully not disturb the birds, you know, too much if they were very close. The forest started waking up and the goblers started going nuts. However, I was facing the wrong direction, but I felt like the birds were too close to make a change.

I was committed. I'm sitting next to a dead oak looking north and a gobbler about 80 yards in front of me finally let out a goblin. I couldn't see him on the roost, but I saw him when he pitched down a couple minutes later. and I must have got a little too close because he made a big loop around me and my decoys. The next couple of hours were uneventful and gobbles, man, they were pretty scarce. Eventually, the overwhelming urge to let loose on the outside all that I had been drinking that morning and was holding on the inside hit me. I did my best to make sure the coast was clear and I stood up slowly to take care of business. and I no more got started when I caught the flash of a fan in the morning light.

There stood a tom in his strut zone doing his thing about 50 yards south of me. The bird turned his back towards me, so I finished up and got myself put back together as fast as I could. The bird made another turn, and I tried my best to be one with the tree. And when he turned his back towards me again, I sat down and got in position. hoping a few soft yells would draw his attention. And it did not. So there I said for another 45 minutes,

calling every so often hoping to entice this turkey into heading my way who was strutting just out of sight. Finally, to my east, a group of four hens started making their way past me. I thought to myself this was it. There's no way there's not a tom hanging out with these hens. I watched these gals pecked their way through the four. forest and when all of a sudden a gobbler nearly spit in my right ear. My eyes darted to the right and there stood two goblers at seven yards.

They were spitting and drumming like it was going out of style. Once they saw my jack decoy, it was on. They rushed that hunk of plastic to teach him a lesson and show him who was boss. And I let him have their fun using him as a punching bag, bending the steak into oblivion, and then one of them. put enough distance between him and his buddy, and bam, I dropped that gobber like a bad habit. The hens got out of dodge at the shot, but his buddy, he didn't fall a suit. In the past, I've had birds beat up their fallen comrade or bolt off with the rest of them,

but this time he hung around right up until I carried this turkey to the truck. I stood in the woods a while filming this interaction and taking him, my photo with the bird I shot. And if you look in the background of the pictures, you'll see him walking around trying to figure out exactly what was going on. It was a unique experience, to say the least.

And I can't wait to see what Mother Nature has the store for me next week when the second season opens. And according to Nick Sorensen, the Brain Trust of Northwest Iowa, that's just how that happened. Well, Nick, I got to tell you, partner, that sounded like a tall turkey tail if I ever heard one, but alas, it was not.

For Nick has provided us with the video, and I'll be sharing it over on my Instagram page for all you doubters. Take that, internet detectives. It is really cool and a sight to see. Thanks for sharing, Nick. I talked about Max Kern on episode 195, Turkey Season Therapy. Mr. Max was 90 when he passed away four years ago. His health deteriorating to the point that the last few years of his life were spent mostly existing with not much living. Before that, however, Max Kern lived it and was a turkey killing machine up into his 80s. I met Mr. Max the first time I traveled with my dad to Missouri to meet him

and stay with our friends Toby and Mary, a tradition that continues. now for well over 20 years. Through that annual pilgrimage, I've gotten to know their extended family and friends broadened my circle of relationships with some of the best folks I've ever been blessed to know. To me, they are a true representation of Americana, farmers, builders, and a host of other blue-collar talent that operate independently for themselves, but also in conjunction with the community. It takes individual effort from them to all be successful as a whole.

Now, what's always caught my attention to is how clean everything is. You can drive from farm to farming from business to business and see the pride these folks taking how they look. And it's not just regulated to the small community of people and places I've been associated with for so long. It's that whole area of the state, at least everything that I've seen. Turkey hunting was the initial draw for my presence there, but just like raw milk sitting on the counter, when given enough time, the cream always rises to the top. The people from this place that have blessed me beyond measure are what keep me wanting to come back,

way more than the turkeys. Max was one of those people. My friend who I look upon as my brother, Toby Neymire, introduced me to Max. On my first visit, Dad and I rode over to his house with Toby, and on the way, we had to stop to let three strut and gobblers that were making circles in the middle of the road get out of the way so we could pass. I sat in the truck seat, my eyeballs running out on stems like I was in a cartoon and my bottom jaw on the floorboard.

Toby bumped the horn and the gobbler's hopped over on the shoulder, and as soon as we passed, they took right up where they left off when we interrupted. That was back during the boon of turkey populations everywhere when fringe areas of our nation had turkeys to some degree. Mediocre areas had turkeys in abundance, and historically good turkey areas were busting at the seams. I remember Mr. Max sitting in the shade of a big oak in his front yard. He had just finished mowing. We gathered up a couple more chairs and sat down talking turkeys and cout dogs. The latter being what I was.

least interested him. My dad, Max and Toby talking about hounds and me interjecting turkey questions whenever there was a slight pause in the conversation to the point of visible irritation on the face of my father every time I broke in taking Max's attention away from chasing coyotes. Toby's sent to my dad's annoyance finally stepped in and said, Max, will you take him hunting in the morning so he'll shut up before buddy kills him? I'm thinking to myself, take me hunting. I'm 35 years old.

I don't need this old man to take me hunting. He ain't going to do nothing but slow me down. Should have just kept my mouth shut and waited until they finished talking about those stupid dogs and then asked Mr. Max for some pointers on where I should go myself. Now Toby and his big mouth obligated both of us to hunt together. I don't even know if he wants to. And out of the four of us sitting there talking three quarters of him, them were running dog aficionados and only half of us turkey hunting. Of the two of us that did,

I was only positive that I knew how to kill the turkey. I just met this old man and even though he seemed spry, fit, or whatever you want to call it, he looked older than baseball and to a cat like me who loved to run and gun turkeys, it was going to be like dragging a ball and chain around the hills of central Missouri. Please, Lord, don't let this old man say, say yes, to Toby's request. On Blood Trails, the stories don't end when the hunt is over. They just get darker. I've seen something in the road.

I instantly thought it was a sleeping bag. And there was a full of blood. Oh, my God, he doesn't have a hit. Blood Trails is a true crime podcast born in the outdoors, where the terrain is unforgiving, the evidence is scarce, and the truth gets buried under brush and silence. Indications were he should be right there, but he wasn't. This season, we're going deeper.

From cold case files to whispered suspicions, from remote mountains to frozen backwards. Each story begins in the wilderness and ends in darkness. Because out here, there are no witnesses, no cameras, just fragments and the people left behind trying to piece them back together. He's not an honest person. He's incapable of being honest. Somebody somewhere knows something. I'm Jordan Sillers. Season 2 of Blood Trails premieres April 16th.

Follow now on Apple, I Heart, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts. Mr. Max looked over at me and said, be here in the morning and we'll go. I agreed and thanked him and acted excited and was giving Toby down the road in my head. You could only hunt until noon in Missouri back then, so I figured I'd drag this old man

around the woods in the morning for half a day, ruining that hunt, figure out some places to go, and on day two, I'd take care of business on my own. I was already preparing myself mentally for the geriatric duty Toby had just volunteered me for. Why did my dad teach me manners? I rolled up at Mr. Max's the next morning. He was sitting at the dinner table, working on a pot of coffee. His eyes smiling behind the gold frames of his glasses. He was sporting a fresh shave and his hair was combed as if he was fixing to go to church.

He welcomed me inside, offered me a chair at his table, and poured me a cup of Joe. We finished that cup, poured the rest in the thermos, and hit the door. He drove a red Ford Ranger pickup, and after loading my vest and gun, we tore off down the road at the breakneck speed of a herd of turtles. I figured that had to be an appropriate barometer for the rest of the day and even, even though I'd already capitulated that today was going to be an information gathering session with an old turkey hunter and nothing more, I was still disappointed that he didn't seem to be in a bigger hurry to get where we were going, even though I didn't know where that was.

Eventually, we pulled over the corner of someone's farm that he knew and got out and waited for goblin time. Can you hoot like an owl? Yes, sir. Well, give him one. I out and a turkey gobbled half a mile away. Max snapped his head over at me and said, boy, that was good. I said, yes, sir.

You think you know where he is? He said, know where he is. I said, that gobbler. He said, you heard of turkey? I said, yes, sir. And I pointed in the direction he'd gobbled. Mr. Max looked in that direction and looked back at me. He said, no, I can't hear worth a durn.

I was talking about your owlhood. That's pretty good. Pointed that turkey again. Well, I did. And he gobbled playing as a coming day that was lighting up the eastern sky about the same time. Mr. Max never flinched. You hear him that time? No, I didn't hear nothing. I figure he's about a half a mile due south of us, Mr. Max. He told me to get my stuff together, and we'd go give him a try. We stepped off the gravel road into the woods, me rolling my eyes and wishing I was anywhere, but on this nursing home field trip, and for the next three hours,

that gnome-sized old man of nearly 70 years tried to kill me one step at a time as we chased that nomad of a turkey all over Missouri up and down hill after hill running and gunning with the endurance of a marathon runner we zigged and zagged behind that turkey stopping only for me to catch my breath while mr max waited patiently we better get to moving if we're going to beat him to that crossing. He ain't broke a sweat, and he was wearing a winter coat in April. His breathing wasn't labored. I was about to die.

My legs ached from climbing hills that I don't have to climb in the river bottoms where I'm from, and I was gassed like I'd been running sprints at the end of football practice. The dread of having to drag someone through the woods had come to fruition that morning, but it was Mr. Max that was having to do it. You want to sit down and call here for a little bit, see if we can get one going? I knew when he said it, he was throwing me a bone, giving me the opportunity to say either no, meaning I'm good, let's go on, or yes, if I don't sit down, I'll never make it back to the truck. I squeaked out between labored breathing, I guess we can sit here for 20 minutes or so.

We sat down by a big white oak, and Mr. Max, began talking to me. Talking about the things I'd been asking about the day before, except today, he had plenty of time to answer while I rested. It didn't take long for me to realize I wasn't sitting under that tree with a man that hunted turkeys. I was sitting beside a show-nough turkey hunter. Missouri had an abundance of turkeys, no doubt, but you still had to trick them.

You could have more opportunities to get on them in high-density population, but there's a reason Eastern turkeys have the reputation of being hard nuts to crack, because they are. We headed back to the truck, having let that one get away by not being able to get in front of him. Had Mr. Max been by himself and not dragging the ball and chain around the woods that looked exactly like me, I'm quite sure that turkey would have never lived to make roosting time. Back at the truck, I guzzled the water I left in the seat, and then helped Mr. Max with the coffee that was left.

I was drenched with sweat. He was still wearing a camouflage coat. He hadn't broke a sweat. He looked at his watch and said, we got time to hit a spot I know before we have to quit. I was glad to sit down and ride for a little bit. We drove for about 10 minutes at the same breakneck speed we'd started the day out with,

the one that had me sitting on the edge of the seat before daylight, trying to wheel that truck to go faster. This time, I welcomed the relaxed atmosphere and took the opportunity to pick his brain about everything related to calling turkeys and finding morel mushrooms, the latter of which I had never been exposed to in southeast Arkansas.

We pulled up to a low-water creek crossing between two ag fields. The county had built the concrete crossing many moons ago, and recent rains had just enough water flowing across it to make it too loud to stand beside and listen and hear a turkey. He told me to cross the creek and stand on the opposite bank and owl like I had that morning. He'd do his best to listen on this side and for me to concentrate on the side I was on.

I waited to swift water with ease and climbed on the steep bank of the opposite side and just enough to get away from the sound of the creek. And there before me lay about 30 acres of fresh plowed ground. Across that rich, black, muddy dirt was a fence row, and across that fence was the edge of a pretty steep, grated hill covered with hardwood. On the opposite end of that field sat an old farmhouse that was void of old farmers, but well maintained in their absence by a younger generation whose inheritance granted them the deed that their occupations kept them far away in the city. It was peaceful and beautiful and a little melancholy. at the same time. I looked back at Mr. Max, he had his hands

cupped behind his ears, listening toward the short side of a plowed field on his side of the creek, and before I could make a peep imitating a barred owl, I heard a turkey gobble across the field in front of me deep in the woods. I ran back across that creek

and told him what I'd heard. Let's go, Mr. Max. I heard one open up across that field, up on that ridge. I'm going to stay here. You go. I'll cross the creek and watch where you go in. I tried to convince him to go with me, but he was adamant that I would go by myself.

It had been boiling in me all morning how selfish I'd been in my dread of what I thought was Toby more or less making me hunt with him when, in reality, Toby had given me a gift and a privilege of getting to hunt with him. No, that turkey is working his way down that ridge to strutting that field, son. you go, you got to go right now. And with that, he patted me on the shoulder, the last of which pushed me back toward that creek in a trot. And I didn't stop until I got across both the creek and the plowed ground.

I was out of breath and hunkered down in the edge of the woods beside the net wire fence that looked older than Mr. Max, but not nearly as tough. Time and weather had done a number on that post and the wire too, and had a cow been on either side of it, they would have. have remained there more on the honor system than by force. The turkey had gobbled when I was about halfway across that field, and from what it sounded like, he was about 200 yards away. After catching my breath for the second time that day,

I placed my hand on the top strand of loose bobwire, pressing down so I could straddle it as I crossed. The wire was rusty and loose and squeaked loudly like a one-note hen yelp making that turkey gobble as I froze the ball. my left foot on the ground, the other in mid-air, my shotgun in my right hand, and my left full of antique fencing. He was no more than 30 yards away, and I could see the top of his fan just around the finger that he'd walked down from the top of that ridge. With one motion, I rolled over that fence, sat on the ground, and released the wire that squeaked again,

snatching another gobble out of that turkey. I had just enough time to shoulder my shotgun and punch off that safety. When he stepped out of Strutt, and I sent him to glory, it was 1158. I couldn't believe what had just happened. I had just called up a turkey with a bobwire fence, and not just any turkey. A 26-pound monster with nearly a foot of beard and on the plus side of one-inch spurs. It was a unique experience for sure. How many folks can say they did that, even though it was all unintentional,

and fate had allowed me to be in the right place at the right time to make a racket that would have normally had the opposite effect on my hunt. It was a day and a hunt that I'll never forget. But not for what you'd think. I'll never forget it for what didn't happen. I didn't get to share the experience with Mr. Max. I only got to tell him about it. Bless his heart, he didn't even hear me shoot.

He just raised his fist above his head waving at me when I stepped out of the shade of the tree line into the sunlight of that field and that monster of Missouri turkey over my shoulder. Like I'd just kicked the winning field goal in the Super Bowl as time ran out. The plowed muddy ground was Mr. Max's limiting factor. He couldn't walk in it very fast and he knew I could. He'd waited on me all morning in the hills to keep up with him and, it had cost us an opportunity at a turkey. Time was of the essence on this one, and he refused to be the reason I wouldn't get a second chance.

Five minutes earlier, I'd been standing with my foot on that turkey's neck, being thankful for the blessing and watching the last of his feathers relaxed in permanent rest as his life faded away. Respectful in his demise, elated in my victory, and saddened by the absence of my new friend who would, only see what I saw as good as I could tell the story. Thankfully, there would be other days with Mr. Max and lots more turkeys before he couldn't go anymore, and time eventually ran out on my diminutive friend.

Cherish the Maxis and the Tobis in your life who have enough foresight to point you in the right direction even when you don't realize it. Thank you so much for listening to This Country Life, Bear Grease, and the Render here on the Bear Greece channel. Until next week, this is Brent Reeve. Signing all. Y'all be careful. 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.