A New Take

Hope all of you readers are well and staying healthy through these strange times. The never-ending procession of “Groundhog Day” nights and days that we’ve had has probably made you wonder exactly what day of the week it is. Yes, that has happened to me as well. However, there are silver linings in what feels like an everyday zombie existence …

There have been more opportunities to spend time with family, catch up on many of those house projects that have been neglected for so long, and enjoying outdoor pursuits. After knocking off a few items of the “honey do” list, that has left some time to fish and get in on another obsession of mine each May: turkey hunting.

When anglers and hunters think of a “Cast & Blast” outing, it is almost always thought of with an autumn backdrop. The classic morning grouse and woodcock hunt when it’s still cool, followed by an afternoon session on the river, angling for trout and salmon. It’s a combination of the best of both worlds if you’re in to these pursuits. Thankfully, there’s also a “Cast & Blast” opportunity in the spring as well.

There’s nothing like getting up before the crack of dawn to listen to the springtime woods awaken after the dormancy of another long winter, and of course, listen for the thrilling sound of a male turkey gobbling in search of a mate. The cacophony of songbirds, geese honking, woodcock peenting (yes, that’s a word – and woodcock do it), and grouse drumming serve as the appetizer, but the unmistakable gobble of a wild turkey is definitely the main course. It really feels like a rebirth of sorts, especially right now.

It didn’t take long yesterday morning to hear the clarion call of a longbeard, greeting a new day in an area that I hunt often, reward for getting up at 3:45 AM (again). Certainly, the good weather that we’ve enjoyed helped get that turkey sounding off early. It seems to me to go the other way on rainy or God forbid, snowy mornings …

Our courtship started shortly thereafter, as I responded to his calls with pleas of my own, initially aggressive, with a few plaintive notes thrown in for good measure. Slowly but surely, he made his way towards me, strutting and gobbling, from several hundred yards away. It took a while and it didn’t always look like it would “happen”, but one soft call when he was within eighty yards of my decoys committed him to me.

He came in as if pulled on a string, and I took him at twenty yards, between my two decoys. Thankful for his display and allowing me to enjoy his turkey woods on a beautiful morning, he’ll be my 19 lb. dinner guest when things get back to normal, but that’s only half the story …

Springtime in northern New Hampshire also means “SALMON”, and in the afternoon I was fortunate to go fishing with a friend for a couple of hours. Now, 80 degrees on a bright, high sun day is not generally what people think of when it comes to salmon fishing. Most days of salmon fishing involve challenging weather of some sort: wind, rain, snow, and sometimes all three. Not so yesterday, with the exception of the wind – there was still plenty of that coming up river off of the lake.

The inlet water level is high and a little bit of a challenge to wade, and casting can be difficult without the aid of something like a switch rod. The water temp was perfect (52 degrees), and the sudden pulse of a hungry salmon on the end of my fly line helped bring everything in to focus. My eyes widened as he soared out of the water several times, and we could tell right away that he was a big fish. One of the larger salmon specimens that I’ve caught in our waters (21″+), and very healthy too. With the amount of bait fish that I saw yesterday, there’s no wonder why. Unlike the turkey, the salmon swims with the fishes again …

A short time later, a 17″ lake trout found the bottom of my net, and after that Jerry caught and released a hard fighting 18″ salmon. That would be it for us, but much better than I thought we’d do on a day that really was “too nice” for fishing.

This springtime session of “Cast & Blast”: turkey hunting in the morning followed by an afternoon of salmon fishing was a great substitute and a perfect escape in this strange time.