Preparing for spring turkey season is vital part of having successful hunt

FOWLER, Ill. — Ben Dutton tried to swerve past the cracks and crevices that had formed in the tire ruts along the grassy lane leading to the back pasture where he was confident he’d hear turkey gobbling on this clear morning.

About halfway to his ultimate destination, Dutton didn’t swerve in time and bounced hard off one of the gaps of missing dirt.

Everything on the seat of his pickup went flying, including his coffee-filled YETI.

“That thing’s indestructible,” Dutton said. “But I should probably slow down a little bit.”

This wasn’t just a race to beat the rising sun.

This was a fact-finding mission.

The 46-year-old Dutton wanted to plant himself on a bucket inside the treeline overlooking a 10-acre field where he had heard turkeys gobbling and caught a glimpse of a couple strutting. That happened to be later in the day, not the hours he planned to be hunting this spring.

So he wanted to get there, get settled and get quiet before the symphony of the woods began.

He assumed, since stars sparkled overhead as the slight glow of the sun began to burn away the horizon, everyone would be at play. 

The squirrels and rabbits ran across the fallen leaves and twigs. The eastern whip-poor-wills were whip-poor-willing. The robins, cardinals and sparrows sang from their perches. The Canada geese flying overhead honked at their leisure.

And off in the distance, a single tom gobbled.

“Pretty faint,” Dutton said. “He isn’t close.”

So Dutton let the dark of the woods and quiet of the morn envelope him. He occasionally sipped coffee from his YETI, but for the most part, he sat there without moving and just listened. A barking squirrel dominated the conversation, although a woodpecker tried to be the most annoying thing in the woods.

Neither bothered the whitetail doe that inconspicuously crept into the picture, maybe 25 yards from where Dutton sat. The sun had climbed enough above the horizon to drop rays on everything, making it easy to see the deer strolling on the edge of the plowed field.

She stopped, smelled the air and quizzically looked around. Her senses told her something wasn’t right, and she jumped to her left and ran out of sight.

“Beautiful,” Dutton said. “No better place to be right now.”

As if not to be outdone, the lonely tom that gobbled off in the distance had moved closer and was being joined by other birds in the conversation. Dutton said he heard three distinctly different calls and believed they were roosting closer to the creek on the opposite side of the field.

“They’re right where I thought they’d be,” he said. “I know where to set up.”

With all the information he needed in tow, Dutton climbed back into his pickup, navigated that bouncy, rutted road, and started mapping out a strategy for the spring turkey season as he took the 25-minute drive home.

“I tell myself every year I’m going to fill my tags, but I usually end up getting just one bird. I have a little more faith in myself and my preparation this year. If you don’t do any scouting or planning or talking to hunters or farmers about the land, you’re banking on getting lucky. You just don’t get lucky every year.

“I’m trying not to be lucky. I’m trying to be a good hunter. That’s important to me.”