I've followed Jerrod for a few years now and know how well he knows that country, so when the opportunity came to go chase some turkeys with him this week I jumped all over it.
The adventure started when I loaded up the Truck Vault with all the turkey hunting necessities. Some of you may have seen this kick ass truck accessory on my Facebook page. If not...well here's a photo showing what the Truck Vault does best. You can lock up all your precious hunting and fishing belongings in this thing so the stuff doesn't get jacked when you're out in the field. It's a killer piece of equipment that's been a long time coming. Check out http://www.truckvault.com to see more.
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Bucket and Brad Watts have been bragging up Owens Meats in Cle Elum for quite some time and since I'm a huge fan of the locally-owned mom and pop butcher shop I just had to swing on in and say hello. I got to meet Doug, the owner, who told me that Owens has been in bidness for 120 years. You could tell that all the guys that worked in there took a lot of pride in being part of the Owens legacy...and they also took pride in the great assortment of jerky, pepperoni, and my favorite...landjaeager...that they make in the shop. I loaded up on a bunch of goodies and vowed to stop back in on my way home.
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Huge chunks of jerky by the pound!
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Pepperoni by the yard...manly man style!
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A quick stop at Giant Burgers in Cle Elum before hitting the road again
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Then off to the Omak Inn, where Jerrod's customers get a discount. I've stayed here several times and it's more than adequate. They also just built a new Best Western next door that looked pretty nice. Omak has actually grown a little the last few years.
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I know the hills around Omak really well, but Jerrod knew just how to get me lost winding around the dirt roads of Okanogan County in the wee hours of darkness on Thursday morning. Finally we arrived somewhere and waited for things to settle down before Brian, one of his right hand men, blasted on the predator call. Sure'nuf...a turkey sounded off in the distance. Jerrod knew exactly what tree that turkey and the others with it were in and off we went.
We stalked to within about 50 feet of the roosting tree in the dark and took up a position where the turkeys had landed the day before. There we sat, and sat, and sat...and eventually I somehow went from sitting to laying down. They told me to sit still no matter what, but for some reason I ended up horizontal...weird. Then the snow came, and the wind, rain, hail, more snow. After an hour plus of freezing our nards off while holding sort-of-still the turkeys, four of them in total, glided down out of the roosting tree and landing just out of range and exactly where Jerrod was sitting with his customers the day before. For having the goofiest call of any bird species they sure are crafty. We put the GI Joe kung fu sneak on them and off they went...running like the wind.
I just don't think a turkey's going to get fired up about mating in this weather
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Jerrod would pull over and Brian would predator call and every other spot would have turkeys. The turkeys didn't want to have anything to do with us in the cold and blustery conditions though.
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More calling and more turkeys that didn't want to play.
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We set up on three or four finicky flocks that didn't want any part of what we were laying down. Finally we found a humongous lone tom and set up on the ridge above him to give it a go. I really though this was it...my big chance
The tom responded and worked his way about halfway towards us and that was all the closer he would get. The damn thing kept calling back at us as he was trotting up the ridge away from us.With weather conditions forecast to be much the same I decided to blaze home instead of beating our collective heads against the wall for another day. I'll definitely be hunting with Jerrod again though and might even try to slide back over in a couple weeks once the weather warms a bit and the turkeys start doing their thang. He's intense about hunting, but he also has an easy going layed back attitude that works well with people. He gets it!
Jerrod put his deer hunting customers into 46 fricking mule deer in Okanogan County last fall and knows the area as well as anyone. We hunted on both public and private ground for turkeys, but his deer hunts are all on private ground and his guests see multiple legal bucks every day.
I kept my promise to Doug to stop back by the shop and pick up a marinated tri tip. We had some family over last night and demolished the whole thing in short order...good stuff
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You see...you don't have to always be successful in the field to have a good time. I discovered a new gem in Cle Elum, Owens Meats, chased some turkeys around in the Okanogan, met a few new peoples...and generally screwed off for a couple days and had a good time doing it
