Turkeys 4, Dennis 0

Headed to the Davenport area three times toward the end of December with four turkey tags in my pocket. Usually tens if not hundreds of birds are seen. Not one turkey made an appearance on the first two trips.

Garnet asked the silliest question regarding hunting turks after I returned from the second trip, “What is the price of wild turkey these days?”

As if the price of the meat mattered on a hunting trip. The last day of the season was Dec. 31.

The Death Ram headed to the hunt area on Dec. 30, with the idea it would return the next day, the last day, to finish filling the tags. Finally, a turkey was spotted, in flight, soaring from one side of the canyon to the other, landing too far to pursue.

At this point the Ram was getting low on fuel, so a trip to Davenport was necessary. After topping off the Ram, it began to turn onto Davenport’s main street, which is State Highway 2, when, there, in the middle of the road and right in front of me in downtown Davenport was a large tom turkey.

As the bird made his way to my side of the road, I got out of the Ram, removed a shotgun shell from my pocket and shook it at him. Didn’t bother him a bit. He continued across the road, 10 yards in front of me, and up the nearest driveway.

That’s it, I declared defeat and headed home. The four turkey tags will remain unnotched.

Last days of most hunting seasons

Hunting seasons in final days

The pheasant, quail and partridge seasons continue through this Sunday, Jan. 21.

Duck, coot, snipe and goose seasons end Jan. 27. Regularly the goose hunting is allowed only on Saturday, Sunday and Wednesdays, but goose hunting is allowed every day from Jan. 21 and Jan. 27. The daily limit for geese is four Canadian, 10 white-fronted and six white-geese. This equates to 20 geese a day, if a hunter was so lucky.

Hunting seasons proposals available on Jan. 23.

Fish and wildlife will be looking for public comments on proposed recommendations for the 2019 and 2020 hunting seasons. However, the proposals will not be available to view until Jan. 23. Plus, comments will not be able to be submitted until Jan. 23.

Seems rather backwards to me, but Fish and Wildlife indicates most of the proposals concern minor changes in special permit levels and hunting area descriptions proposed since the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission approved the state’s latest three-year hunting package in 2018.