Darrell had gone to north Georgia to help one of his girlfriends move to a new trailer park leaving Dwayne (pronounced Deewayne) home at their place between Cartersville and Kennesaw Mountain. During the past week, Dewayne called my hunting partner Chad Harmon, now deceased, and said that he had found a couple more coveys of birds along a creek we had frequented the past season.
Pictured is my Brittany Spaniel, Beechnut’s Rooster Cogburn, or Rooster, who played a part in this drama. A great tireless hunter!
We arrived at the designated “meet” after lunch on the following Saturday, my morning being consumed with coaching my team, the 12 year old, Sandy Springs Saints, to a win over the DeKalb Yellowjackets in a hotly contested Georgia Youth Football game. We held them twice within our 5 yard line in the last quarter, to preserve our 7 to 6 victory.
Ready to shoot some birds, we let out Rooster, my Brittany, and began our hunt along a flowing creek, lined on both sides by harvested Soy Bean fields. Dewayne’s dog, “Old Slick” had been rendered “hors de combat” by a big tom Cat and was unable to hunt with us. We were soon into the first covey and dropped two, fat Quail, the balance of the birds flying into some thick cover on the other side of the field. Dewayne, ever the gentleman, said, “I’ll go root those birds out of the cover. Both you all want to come with me?”
We didn’t find the “flushed” covey, but clearing the thick cover, Dwayne in the lead, there standing before us, looking at us, was a Turkey. No fall season in Georgia, so I yell at Dewayne as I see him raising his shotgun, “Dewayne, don’t sh, Bam, oot! He had just dispatched a domestic, hen Turkey.
Lifting up the bird, he exclaimed, “How about taking a picture for me?” We declined! Two weekends ago his twin brother Darrell had shot a Rooster out of a tree and now Dewayne shoots this Turkey. Dewayne takes the Turkey back to his old truck and we take this opportunity to end our hunt.
Chad or I never went back to hunt with the twins, Darrell and Dewayne (pronounced Deewayne).