Thrill of the Hunt.

My most exciting spring bowhunt to date has to be the first turkey hunt I ever went on. A friend and I were set up in a cow pasture with a stand of white oaks to our back and a blind made of their fallen limbs around us. The pasture stretched away from our position for a few hundred yards, but it wasn't more than 70 across. A hill in the middle of it sloped from our right to left, and we had roosted a few birds in the trees at its foot the night before.

We were in position long before sunrise, my friend ready with his slate call to coax the birds down and out of the woods. Whether they would have played along or not, we'll never know; just as he began calling, a coyote came slinking over the hill from the right.

The 'yote got to within 35 yards of our blind, but it must have winded us. Just as it turned to bolt, my friend, who was the better shot between us at the time, let an arrow fly. It was a perfect quartering-away shot, zipping through the song dog before exiting behind the left shoulder.

While it wasn't the ending we had hoped for, and even though I didn't kill the coyote, it was an unforgettable turkey hunt.

Howard Cook, Raleigh, N.C.