Warning: This column is rated H.C. for Hunting Content and may not be suitable for all readers.

Biologists tell us that a turkey’s brain is about the size of a pea, maybe a little larger. That doesn’t say much for the size (or intelligence contained therein) of my gray matter since four times out of five the wild turkeys around West Bem can outwit me.

Turkey hunters may start shooting one-half hour before sunrise and must cease hostilities by 1 p.m., CDT. Sunrise on opening day this year was 6:16 a.m., meaning there was enough light by 5:46 a.m. to identify a male turkey enticed into shotgun range (ideally 40 yards or less) by perfectly executed calls imitating a sultry promise from a hen turkey.

Sunrise continues to occur two or three minutes earlier each day throughout the turkey season and by the last day, shooting can start at 5:22 a.m. Hunters need to know this important information because if a turkey appears in front of your shotgun at 5:20 a.m. on that last day of the season, you have a two-minute wait before you can pull the trigger.

So roughly, turkey hunters have somewhere around seven and a half hours a day, more or less, to fill their tags. Hunters can bag one turkey during the first week of the season and one anytime during the second or third weeks. Or, if outwitted by turkeys in that first week, a hunter can kill two birds during the second or third week, but not two on the same day.

Seven and a half hours of turkey hunting a day is very close to an eight-hours-a-day job. With this difference, however: during turkey season you must report for work seven days a week, not five. There are no paid holidays, sick leave, or vacation days.

There are on-the-job hazards, not the least of which are ticks, chiggers and the occasional cooper-headed rattle moccasins.

And apparently turkey hunters should start thinking about the remote but still possible encounter with a cougar or a bear when venturing into the woods. Sightings of both seem to be on the increase in Missouri, a little something to add excitement to a turkey hunting adventure. And don’t discount those Boeing 747-size hawks that respond to calls as one did to mine last year, reinforcing the illusion that I am indeed an expert when it comes to imitating a lonely, if not desperate, hen turkey.

Missouri residents pay $17 for a tag that allows them to kill two gobblers. Non residents must pay $175 for the same privilege, but I can’t imagine someone paying that kind of money to be humiliated by a Missouri turkey. Turkeys of one specie or another exist in almost every state in the country, so why not stay home and be made a fool of. It’s cheaper.

For qualifying landowners, the turkey tags are free. I already have the necessary gear and one box of turkey loads that I bought several years ago will see me through my last turkey season with enough rounds left over to pass on to my children and grandchildren. So turkey hunting costs me little and the benefits are tremendous, even if I let the turkeys outwit me again. Being in the spring woods is a satisfying reward and, sometimes, the appearance of morel mushrooms happens to coincide with spring turkey season.

I often can outwit a morel, that is if I can find them.