Driving Highway 154 over San Marcos Pass alongside Cachuma Lake can provide some scary moments of danger and plenty of opportunity to reflect on what could have happened. I had one of those days during a past autumn.
I was driving along between the pass and the lake, minding my own business as the old saying goes. The weather felt perfect, so I had my driver’s window open and my arm out while I tapped the beat to a great oldies tune on the side of my door. The tune was “Paint it Black” by the Stones, for those of you are wondering.
Suddenly, it seemed like I was being attacked through the driver’s window. My hand came up instinctively to try to grab the attacker and fend off. To my surprise, all I grabbed was a handful of feathers, big feathers. And then the danger passed, and I managed to stay on the road.
It was a wing and tail feathers that beat me about the head and shoulders while I was driving that already dangerous road. The body of the bird glanced off my windshield, and I watched it continue its flight. I don’t know if the bird was injured, but there was no blood on my windshield, so I hope the bird was just as equally shaken yet unhurt as I was.
I had the rest of my drive to reflect and play what-if.
Suppose that bird went through my open driver’s window. It only missed by a few inches. Had I managed to stay on the road, I’d have a freaked-out large and very wild bird to deal with. Or, if it hit the window frame in a bad way, I’d have a dead turkey in my car.
I’ve been a hunter and fisherman all my life, a charter boat owner/operator, and I’ve owned a gun store and a bait and tackle store, so I have a working familiarity with fish and game code.
I’m pretty sure there is no good explanation, should a game warden stop me, for having either a live or dead wild turkey in my car under those circumstances.
The incident happened in an area where we can’t hunt because discharge of firearms is prohibited. It is true that I didn’t shoot the bird, so I didn’t break that law. But the code is written to describe ways a turkey can be taken, not to cover every strange way that happenstance could put a turkey in a car.
Since my way of almost having that bird in the car didn’t fit into the methods described as permissible in the fish and game code, it would not be a legal possession.
Sadly, if a turkey landed on a power structure with one foot on the wire and one foot on the structure, that bird could theoretically fall in your arms fully cooked and ready for the dinner table. Okay, that’s even a greater stretch that what happened to me, but you get the idea — it ain’t a legal possession.
At any rate, be careful out there because there are some real turkeys on Hwy. 154.
— Capt. David Bacon operates WaveWalker Charters and is president of SOFTIN Inc., a nonprofit organization providing seafaring opportunities for those in need. Visit softininc.blogspot.com to learn more about the organization and how you can help. Click here to read previous columns. The opinions expressed are his own.
