Winner of USA’s 2015 See It to Believe It Contest
by Clayton Bolton, IAMAW LL 946
I’m not of a fan of hunting “Foster Farm” pheasants. But I’m not one to turn down an offer to shoot most anything when someone else is paying the bill. They still taste good. Diet sciences for these pen raised birds have come a long way since my first experience with them. The “new” birds actually fly quite well.
One of my brother’s buddies had a lot left on his bird card with little season left. Any leftover birds won’t carry over to the next year, so my brother and I were invited along to help clear the card. It was an opportunity to pop some caps, swap some stories and tell some lies, with the promise of a beer or two afterwards. It didn’t take much to get me to go.
We walked the fields shooting up a storm and stuffing our vests. Suddenly, a strange looking bird with a severe flight disability fluttered across the sky. It looked like a pheasant with no tail feathers. Its flight path was in the general direction of a couple walking the road at the end of the field. The man had his shotgun over his shoulder with his woman by his side. As this directionally challenged bird approached, they were oblivious to the football shaped projectile heading their way. We all had the same thought, “that bird is going to hit them!”
Before any of us could speak, the bird crashed into the top of the gun barrel protruding over the man’s shoulder, the barrel hit the man in the head, and down he went. We all turned and looked at each other, knowing we all saw it and still couldn’t believe it.
Never had any of us seen anything like it before. Even the time I was run over by a doe while hunting wild pheasants on an island in the middle of Cut Ridge Slough didn’t compare. We were on our knees crying with laughter. It was just one of those unexpected things that happen in life. The best part was, it didn’t happen to us.
