How to Serve a Wild Turkey for Thanksgiving

There is always debate over the best sides for Thanksgiving dinner, but there is no doubt that turkey is the centerpiece of the holiday dinner. If you’re planning on serving a wild bird instead of a butterball this year, there are a few things to consider. Whole Bird versus Breaking it Down Nothing is more iconic than a whole roasted turkey on a carving platter. But it’s really not an ideal way to cook a wild turkey, or for that matter, any...

How to Reap a Turkey

The beauty of spring turkey hunting is that success can be achieved through multiple hunting styles. You can run-and-gun with a shotgun or set up shop in a hub-style blind with your bow. You can crawl around and bushwhack them, or put out a whole spread of decoys and only take the safety off when a gobbler struts in to put on a show. Or you can reap. Reaping is the act of crawling into a longbeard’s guard and popping up a fan or a decoy built...

Is a Turkey Sponge Edible?

When I began to remove the breast from my first tom, I was dumbfounded to find handfuls of a yellow, jellyfish-like substance in front of the crop cavity. I wasn’t sure what it was at the time, so it stayed in the woods. With a little research, I learned that this gelatinous tissue is called the breast sponge. The sponge of a gobbler is undoubtedly a curious trait. Nature provided turkeys with this useful mass of tissue with the sole purpose of...