R.I.P. My Turkey Hunting Alarm Clock

Nope it didn't gobble like some do.

My turkey hunting alarm clock did travel around the United States and even down to Mexico with me. And since the 1990s. Seriously. Chasing spring gobblers. Fall and winter turkeys. A part of the deal.

Just this week my alarm clock died though. My lucky travel buddy just blinked out.

Natural causes, I guess.

Yeah, I know, iPhones have alarms and I've surely used mine - as a backup to my inexpensive blue-and-white plastic wake-up call.

Backup? Only someone who isn't a turkey hunter would question the need for two alarms.

It helped me be there for fly-down time on countless turkeys. Texas Rios in sprawling live oaks glowing with the sunrise. Wyoming and Nebraska spring turkeys in the bright fallen snow. Easterns from Maine's piney woods to Georgia's red clay. Swamp Osceolas too. California central coast gobblers in wine country. Ocellateds down in the Yucatán. You name it.

It's been there. And has never let me down.

Yeah, I surely confess to waking up before my late, great turkey hunting clock, just minutes or even seconds ahead of its insistent beeping (never annoying, always a relief).

Hardcore turkey hunters know that deal too: the biological clock we all acquire . . .

My alarm clock. It has been there next to camp bunks through many a fall turkey dog too - Jenny, Midge, Radar and now Luna. And it kept running right through this recent October and November campaign for autumn birds. Maine. New Hampshire. New York. Pennsylvania.

A final season . . . And now, it's gone.

Toss it away? Nope. I'll likely keep it somewhere reserved for turkey hunting memories. I've many such boxes full of stuff around this cabin for that. Junk to some; not to me.

I'll miss it. Look for it a time or two, no doubt. Spring turkey season won't be the same.

R.I.P., ol' buddy, and thanks.

Steve Hickoff is Realtree's turkey hunting editor.