Woman reflects on World Slam of Wild Turkey
Woman reflects on World Slam of Wild Turkey
BY TYLER FRANTZ
Fifty years ago, there weren’t many female hunters, let alone female hunters who ran their own outdoors sporting goods stores. But Doris Shyda, of Lebanon, isn’t one to let gender stand in the way of progress.
For five decades, Doris owned and operated Shyda’s Outdoor Center, where her husband ran the gun shop, and she was in charge of hunting apparel and gear in the clothing barn. “It was a tough start to the business because a lot of customers didn’t want to take hunting advice from a woman,” Shyda said. “My family thought I was crazy. But as the years went on, customers started to see the gear I was recommending was working better for them, and things began to change.”
Many didn’t realize Shyda wasn’t just someone’s wife working in the store. She was a competition trap shooter, an avid deer and turkey hunter, and she also duck and goose hunted at Remington Farms- an experience that led to making design recommendations on Remington’s line of hunting garments.
Now, she is four years into retirement, with one son running the Outdoor Center and another designing and selling Lincoln traps for shotgun competitions. She still stops by the store sometimes to visit and chat about the impressive 20-foot taxidermy mount in the store, which displays her six special trophies.
Shyda is one of the few women to have completed the coveted World Slam of Wild Turkeys, meaning she successfully harvested each of the four subspecies existing in the United States (Eastern, Rio Grande, Merriams, and Osceola), plus Goulds and Ocellated turkeys in Mexico.
In reflecting upon all her hunts, a few memories stood out from each unique experience worth sharing.
“I shot several Eastern turkeys in Pennsylvania and Maryland, but one I remember well was the year in Sullivan County when I was so sick I could barely walk,” Shyda said. “My friends from a neighboring camp crossed their arms to make a seat and carried me back into the woods behind the cabin. You wouldn’t believe it, but I killed a bird that morning!” “My Rio was taken in Texas, and it was by far the quickest and easiest hunt I ever had. The guide was really good and almost everyone in camp killed a bird. I wish I could say the same about my Florida experience.”
While hunting for her Osceola turkey in the Sunshine state, her guide showed up late and fell asleep during the hunt.
“I’m pretty sure he had a late night partying the evening before and was still half drunk,” Shyda said. “One minute he was calling and we heard birds, but then he stopped calling. I looked over my shoulder and there was the box call lying in the sand with him conked out against a Palmetto tree. So I reached over and grabbed the box call, dumped the sand out of it, called in the gobbler myself and shot it.”
During her first trip to Colorado for a Merriams, all Doris and her guide could find were jakes, so the guide talked her into shooting one because it would count for the slam. But she wasn’t satisfied and decided to fly back out a second time to kill a mature long beard, which she was successful in doing.
Mexico was a real treat. While hunting for her Goulds turkey, they had a hard time getting ammunition across the border, so each hunter was limited to five shells. On the morning of the hunt, her friend, who was in another area of the property, shot six times, and that puzzled her. Doris reached in her pocket to discover the only three shells she had were already loaded in her gun.
When Shyda later asked her friend about the missing shells, she admitted she took some of Doris’ shells saying, “You’re a better shot than me.” It was a good thing she did, too, for her friend needed six of seven shells to kill her bird, while Doris required only one.
The Ocellated turkey was taken in the jungles of the Yucatan Peninsula in Southern Mexico, and it was by far the most memorable adventure of all the hunts.
“We were driving for hours through the jungle on a dirt road and my driver didn’t speak English, so I thanked God when he finally pulled over for a bathroom break,” Shyda said. “There were tiny little monkeys that followed us around and poisonous plants and insects everywhere. It’s the only place I’ve ever slept in my hunting clothes with a loaded gun by my side in all my life. It was downright scary.”But Doris succeeded in taking her bird on the third afternoon of the hunt, and it at one time stood as the Ocellated turkey with the longest spurs on record ever taken by a female hunter.
“Completing the World Slam was a goal I really wanted to accomplish,” Shyda said. “To me it was like winning the State Trap Shoot. There just weren’t many girls who did it. I learned a lot from my experiences in the outdoors, and that helped me better serve my customers.”
While Shyda, now 74, is currently battling back from some health issues, which have limited her ability to shoot and hunt as a result of Lyme disease, she promises she still has some days afield ahead of her. She’s looking forward to getting out again next year, because Doris isn’t one to let illness stand in the way of progress either.
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