Patented Hunting Technique Targets Urban Turkeys in Blatant Geographic Location Discrimination
With Thanksgiving just around the corner, I wanted to blog about a turkey-related patent. I soon realized this really limits the patent pool. Luckily I found the perfect patent for Thanksgiving: U.S. Patent No. 8,291,634 for a “Motion decoy system.”
This patent describes an invention for hunting turkeys by using a decoy turkey on what appears to be a skateboard. Normally I try to look for the positive, but I noticed a number of problems with this invention that I’d like to enumerate.
The first problem is that no turkey is going to think that another turkey can ride a skateboard. Why does this matter? Well, this is supposed to be a decoy turkey to lure an unsuspecting turkey in so that a hunter can, well, shoot it. Any turkey with a normal intelligence level will realize immediately that the decoy turkey is not a real turkey, because turkeys can’t skateboard. Duh.
The second problem is that this invention seems to be only targeting urban-dwelling turkeys in what seems to be some form of geographic location discrimination. I hate to play the geographic-location-discrimination card, but that is what it looks like. Because the decoy has wheels, you can only hunt turkeys that spend time near sidewalks or paved roads, which are going to be in and around cities. One solution to solve the geographic discrimination would be to put the decoy turkey on a drone. The turkey hunter would have to be careful not to fly it too high, or the turkey decoy may appear to be floating in mid-air like Superman or Magneto. Everyone knows turkeys have to flap their wings to fly.
The third problem is that the skateboard appears to have training wheels. In order for me to make this point, just assume that you have a dimwitted turkey out there who doesn’t realize that turkeys can’t skateboard. Any such turkeys are not going to want to be friends with a turkey that has to have training wheels on his skateboard. Remember when you were young and had training wheels on your bike? You will recall that you didn’t have any friends at the time. You were always on your bike by yourself, or with a parent. Why no friends? It was the training wheels.
The last problem is that this decoy turkey is a yes-man. I say yes “man” because I’m pretty sure this is a male turkey from the figure below. (Side-bar: a male turkey is called a tom or a gobbler. Gobbler? Really? That sounds bad.) The invention allows a hunter to move the head of the decoy turkey up and down, which I can only assume is to mimic a turkey saying “yes” to an unsuspecting turkey. Sure, this is fine if the turkey being hunted asks the decoy “hey, you from out of town?”, “are those training wheels?”, or “did you vote for Trump?” But what if the turkey being hunted asks the decoy a question that requires a “no” answer? For example, questions like “are you a cop?”, “are you a member of the NRA?”, or “is this a trap?” These are all questions that you’d want the decoy turkey to be able to answer “no” to. The decoy turkey doesn’t appear to be able to say no.
The patent does have a great figure showing what it would look like if the decoy turkey caught some great air off of a jump. This sweet shot of the decoy turkey soaring is shown below. I should give you a warning that the drawing below depicts the turkey’s “undercarriage.” Viewer discretion is advised.
