MS 3/21/2022
I leave work and head to the woods with a co-worker that has a camp about 30min from where we work. He had told me it had birds on it and wanted to watch me hunt them. Can't argue with that. When we arrive he told me I prob need to lock my doors so I pulled the key out of the ignition and hit the trunk button then the door lock and set it in the change holder as I gathered some stuff from the passenger seat.(yep I did it, working 18-20hrs a day has worked on me a little) I got out of my car and eased the door shut, that's when it hit me s@*^*)@)*&, I just locked my key in the car. Luckily I had popped the trunk so I could still get my gun and vest. I told him lets go I'd worry about that when we get back, I handed him my shotgun and he asked me what was that for. I told him so he could shoot one and he said no way man I'm here to watch you hunt them.
As we're walkng in the woods a helicopter comes flying over and we can hear a couple birds in the distance. We keep walking and now its a couple birds in the far distance. We close the distance from about a mile to 200yds and now its breaking day and the woods are so open that I don't want to go any farther. The lay out is like this. Old logging road running a ridge(north and south) with a cutover on the east side, nice hardwood bottom falling off the west side, to the north the road makes a hard right turn, straight out that turn is a ridge that slopes off into a nice semi thick bottom. After the right turn of the road follows another ridge that makes a slight left hook off into that bottom. The gobbling birds are 200yds across the bottom on the next ridge in some tall pine trees pretty much directly in the middle between the two ridges that I'm standing on. Its light enough and open enough that I tell my buddy to take a seat by a tree in the middle of the two ridges and I eased up about 5yds and set up on another small tree. I should be able to shoot to the top of both ridges if they walk in the right spot or I can get a shot if they come up the saddle that leads to me. Just to my right is an old downed tree that is just gnarly with libs and vines and it has my 1-2o'clock block pretty bad and its bugging me, but there isn't really much I can do I'm pretty much centered of where I need to be.
It breaking more light and now its 3 birds gobbling in front of us and a bird gobbling way way way behind us but his gobble is different its a deep thunderous gobble that's a little different than most. I start off with some soft calling on my copper Madhatter pot and every so often they would answer so I got a little louder and they would all gobble all 4 of them. I kept at it knowing that I had to pull them a ways to even be in the game. After a while you could tell they were on the ground and I hit my AGE trumpet one time and they cut it off. Then I started on them with my mouth call one my wife gave me for my birthday a few days before. Only the 3 birds in front are gobbling now and they seem to be getting closer. I finally see one in the bottom and he's headed up the back of the ridge to my left. I go silent and in about 3 min or so I see three birds top the far ridge. one of them is a good bit bigger than the other two but they are all longbeards. The larger birds rattles the woods and you can feel it in your chest. It was an amazing site. As the birds are inching their way up the ridge to my left I'm looking at the tree i ranged at 35yds and I'm looking for openings that I hope they will walk through. Then I hear it, the unmistakable sound that all turkey hunters love to hear but the same sound that will drive a turkey hunt absolutely nuts because its hard to pin point. Drumming and its not from the three birds I'm looking at its coming from the old log road off my left should and behind me a little. I literally go blind trying to see where its coming from I let me eyes come back to me and try again but I cant see him but he's keeping the other birds from coming on up the ride. The drumming is defanging and I can't find him. The other birds ease off the way they had come, two birds get a ways away and the one larger bird hangs out at the very back of the ridge. The drumming now dims in the distance. I make a quick crawl for a different tree while checking them with a call and all three in front would gobble. I start calling a little more aggressively and the three birds answer so I lay it on pretty thick, and they finally brake and start up the saddle and on the ridge I'm sitting on and of course I'm looking at that downed tree and its not looking good.
The bigger of the three starts up the hill but he's in a swag and all I can see is the crown of head at about 40yds. He tops the ridge directly behind that downed tree and stands there at 30yds gobbling at every sound I would make. The other two stop and are looking out there about 55yds and that's when I hear it again, the defanging sound of the drumming is back and its directly behind me. The two birds that are on the side of the hill start to ease back down the ridge. I'm calling as soft as I can hoping the bird that is in front of me will just look my way enough to give me a shot. He decides to walk back down the hill as the drumming is intensifying and as he does just as he hits an opening on the side of the hill I give one last yelp and he turns and walks my way in that opening. That's all I needed and I was able to take a beautiful gobbler on an unreal hunt. My buddy said that was a pretty wild hunt and thought it was neat how I got them to come back. He never saw the other bird behind us either.
We walk down to the bottom to where my bird had rolled and when I picked him up my buddy says he's got 2 beards. I said that cool and set him down on his side to look at them and then I was like oh dang he's got a lot of beards. 6 total beards and comes in weighing 19lbs and has 1 1\8" black sharp spurs.
The good Lord really blessed me on that hunt and I was extremely lucky to have a friend allow me to hunt his place. It was the best morning I've had in MS in a long long time if not the top morning ever. Hoping I can coax the drummer in for a look in a few day after this weather goes through. Hoping my buddy will take the gun next time.
