No luck on youth day, for whatever reason things stayed quiet all morning. We did call in a hen at 7:45, Jayden was laying on the ground curled up asleep in the brush blind when I heard her clucking from across a powerline. I nudged him and he got his gun up, when she finally crossed she was by herself. He asked if she had a beard, in VA as I had explained to him a bearded hen is a legal target, I said no. Since he has never killed a turkey if she had been bearded I would have let him shoot, I had seen a hen last spring in the same area that had at least an 8" beard on her. We stayed out until 10:30AM when the wind started howling. He got several good naps in while I stayed on watch, on the drive home I asked if he wanted to go out again and he said definitely. I had roosted a bird Friday night but where he was at there is a wide and deep creek you have to cross and I wasn't going to expect him to take off his boots and roll his pants up to wade thru knee deep water in the dark, I don't think he would have gotten out of the bed if that had been the case. We just need to invest in some hip boots for him.
