Hooter and I went straight to where this bird was going to go on Saturday morning. I hunkered down in a briar thicket and Hooter was behind me doing the calling. The turkey gobbled twice on the roost right behind us and popped out in the powerline shortly after that. He strutted most of the rest of his life away after the lone hen got between us. Hooter stayed on the calls and pulled her in to us. She wound up standing about 6 yards in front of me clucking at either the dead decoy or the dark blobs in the briars. Directly, I could clearly see the gobbler's head silhouetted against the orange morning sky and in one smooth motion, raised my gun and got the dot on his head. The rest was academic.
He was a 2 year old bird with a 9.5" beard and 3/4"
sharp, fat spurs. We had seen this bird several times and saw that he ran with a pronounced limp. Upon his post-mortem examination, I found that his right leg would not bend, but his left leg moved easily. When I cleaned him, I showed the guys the clear difference in size of his two drumsticks, the right being remarkably smaller in size, presumably due to disuse.
As a point, I came within a gnat's a$$ of smoking another gobbler the next morning, but was actually thwarted by a red tailed hawk divebombing the gobbler twice at 35 yards and running him off. I had a great weekend with a great group of guys who are as passionate about hunting these birds as any you could put together in one place.
FC
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