Public land hunts=37 includes some afternoons, private land hunts = 3.
Total birds called in/worked to the knife edge of death= 15. Blah blah blah.. but true
1=kill on private land kill by my Dad, thanks Wackem that was a huge gift for my Dad. I owe you big time. I called and ran the camera while the bird came in on a string. Props to Wackem as he had this old bird figured out to the tee. Wack even got all hyper excited when he came into the field. He was honestly as happy over my Dads kill as my Dad was himself which is awesome and shows to Stackums character.
Most of the public birds hung up at 70, which was both fun and frustrating. Most of these hung birds found the need to yell directly in my face over and over again. After about bird number 8 doing the same routine I figured out that yelling back worked wonders for my anger issues. It also lets the bird know exactly who the boss really is and shuts him up quite quickly hummphh. I will never know why they kept hanging up on me this year repeatedly. I think it might have had to do with the ten car doors slamming, the hard core truck box callers, the owl hooter chorus crowd and the flowmaster fan club. Most likely though it was my stinky shirt and boots, turkeys can smell ya know.
Anyhow I let a really good one walk for gayness reasons early in the season. You see I had read some book about 10 cases of PBRs or something to the like. So anyhow I thought this would be a good sacrifice from me to the turkey Gods. The Tom I let go certainly earned his life as he and his hens sang their spring melody right in front of me at 35-40yds for around 30 minutes. It was on one of our rare crisp cold mornings here in the Lowcountry. Every time he gobbled his air bellowed out into a puff of steam like that of a locomotive, pure awesomeness. That performance honestly saved his life as I really did lay my gun down and watched the show. I know he is still alive because I went back to unmercifully kill him three more times after the gayness leaked out of me. But I think by then he knew the squeak that the sole of my right boot makes when I walk.
All in all it was a great season. I ruffled the USFS yet again and gained a little more support from the "I love spring burns during turkey nesting season" crowd. A good buddies son missed one. Three buddies/work related customers on three occasions flinched sneezed, farted or whatever jack legs tend to do when you have told them not to move 1000 times when the Tom comes into range. There was also a myriad of other humorous events which at first produced no dead public birds. Mind you I am very cautious to only take customers that are scared of the dark, snakes, graveyards, Deliverance and the Boogy man.
Our own Stumpknocker even ran up hugged and shook a roost tree per my request. This was definitely a very secretive 15th legion technique and was done in the utmost of ethical and sportmans like conduct to give the Tom a fighting chance. I may be removed from my 17th legion status just for talking about the roost tree shake technique. Anyhow the Tom took the hint and flew directly out of the tree and over our heads never to be heard from again.That one was awesome smart of me.
Eventually my duties ended after taking just about every promised friend and business customer, including their kids and grand kids. At last I finally found a couple days to myself.
I killed these two in the National Forest with little time to spare which scratched off my WMA bag limit. In all honestly I had to go back in to find the bigger of the two as he pulled the shuck, jive and disappear into thin air turkey magic trick. This happened even in lieu of my excellent tracking skills, my nerves of cold steel, the toilet paper trail woodsmanship 101 classes taught and my expert turkey gun building and shooting skills. I can sometimes be heard spouting said things from my expertise on such forums that concern long range rigs, deer hunting, turkey hunting and saltwater spearfishing amongst a few others. I woulnd't listen to me if I were you , just saying. I actually think we have one member here that should jab me firmly in the ribs as I mentioned practicing with swinging tennis balls. Foot in mouth there buddy. It tastes great I tell ya!
Seriously though after 2-3 hours of looking for him hard dark came and went. I had to leave and even without a trace of blood I still knew he was firmly hit. Shooting a .650 Trulock with 3.5 Fed Heavyweight 7s doesn't leave a lot of doubt if you do your part. I did find two primary feathers leading in the same direction he was facing when he ran off and each about 30 yards behind one another. I somehow knew he had to be dead as I played the shot in my head over and over again all night long. So as I soon as I could get out again I borrowed a buddies Boykin and headed back in to try and round him up.
Well to both my joy and sorrow we found him after a couple of hours. A Bobcat had drug him off from his well hidden place of death and had covered him up. The Boykin actually found where the bird had died after dragging me all over creation of course. I then followed a drag trail where the grass had been laid over for about 20 yards and there he was headless and buried beneath a bunch of leaves and freshly raked grass. I asked forgiveness and burnt my last public land tag on him, rightfully so. I salvaged what I dared as he was pretty ripe and then put the rest back for the bobcat. I figure that should fix my karma situation quite well. The cat would surely use that turkey to feed its cubs which in return would eat more turkeys thus making it even harder for me next year. Take note here on how a real sportsman always makes it harder on himself than necessary lol. My dad taught me this and its an invaluable lesson but very easy to learn and repeat over and over again mostly when you really didn't mean to repeat said lesson.
My feelings were obviously badly hurt. To be honest I was ashamed of myself and double daggum skippy confused. Especially hurtful was that the found bird is my biggest bird to date and carried 21" total inches of rope with the first beard at 11" the other at 10". The spurs were and 1-1/4 and 1-1/8".
I will never know why or how he got away only that he did. I also know that I alone was the reason behind his dethroning. Whats worse is that he wasn't exceptionally far from the first log picture attached below. 100 yards at most. I guess the wiliness of the turkey combined with his feathers showing his direction of travel and my line of sight led me to track one way much harder than the other. We found him beside a log in the completely opposite direction. Go figure.. Turkeys are gonna Turk as some fella on here has said before. I just wish I had found him that afternoon. Sorry old feller I promise to do better with your offspring!
Dad at 70 with private land bird:
(http://i.imgur.com/Yp1AlbL.jpg?1)
Wingbone yelpers I made from Dads bird that afternoon:
(http://i.imgur.com/yCkfC7t.jpg?1)
WMA first bird Sinclair 3" Titanium and Crystal over Titanium
(http://i.imgur.com/ISWNvhf.jpg?2)
Bobcat covered and Boykin found:
(http://i.imgur.com/8lIaDPZ.jpg?1)
Found bird:
(http://i.imgur.com/uyVyUvb.jpg?1)
Congrats, great story.
Awesome. Enjoyed that.
Great story, thanks for sharing...
Awesome pics and stories
Great read!! Congrats! :icon_thumright:
Enjoyed that write up very much. Congratulations!
Excellent story and write up.
I salute you for getting back in there to find the bird and for tagging it and leaving the remains for Mr. Bob.
You are a sportsman, sir!
Sorry about the bad luck. Good to see you put the effort into finding him that you did. Also great sense of humor!
Very nice! Congrats on a great season. I enjoyed your story!
Good read & congrats
awesome story... enjoyed it
I second all of the comments above! Great story and pics! Thanks for taking the time to share it with us.
LOL! Great story.
Sounds like an exciting season anyway!
Sounds like you had a good season. Sucks that big bird ran off, but I'm glad you found him.
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Damn brother....youre pretty handy with a pen and paper.
Great read!
A true student of the outdoors!
surprised that a coyote had not eaten that one.