Favorite hunt and/or first gobbler tales

[drenalinld]

I will share my first gobbler story hoping to hear some of your favorite hunts or first gobbler tales.

I grew up hunting some rabbits and squirrels with my grandad and shooting everything possible with a pellet gun. I never had the opportunity to hunt deer or turkeys until I was in HS. My last couple years of HS and first couple yeas of college my three brothers and I decided we wanted to hunt turkeys. The first Spring we were totally clueless and made 4 or 5 hunts only getting a handful of responses with no clue what to do next. I read a lot and worked on my calling quite a bit and over the next two Springs I had many gobbler encounters and even had strutters in gun range but could not get a shot because it was so thick. I screwed up more hunts than I care to recall. I wrote the book on what not to do. Patience is hard for me, but gobblers were teaching me a little patience. My brothers were also learning, but were not nearly as stricken with the sickness as I was. I would go follow turkeys in Jan and Feb to learn and listen. I turned down many jakes, I had my heart set on a long beard.

In our first three seasons, all three of my brothers and my dad had shot jakes, but no long beards. The 4th Spring was looking to be our year! I was hearing 10-20 gobblers every morning in March!! There was one particular group of three good long beards that I think was 3 year olds that I was particularly fond of listening to. They loved to gobble and they were good at it. One of them was legendary on our lease b/c his GOBBLE was HUGE. He would answer a crow call almost any time of day. We nicknamed him "Monster Mouth".

[drenalinld]

Two weeks before season, my brother and I found them roosted near our parking spot. Against better advice, we called them up to try and see them up close. Two of them strutted about thirty yards in front of us and Monster Mouth stayed back about 20 yards behind them. We were stoked to say the least. All three were studs. The evening before opening morning, my girlfriend and I roosted Monster Mouth. I didn't sleep a wink. My brother and I were set up in some open hard woods less than 100 yards from him before first light. The next two hours are etched in my mind forever. The woods were on fire. Gobbles everywhere. Yelping, cutting, kee keeing. It was incredible. Monster Mouth flew down a little farther away and would answer our calls, but not come any closer. We finally figured out he was in a small green field. We crawled about 75 yards within 25 yards of the field edge and could not believe what we found. Monster Mouth was in full strut in the middle of the field with several other long beards around but afraid to strut. My brother was slightly behind me and I motioned for him to call. He made some sweet clucks and purrs on a slate and Monster Mouth double gobbled and strutted up to the fence about 25 yards from my barrel. He stood up straight and walked up and down the fence looking for the hen. I swear he was looking over the top strand. He stepped in an opening and I shot. Turkeys went everywhere. He flew off. I don't remember looking down the barrel or seeing my bead at all. My first big chance was a MISS!

[drenalinld]

The rest of my 4th Spring was full of Turkey education, but no success. Opening morning of the next Spring was cold with 40 mph winds. That evening it calmed down and a different brother and I roosted Monster Mouth at the same place we had called him up before season the previous Spring. We were on a flat about 100 yards from him well before first light. About 30 yards from us it broke off sharply and MM was downhill from us. He gobbled his fool head off, but we stayed quiet. One time in 30 minutes, I tree yelped and he answered. About fly down time I heard hens coming his way. I made a fly down cackle and he lost his mind gobbling 8 or 10 times consecutively!!  It was quiet for 10-15 minutes that seemed like hours before we heard him fly down. I cutt a couple times and he double gobbled. The next hour and a half he didn't budge. He would answer our calls, but made no move to come our way. I heard a hen with him now and then. I was running out of time, and had to leave for work soon, so we decided to give him everything we had. We cutt, cackled, made fighting purrs, used a jake gobble shaker, and he gobbled several times during our 2-3 minute sequence. We got quiet for 15 or 20 minutes and heard nothing. I was standing up to leave for work, this was a huge chore b/c I had been sitting on a tree root for 3 hours, when I heard a hen right in front of us. We fell back on our sore butts just as she topped the hill on the flat we were on about 25 yards away. She walked up about 5 yards from us and looked us over closely. Looking through squinted eyes we were afraid to blink. She boogered a little and moved off  to our right. I managed dry mouth clucks and purrs on my mouth call and she calmed down over near our dekes. I then realized I could hear him DRUMMING just over the hill. My heart was about to explode! A crow buzzed right over him screaming at him and Monster Mouth produced his final gobble and we got to experience that chest rattle I had heard so much about and feel the thunder. A few seconds later I could here him walking a little more to my left. This was good for me b/c my brother was on my right and we had agreed the bird would decide who shot. He was on our flat now behind a huge rock. Because of the shape of the rock slanting up off the ground, the first thing I saw was his beard. It was long and thick. From the side it was four fingers wide and split so it almost looked like two. I was describing it to my brother, he said quit looking at his beard and get ready to shoot him in the head! He strutted out in view and I had the good sense to cluck at him. He raised his head and I buried him with a swarm of #6's. I jumped up and screamed get out of here you slut!  I guessed it to be 17 yards, but it turned out to be 33. He looked huge. Monster Mouth got to ride in my truck!

[drenalinld]

Here is a current pic of the beard.

[Houndstooth Game Calls]

My fav hunt besides all of my sons hunts. Well had a turkey hanging around a 150 acre cotton field close to a county rd and never could here him saw him once new he was a old turkey but not this old LOL. Headed out of the woods for work glassed some turkey OB a hedge row out in the field couldn't tell what they were so decided to hit the county rd and new how to slip in position since the field had small hills sat down figured the birds ought to be around 200yds let out a yelp nothing sat for bout ten minutes got a little aggressive and got blown away by a gobble eased my head out the hedge row and looked to see a big gobbler coming towards me down the woodline he got to 15yds and I capped him 11in beard 1 3/4 spur and the other just shy of 1 3/4. Took him to the local outdoor store and won the category of largest spurs and a $50 gift certificate.

[TRKYHTR]

It's really hard to pick 1 hunt out. There is so many I wouldn't do any of them justice. But that said I will never forget the first time I ever hunted the south. I was huntin with some friends of a friend of mine. They dropped me off the first morning in the dark and told me to walk the dirt road to the bend, ~1/4 mile, and set there and listen for a gobble. So it's dark 30 I'm walking down a dirt road on a piece of property I have never been on, in Alabama, by myself. I made it to the bend without anything eating me and I stopped to wait for daylight. I had killed several turkeys b this time in my turkey hunting career but had never killed or even hunted an Eastern. About 10 minutes before daylight a barred Owl started cranking up. It was an awesome experience because we don't have Barred owls where I live. 2 owls started going nuts that sounded like the same tree when a big old Eastern turkey HAMMERED. I spent the next 3 days huntin the turkey of boot eatin creek. That turkey would stay in the tree and strut and gobble until 9:00am. I didn't know he was in the tree all this time until the 3rd day when I spotted him. I had been close enough on 1 occasion to her him spit and drum but I guess I never looked up into the tree for him since it was an hour after flydown. I ended up killing my first Eastern at a different location but never did kill that big gobbler. I could have shot him out of the tree at 9:00am on the last day of my hunt but decided I wasn't going to do that. It was funny because when he eventually did fly down he flew over a road and into a completely different area about 1/2 mile away. They guy we were hunting with killed him the next week because he went to the 1/2 mile away place and waited for him to show up there around 9:00am and he did. Thats the one I will mostly remember because of all the nuances of that trip and the gobbler I didn't kill.

TRKYHTR

[savduck]

There are so many favorites of mine. One of my all time favorites involves my buddies from WV. We met over on the old original NWTF board about 12 years ago. They wanted to come hunt the south and get in some "true" swamp. I decided to take them to a WMA and make base camp where we could run on two public properties and my old hunting club. We got on birds every day, but they were super henned up. On the last day of full hunting we went to my club and a section of a creek that runs the entire length of the club. I had called in many turkeys here, kinda of a honey hole. We heard some across the property gobbling but nothing close. We cut and run for a while. there is a little island in the middle of the creek about 3 acres in size. Late that morning, we ended up on the back side of it just chilling. There were huge pines, bamboo, and cypress knees. The bank kinda of dropped off and formed a shelf. We had taking our boots off and had our feet in the water. I pulled out a gobble tube and started gobbling and we were cutting and yelping....just messing around. We stopped and started to say something, and a bird literally gobbled about 15 yards from us. He was above our little shelf and behind the bamboo. All we had time to do was pull up our mask. Swamp birds dont mind water, and will hop creeks, thats what this one did, he hopped over the bamboo and landed at about 15 yards on the opposite creek bank. Scott put his black powder on the bird and smashed it, still bare footed. Huge thick beard and fan, but not a single spur, no scars on his leg. Nothing....smooth as silk. We walked back to the truck and started towards another area where we had heard a bird a couple days before to see if we could get Keith.....his Dad a bird.

[savduck]

Well, we pulled over and started cutting pretty aggressive. I walked about 40 yards away and started hammering on the diaphram for about 45 seconds. I turned around and Scott and his Dad were running towards me with their gear and my gun. A bird was gobbling at me and I couldnt hear it because I was cutting so loud. Anyway we got set up in a little rye patch on our main hunting club road about 100 yards down. The bird was coming on a string, gobbling his head off. This particular road is an old civil war army road with an old bridge, there is swamp on either side. The bird came through the swamp and stepped out on the rye patch about 65 yards, there was a litte gully wash between us and the bird...nothing big and bone dry. Well there was a log that was laying sideways across the road. The bird came right up to it, but would not walk around it. He was about 60 yards ( pre hevi shot days). He gobbled and strutted back and forth and then went back in the woods. I knew a cut through the woods, so we Keith and i doubled back around. Scott stayed with his gobbler to pull the guts and ice it. Anyway, I wasnt wasting any time, I was booking it and leaving Keith behind. We popped out on the other side of the club and i started making my way up the road to a spot where it makes a cross roads, it was planted with rye and directly across from where we just were, only a couple hundred yards difference. Anyway I was about to pop around the corner, and Keith screamed like a girl. I whirled around to see a HUGE copperhead slithering out from under my feet. Keith was pale white.  was pissed because we were literally feet from looking down the food plot. Anyway, Keith managed to get up to me, and on three we stepped out and looked opposite directions into the food plot. The gobbler was standing there staring at me at about 45 yards. Sorry Keith. I squeezed the trigger and rolled him up. To this day I still dont know how we didnt spook that bird.

[savduck]

The Copper head



Scott and his bird



My gobbler



The swamp

[drenalinld]

Great stories guys.