what's your most memorable hunt?!?

[SheGotHoOks]

I have two...
The first hunt I ever went on.. I was on public land with Justin and it was a great hunt! I wont ever forget this.. To see him call these birds right up to us, to be surrounded by them, to hear the gobbles the drumming.. and of course seeing him drop that longbeard!!! It was a feeling I had never felt before.. from that moment on I was HOOKED!
And.. MY first hunt.. MY first bird Justin took me to some of our private land and we used a pretty boy.. he didn't have to call long before two longbeards came running.. they were tripping over each other.. I picked one and dropped him like I'd been doing this all my life! Now I hope to NEVER miss a season for the rest of my life!
I want to give special thanks to Justin for showing me what I had been missing! Ok guys I told you mine now you tell me yours!

[longspur]

I guess if I have to pick one it would be that first longbeard. They are all really memorable.

[SheGotHoOks]

Well let's hear about it?

[longspur]

OK... You ask for it,lol.
This bird roosted on a steep ridge beside a lake near my house. It was my second year hunting turkeys.1996.He was a serious loud mouth. Gobble,gobble, gobble...gobble, gobble, gobble. daylight he was gobbling. 10:00...1:00... 4:00...gobble gobble gobble.I could hear him well from my house.This is public land the bird is on. He is very well known by every turkey hunter around. The lake is fished alot and every body that fished heard him and told everybody and there brother.They been trying to kill him for years. He gobbled all day long until you make one hen sound. Then he goes silent for that day.
One afternoon I could hear him sounding off so I got my hen and jake decoy. This was before any jake on hen dec was ever heard of publicly. I dreamed it up on my own. I walked up the edge of the lake and climed the steep hill to where he usually roosted. He was gobbling his head off on another ridge to my right. Got on my belly and slid as far over the ridge as I thought I could without being seen from the other ridge. I put the hen on a short stick and the jake on a longer one over her tail. slid back down the hill about 20 feet, sat aganst a huge white pine in a laural thicket.I could see the decoys but thats about as far as I could see in any direction.Yelp, yelp, yelp.He went silent and I got comfortable. After a couple of hours I had given up on him comming but thought I would wait and see if I could tell where he flew up to roost for the next morning. 3 1/2 hours, sun is sinking, my gun is laying in my lap, he steps out from behind the bushes on my left in front of the decoys.There he is. Its big daddy, less than 10 yards. I thought I knew what an adrenaline rush was, I didn't. There's nothing I can do.(at least thats what I thought back then,now I know you can raise up and blast him.) He hits the jake and flips it off its stick. He hits it agan and knocks it couple of feet toward me.Its completly flat with its head and tail curving up like a canoe. He walks toward the hen. I'm hopeing he will strut and hide me behind his fan. He turns and comes to the jake agan. Every time he hits it, it comes farther down the hill in my direction.Then starts back to the hen,maybe he'll strut. No, he's comming back to the jake. If he knocks it behind that big pine about 10 feet from me I can make a move. He does, then back to the hen. He turns and heads for the jake behind the tree. I raise up on him. When he steps out I follow him with my gun and he sees me. He stops with his neck behind a laurel and his head right in a fork.There we sit. Me and big daddy,staring at each other. I remember seeing him blink. I don't know if I did or not. what to do?what to do? Its now or never. BOOM!!! I blew off one side of the fork and jellied his head. Threw him over my shoulder and started the walk home. My wife went to a store nearby that night and overheard some guys talking turkey. One said "there's one down at the lake that nobody can kill". Wonder what they would think if they knew a rookie busted his head at 10 feet? I have since moved away.The big pine I sat by has fallen down. The laurel with one fork missing is still there. I have to go back every couple of years and sit there for a while. I will never forget that birds face.

[SheGotHoOks]

awesome...  I really enjoyed reading about your hunt! Thanks so much for sharing it with me!

[spurman]

I have so many turkey hunts that are memorable, My first gobbler, that old boy I chased for 5 days, the huge timber rattler I almost sat on, the bobcat that was looking for a turkey dinner, taking a nap and waking up with a gobbler in full strut at 20 yards, my first trip to Kansas or maybe that old gobbler that several hunters were trying to kill on public land.

There are more but I like this one..

This was a public land hunt early in the season no leaves on the trees. I arrived at my area early,geared up and walked a short distance into the woods. It was still to early for gobbling so I found me a stump and sit down. After several minutes I heard a far off gobble, I started moving in his direction. It being public land I knew other hunters were hearing the same gobbler. It was starting to get light and I was not as close as I wanted but as close as I could get without being seen. I found me a good tree and sat down. I waited a minutes and did a soft tree yelp, he gobbled and then double gobbled. I took my cap and did my best to sound like a turkey flying down, he gobbled. I scratched in the leaves and he gobbled. I had my gun on my knee ready when this gobbler comes flying in and lands right in front of me at 15 yards. Hunt over. I am standing there admiring my bird when I hear this gobble coming from where the earlier gobbles came from. I think I had killed a different bird than the one I was hearing. I loaded up my bird and started back to the truck and had gone maybe 50 yards when I see two hunters coming. They had parked a few yards from my truck and came in right on top of me. Public land hunting you gotta love it. Anyway they didn't ruin this hunt.

[longbeard95]

Awsome stories guys! My favorite hunt has to be my dads first bird I called in for him last year. Here's the story.

It was the saturday of the 2nd week here in WI. My dad and I both had a tag in our pocket's but I was determined to put a bird in front of him before even thinking about filling my tag. Well I had been doing some scouting each day before school and I had found a bird that I had a general idea of where he was roosting. Saturday morning rolled around and we headed to the spot early. We got to the spot and I headed out to the field to set up the decoys and my dad headed to the tree to get settled in. Just as I was returning to the tree the bird that we were after gobbled directly above the tree we planned on sitting under and flew across the river behind us. I was literaly speechless. I had spent all week scouting and trying to make up a game plan for this bird before school that I had no back up plan. Well we dicided to just stay put for the morning and just listen to the woods wake up. Well not even 10 minutes later the bird that we had spooked off just lit up and was gobbling his head off. Figuring I couldnt make the situation worse I got on the box call and a mouth call at the same time to immitate a couple hens fighting. After a little while of that he suddenly shut up. I looked back towards the river to see if I could possibly see him on the other side. Just as I was turning around I cought movement on our side of the river. It was the tom and he was heading right towards our set up. At first my dad didnt believe me but as soon as he looked to my left and saw the bird at 20 yards in full strut he became a believer. The bird came right in to the set up where my dad droped him at 15 yards! I can't even explain how happy I was for him.
Here he is with his bird.

I appologize for the large picture. For some reason photobucket wont allow me to edit this picture right now.

[West Augusta]

My most memorable hunt?  My first.
I had never turkey hunted before or even thought about it.  But while stuck in Pittsburgh during the week for work I spent a lot of time watching the Outdoor channel.  I became drawn to the turkey hunting shows as it looked like a lot of fun.  I bought three calls.  A Camo Copper Pot, a Quaker Boy Aluminator and a K&H Ol Yeller.  I borrowed Dad's model 12 and his Korean War era camo jacket and ran up on the hill about an hour after first light.  Not knowing what I was doing, I yelped a few times and what do you know, I got an answer from waaaaaay down in the bottom.  I yelped again, he gobbled a little closer.  Pretty soon "he" was very close.  To say that my setup was poor was an understatement as I was sitting against a 10" tree with no brush around me but the gobbler kept coming.  I see a head bobbing up the hill.  He passes within 20 yards and just keeps walking.  Behind him, another and behind him, a third.  I decided to take a shot at number three.  I ease off the safety and take careful aim and gently squeeze the trigger only to hear the loudest click that I have ever heard.  Yep, I forgot to jack a shell into the chamber.  I've been hooked ever since.

[longspur]

good stories guys. thanks

[SheGotHoOks]

those are some great stories guys..  oh and bill I had forgotten all about the hunt that me and Justin had walked a good piece trying to move in on a bird and when we got close we decided to sit down for a bit, we set side by side and at the same time we realized that there was a snake in between us.. It was a little one so Justin just took a stick and shoved it's head into the dirt.. it was still alive but we sit there and hunted a little while longer! and another hunt we went on where we was in the blind.. we had said a hen decoy and a Jake decoy out and after sitting there for a good little bit all of a sudden a red tail hawk swooped down and took our hen decoy out lol it just sit there ob her for awhile pecking at her head.. I'd never seen anything like it before in my life! Thanks again for sharing your hunts, I enjoyed hearing about them!

[spurman]

Good stories guys keep em coming. Good one Joni, I have more snake stories and your hawk storie reminds me of a couple of eagle stories.

[Onpoint]

I have a lot of memorable hunts too, it's hard to pick just one, there's the time I forgot to jack a shell in the chamber and Click, man when i pumped that shell up in there he didn't know what to think, but I got my first and only double beard that day and still wear a scar on my hand where his spur got wrapped up in my glove and broke off in my hand. My big LBL bird that gobbled his head off on the roost, while I was working my way towards him a truck come down the road, n the guy got out and owl hooted and I remember thinking well He's gonna mess this up for me, but the bird kept his mouth shut until the guy was back In his truck and headed down the ole gravel road then he was hammerin again. He was my biggest public land bird ever 1.5" spurs. Then there's the gas-line bird that eluded us for 3 seasons. I finally got him on a rainy morning that I almost didn't even go. He's my biggest bird. 1 58 spurs, man i sure was glad I decided to go that mornin. Then of course gettin my ole lady on her 2nd bird ever and seeing her drop him at 6 yards. She never had a shot until he was that close. There's so many it's hard to pick just one but if I had to pick one it would probably be my first Longbeard. I had killed my first turkey the year before but he was a jake. I was just a lil fella prolly 7 or 8 years old and I had insisted that I would not shoot a jake. Well opening day of season Here come 2 jakes in full strut. I drew a bead on the lead bird and my grandad "Pops" said "Justin they're jakes."
"I don't care" BAM. That was my first bird. But anyways back to my MOST memorable hunt. The afternoon before Kentuckys season opener I was with Pops at our farm trying to roost a bird for the next mornin. It was cold and windy, and hard to hear anything over the wind blowing but right at dark we heard him gobble plain as day. As windy as it was pops knew he had to be pretty close so the next morning we were there bright and early. The whippoorwills were the first birds we heard n shortly after that we heard him. And then we heard the flock of hens with him. They decided to go the other way so pops decided it'd be best to take a crack at one of the other gobblers in the distance. If he had been by himself he'd prolly killed one early. We came close a couple times that morning but i never could make it happen. It was gettin on up in the morning and pops decided to head back up to where we started out that mornin. We got there and the bird answered us about 300 yards out the ridge from where we had last heard him. We moved within about 200 yards of him ( that's as close as we could get because of the property line), and pops got about 40 yards behind me and started workin him with some soft talk. There ended up bein 2 of em and they were goin off. They shut up for a while n so did pops. It seemed like forever. Pops cut on his mouth call and bam he gobbles right on top of us, like 60 yards away, and that was the last call the turkey heard. I pointed the ole 1100 with a 30" full choked barrel in the direction of the last gobble n waited. It wasn't long n here come two red n white heads bobbin along the side if the hill. They got up there about 30 yards and I shot the one on the left. Where he was on the side of a steep hill when I shot him he started floppin down the hill, n here I went after him. When I got up to him and got my hands on him He spurred me. That's about the time pops showed up. The bird rolled over and I could see his 10.25 " beard hangin down and I was pumped. I was sayin " look at his beard, look at his beard" and all pops could say was " look at his spurs". When he picked the bird up he said it was the heaviest turkey he's ever had his hands on. After a lot of high-five givin, celebrating and excitement, we took the bird down to the check station. He had a 10.25" beard, 1.5" spurs and weighed 26 pounds. To this day he's still the heaviest turkey I've ever killed. I still remember this hunt like it was yesterday and I hope I always can.