As with many old families from the South, heritage and family history are important. This is the case with my family. To try to impress upon the readers how important the events that took place the weekend of April 9th for my younger brother and I, a little history needs to be told. My great great grand father lived on a farm in southern Va near Martinsville. He built a cabin for him and his wife, as well as a separate cabin for his blind father. He went to fight in the War Between the States where he was wounded twice in Pickets charge in Gettysburg. He walked from Gettysburg to his farm while wounded where he healed and rejoined General Lee and was standing next to him at Appomattox. He also had a son, when he was in his 50's along with his wife. This son grew up to become a very respectable businessman who has a town named after him. This son repurchased his fathers farm and fixed up the cabin, adding on to it, creating a place for generations of our family to enjoy. Enter my younger brother and I. We spent almost every vacation here at this farm, learning our families proud history, playing in the creeks, catching fish in the lake and ponds, forming bonds and memories that could never be broken. We come from a long line of hunters, fisherman, and outdoorsman. Last year I went to the farm to turkey hunt and was very fortunate to kill a very nice longbeard on the property. I was the first in anyone's recent memory to kill a wild turkey on our property. Recently our family has decided to sell the property. Being that this may be the last year we could enjoy the place of countless family memories, my brother and I headed down to the farm to enjoy it. Possibly, but hopefully not for the last time. We left on Friday after work, arriving to the cabin in the predawn hours of Saturday. There are still parts of the cabin remaining from when our great great grandfather built it. Early on Saturday morning we wake up after laying our heads down for about an hour, and head out to a good listening location. We hear a few birds gobble and head in that direction. We chase several birds throughout the morning but have no luck, the birds moving off the property. My brother during this time has an old knee injury flare up from walking up and down the mountains and says he wants to head back to the cabin about 10:30. I drop him off and head back out. I start where we had started that morning and walk into the woods. About 100 yards in I yelp and a hen yelps back at me from directly in front of me. I scramble to find a tree and sit quickly. I'm looking for the hen when I see the bright white head and huge black body of a longbeard in strut. Have you ever felt your heart stop? I did. It slammed to a halt and then started again at about 10k beats per minute. The blood in my hears was so loud I'm surprised I could hear them walking through the pines. There was a longbeard and 3 hens walking towards me. The longbeard got within 40 yards, however never gave me a clean shot so I let him walk. The group stopped about 50 yards from me in the woods and stayed there, the hens feeding and the gobbler showing off, never breaking strut. He'd gobble at me, or the hens, but would never walk out from behind this clump of trees he had taken refuge behind. After about 45 minutes or so of this the group of hens eventually started to work their way away from me. They walked to about a hundred yards, still in these open pines and again seemed like they were going to make camp for awhile. By this point it was getting close to 11:30, quitting time being noon and I knew I had to act soon. The only thing I could think of was to get low and crawl towards them, hoping they wouldn't see me as they would not come to any call I threw at them. So I stripped my vest and started Army crawling towards them. About 11:45 I realized I was going to slow and needed to pick up the pace, so I got on my hands and knees and again prayed they wouldn't see me. Well wouldn't you know it, the hen closest to me picked me out almost at once. But she must have been curious as to what I was because she decided to come investigate this weird shape in her woods as opposed to putt. So in she comes walking, being followed by the other 2 hens and their boyfriend. She stops about 10 yards away, the other 2 hens after her and the big ole boy shortly after that. I'm sure you all have tried to calm your nevers when you're in the presence of a gobbler and your body wants to betray you by shaking like a leaf. Well that's what I was trying to overcome as she was standing there staring at me. I must have been able to control the shakes well enough because eventually she started to wander off, always keeping an eye on me though. I check my watch, 11:54 time to make it happen. I scoot forward a bit and finally get a clear shot at ole mister longbeard and drop the hammer. What an awesome feeling, walking back to my truck with a longbeard over my shoulder thinking about all the family history that had taken place on this property.
Fast forward to the next morning. Both my brother and I had roosted birds Saturday night. We started off on his bird, but he didn't gobble, so we switched to the bird I had roosted. He was gobbling good that morning. Now this bird had a good thing going. He was holed up in a creek bottom that was the property boundary and in between him and us was a thicket of young pines. No way for us to close the distance, and not appealing for him to walk through. Well we set up and I called, getting him hot. However he wouldn't leave his creek bottom. After about an hour or so, I grew restless of hearing him gobble at me, but not come closer. I motioned for my brother and we met on the road. I suggested we head on back, calling while we did so, then double back close to the property line, coming at him from a different angle. I hoped that this move would get ole mister longbeard to move his feet. So as we walk out I give the sweetest yelps and the most persuasive cuts I can manage, getting him to gobble back almost every time. We cut back, following a field edge and just as we step into the woods I whisper to my brother, "Be ready man, I bet we're going to walk up on that bird. I'm sure he's headed this way." He takes the lead and starts to slip through the woods. After about 30 yards he stops dead. Reading his body language I know he's seen something. Sure enough here comes ole mister longbeard himself. He stops at about 30 yards. Now I'm about 5 yards behind my brother and have a perfect shot at this bird, but he has a tree in his way. So I whisper, "Shoot him. Shoot him! Now! Shoot him now!" The bird, sensing the jig was up, starts to turn. My brother takes a step back, leans to the side and lets the hammer fall. Down comes the third gobbler taken off the farm. That hunt was only the 2nd time I have hunted with my brother, or anyone else in the last 12 years. I have thought long and hard as how to describe the emotions I was feeling watching him stand on the gobblers neck, however I have not been able to come up with anything that comes close to describing the rush of excitement except for awesome. The feeling of pride was overwhelming. Two days after we leave the farm our father makes his way to the property from SC and bags a nice Tom not more than 30 yards from where I had shot mine. If this is indeed the last time we have the privilege of hunting the property that 6 generations have either lived on or grew up on, we will have great memories to last us a lifetime.
