Spring 2017 Reflections GOOD and BAD (Very Long Read)

[Roost 1]

WOW..... Where to start!!! I'll go back to Nov 26 2016, when my long time hunting buddy and best friend was called home from his deer stand  to be with our Lord. I knew then hunting would change for me. I called in his first bird for him in 1994. After that we turkey hunted together most all the time until his son got big enough to hunt. We still made time to hunt together each year and for the last 3yrs I had the pleasure of videoing  him killing a turkey. We have a friend who had invited us to come hunt his farms in GA this year and we decided to go. My buddy had not travelled out of state to hunt since his son started hunting with him, with TN being the only exception. Well after my buddies passing our friend from GA asked me if I was still planning on coming down to hunt and told me I could invite someone else if I wanted too. I invited Whiskey.  So we plan on leaving from Whiskey's house which is 45 mins from me, I get down there and realize I forgot my turkey vest. Not the way to start out. We eventually get to GA and meet Tony. He takes us to his cabin where we are gonna stay and shows us around the property then we go to the other farm and look at it, both nice places. Tony leaves and we are changing shoes to scout a little when a guy pulls up and introduces himself as Tony's brother and tells us he's been feeding corn on this property and plans on hunting it the next day. Whiskey and I leave to go back to the cabin and decide we are not hunting a baited spot so now we only have 40 acres to hunt. Luckily I was able to kill a bird the next morning and we did call up 3 different bunches of jakes through out the day. Severe storms were predicted for that night and all the next day so we decided to cut our losses and head home.
Tennessee season up next. Take my truck to get it serviced and my mechanic tells me the water pump is bad. $35 oil change turns into $400+ bill but better than being stuck on the side of the road I guess.
Head out early for my TN spot, 125 miles away, landowner been telling me he's been seeing them in the bottom field so I get down about an hour before light. I like to get to my listening spot early and spend some time talking to our Lord about different things that are going on. About 30 mins before light a truck comes driving through the field and parks by the pond. I'm thinking what the heck, I'm the only one with permission to hunt here according to land owner. I walk up there to see what's going on and it's two young guys who say they have permission but were more than willing to leave to after I explained to them I was the only one with permission. Needless to say I didn't hear any birds that morning but I was fortunate to call in a hen who brought a longbeard with her. Leave this place and drive 75 miles to meet up with Whiskey for the evening hunt, he was on birds that morning but the neighbors dogs ruined his hunt. Had a great evening hanging out with him and we finally found a bird that wanted to die. Got to Hooters for an early dinner.
Get back home to find out my 84yr old grandmother has taken a turn for the worst. I try to spend as much time with her knowing I am heading back to TN on Wednesday to meet up with Ron aka Snapper and a couple of my other buddies. This was my first time meeting Ron and turns out he's a fine fellow and quite a turkey hunter as well. He and one of my other buddies had birds on the ground before I ever even get there. Weather turned off bad next couple days, bad weather was common place for me this year,  however between 4 of us we scratched out 9 birds in 4 days so I'm not complaining too much.
Sometimes you can't do no wrong and sometimes you can't do nothing right in the turkey woods, that's kind of where I was at... On the wrong end this time.
Anyway back home for a day or two, spending time with my grandmother who is doing much better now. Leave out Monday evening for LBL quota hunt, Whiskey has camp set up by the time I get there. I knew this was gonna be interesting, I hadn't ever slept in a hammock before. We spend the rest of the evening scouting, can't find birds anywhere so we just decide on a spot that looks good. Have a good evening roasting hot dogs over the fire and drinking adult beverages. The next morning turned out to be my best hunt of the year. We get set up early at our listening spot and wait. Lots of owls carrying on, I like to listen to them, and eventually the gobbling begins. We got a couple birds 300yds away gobbling a little and a few more in the distance.  The closest ones only gobble 3 times and get quite, I tell Whiskey this is not good someone may have come in from other direction and spooked them. Well it wasnt long they gobbled again on the ground, it's real early and I haven't called any. They gobble another time more to our left, I let out a few soft tree yelps, no response. They gobble again from same place, I yelp just a little louder and they answer me. I wait 2-3 minutes call again they cut me off and are on the way. Next I hear drumming and over the ridge they come, textbook hunt!! We are headed to truck by 6:30.
Back home to scout for KY opener, while checking on my grandmother as much as possible and mowing grass after work. For the first time ever,  after 25yrs of trying to get her to go turkey hunting, my wife decides she wants to go opening day. So, we go and hear several birds and actually have some fly down in the field with us however they have plenty of hens and don't want no part of us. About 10am the spray coupe rolls in to spray the fields, this place is done for today. Whiskey and I go back Sunday morning and the birds sound like they are 3 farms away. We ended up walking 5 miles that morning and never got on a bird. We give up. Well I text my buddies son( the buddy who passed away) to see if he's had any luck and he replies "no". I asked him if he would like me to tag along and I can see the excitement in his text message. It's Easter so I'm doing the family lunch thing and tell him I'll meet him at 3pm. I get up there and he's outside waiting on me. We head out across the pasture to the back of his farm and we see a gobbler in a low spot. We get down and crawl to a good set up spot and I'm about to call and the bottom drops out, raining so hard I can't even see across the field. We got soaked but luckily it only lasted about 10mins, after it quit raining I waited about 10 mins and let out a series of yelps that was met with a gobble. That's all the calling it took as it was only minutes before we saw him coming up out of that low spot in full strut. My buddies son took the shot at 40yds. It was a very emotional time for me as we high 5'd, fist bumped and all that great stuff. I texted his mother and told her to get the camera and tissues ready. This was prolly the high point of my season because I know my buddy in Heaven was most definitely smiling down on us.
Next few days it gets tricky as I find a boss gobbler, I mean a stud, on another farm. Hunted him for three days in a roll, he beat us each time. Now it's time for my buddy from IN that I swap hunts with each year to arrive. I kept my best spot for him, however as we are walking in I can see the muddy foot prints of where a couple people have made at least a couple trips in and out. I knew this wasn't going to be good. However we got on birds and unfortunately he took a bad shot(too far), we never found the bird although I know he hit him. This hunt is not starting off good. We have to hunt a few different places but he gets his 2 birds and heads back to IN.
I decide to go back after big boy the next morning, of course it's raining and windy. This might of worked in my favor however. I slipped in up on the ridge where I knew he had been roosting on the backside above the creek, it actually stopped raining about daylight. It had already got good and light before he gobbled the first time, he gobbled 5 times on the limb and got quiet. I figured he had pitched down after not hearing him for a several minutes, so I gave him one soft cluck and I immediately saw the top of his fan just over the crest of the ridge. I waited until he strutted up on top, gave him a few yelps to get him to come out of strut and sent the TSS on its way. It's bittersweet to kill a bird that you battle with for a couple days. He was a very worthy adversary and prolly one of the best 5 or 6 birds I've ever killed. I was on cloud 9 and had just started scoring my "upgrade" when I got the phone call that my grandmother had fallen and I needed to get over there ASAP. Naturally I stopped messing with this bird and took off to her house. By the time I got there my aunt had already gotten her up and in her chair. Thank The Lord she was not hurt, just scared and shaken up. However by the time I got back home and was trying to finish measuring this bird my mind wasn't on what I was doing and although I thought I had taken good pics apparently I didn't and some of them are of a wet bird and some of a dry bird. If I had been thinking clearly I would of just started over but I didn't and so I apologize to my team-mates, hopefully it won't matter in the end. I just don't want to post not so good pics and cause any controversy for myself or the team.
On with season... It's time for Whiskey and I to head to IN for our hunt. We get up there in time for our buddy to take us out riding around looking for birds. He tells us 4 gobblers have been hanging out in a certain spot on his family's farm so we ride out there to see if we can see them.  Low and behold there sets 2 decoys and a pop up blind in "our spot". I won't get into all the particulars but let's just say it's another run-in with trespassers and our hunt with him didn't get any better after that and the 4" of rain that came the next day. We pulled out midday and headed to a friends families farm about 1.5hrs west of there only to be met by more rain the following day. However it quit right after daylight and we were able to get a bird each and back on the road headed home by 9:00am.
Spent the next week catching up on lawn mowing and checking on my grandmother. Next to last day of season decided to head back to the farm where my buddy from IN took the long shot. Woke up to cloudy skies and a heavy chance of rain and wind, no surprise I'm used to it by now. However it turned out be a fairly good morning weather wise, heard a few birds gobble on the limb but got quite after fly down. Got set up in a fencerow doing a little blind calling and had a bird answer me. I was calling very little and he was only gobbling about every 5-10 minutes but getting closer. Then I hear that loud yelping, I know it's not a real hen and then the cutting. I start scanning the wood line and sure enough with my binos I see 2 figures in the edge of the woods. For whatever reason, maybe they know they don't have permission to be on this property and  why you would trespass on a Sat I don't kno, but they turned and walked away back towards the property line. Another run in with trespassers!!!! Needless to say I never heard or saw the gobbler I thought was heading my way. Luckily I was able to fill my last KY tag the next morning which was by far the best gobbling day of the season for me.
Overall it was a very different type of season but it was still fun. I got to meet some new people, hunt with new friends and old friends alike. Hopefully next year my wife will want to go more than 1 day and we will be able to get her a bird.
In closing I'd like to say if you've ever had a close hunting buddy/friend consider yourself fortunate. If you've ever had one and lost him then you know the void that's left, it's just not the same. However I think when one door closes another opens and I think The Lord has blessed me with another hunting buddy/close friend in Whiskey. We met thru OG contest several yrs ago on the Voodoo Mafia team, I was the only guy not from TN on that team and it just so happened that whiskey and I only lived 45 minutes apart. We started hunting together a little, and then a little more each year. Not long after that we were doing other things together outside of hunting.

I'm gonna end by just saying THANKS to Whiskey for bring a great friend/hunting buddy when I needed one the most. I actually think of him as more of a brother than friend. I kno I'm hard to get along with at times and every once in awhile my OCD kicks in but he hangs in there none the less. Thanks to the Crusaders for letting us be a part of this team and I'll look forward to meeting more of y'all down the road.
God Bless

[wvmntnhick]

Sorry to hear of the loss. Luckily, mine is still around and if everything goes well, I'll be buried first. Aside from that, congrats on an otherwise great season. Hope all gets better with grandma as well. 

[GobbleNut]

Great season recap, Roost.  Thanks for taking the time to write it up for us.

[whiskey]

Brother, I offer the same Thank You back to you. We all know how hard it is to come across someone you can stand to hunt with more than a couple days a year and I'm glad to be able to share a blind with you. Thankfully we have wives that are willing to put up with us through season.

The hard times are what makes the good times so much sweeter.  Even though Indiana was less than we had hoped for, I got to laugh as hard as I had in a long time talking about "french fried taters".




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[hookedspur]

Thanks for sharing this Greg ,sounds like a whole lota fun ,some tears a laugh or three and one awesome season ..Congrats brother the Crusaders are glad to have ya !!

[vicksburg]

Good recap.  I know the feeling and the void you mention all too well...

[BOFF]

Thanks for sharing!

Sorry for the loss of your friend, but glad you and Whiskey have hit it off well.

Reads like an awesome season, despite the difficulties you encountered!

God Bless,
David B.

[snapper1982]

Thanks for sharing Greg. It was great hunting with and meeting you!