2022 Story Thread

[Tom007]

Way to go brother, congrats.....

[twyatt]

Whew, what an awesome opening week here in VA.  Zach came down and we had an absolute blast for 3 days.  Got into birds all 3 days, and Zach filled tags Monday and Wednesday with 2 great VA birds.  I don't think we could have asked for a better 3 days.  Weather and birds cooperated perfectly.

On another note, earlier this year my youngest daughter (8yrs old) said she wanted to go try turkey hunting this year.  That was music to my ears, as neither of my daughters has ever really shown any interest in the past.  I promptly picked up a Stevens .410, and hit the patterning board.  I liked it so much I bought one for myself.  Well 2nd trip out with hers to practice, I noticed after cleaning it that there was a crack in the barrel.  Called Stevens, and they had me send the gun back to them.  Ok, no problem, my daughter can use the other one I bought for myself.  Back out to pattern this one, and I start to shoot some bird shot to get the dot lined up, and the trigger is SUPER stiff.  Like no way she'll be able to use this gun.  I get home and put it on my digital scale and the trigger is 11.75lbs of pull.  I call Stevens, and they tell me to send that one back too.  Now I've got a problem, no gun for her, and no ETA from Stevens on getting them back.  So, I go buy ANOTHER 410 - Mossberg SA410.  Get that one all set up and get her practicing, and that all goes well, finally.   So I spend time getting 3 different blinds set up at various places, get chairs in them, everything ready for the youth opener.  Opening week comes and it's cold.  Saturday we hear NOTHING.  I was worried she'd lose interest but she was ready to go back Sunday.  Sunday we hear a whopping 3 gobbles early and then nothing.  Around 9am she decides she's ready to leave, so I try to express the importance of not leaving early, but she's young, and I don't want to make her do anything she doesn't want to do.  Well, we leave at 9am, and at 10am I get a cell cam picture of a gobbler standing right in front of my blind.  I showed her that picture and she cried for 45 minutes.  She was devastated that she had wanted to leave.  To me it was the perfect learning experience.  Anyway, no luck opening weekend. 
Following weekend we sit a different blind, again cold Saturday, we hear a few distant gobbles, have a hen come in, and that's it.  Sunday, cold again, and this time there is a bird HAMMERING behind us on the ridge.  He gobbles from the roost, walks the ridge behind us, and comes down into the next field beside us, and proceeds to gobble about 300 times, but refuses to come into our field.  That got her fired up, but once again we leave empty handed, but she seems excited to keep going, and I'm beyond proud of her for sticking it out in the cold each day, but starting to worry about how long she'll keep interest if I can't get her some action soon.  Zach and I hunt this same place Tuesday, and chase a bird all over the place but can't close the deal, and after the hunt he helps me move my blind over into the field where we had the bird gobbling Sunday.
Friday she's out of school for Easter, and the night before she wasn't feeling too well, and I tried to tell her to stay home and get some rest, but she INSISTED on hunting Friday, and started crying at the mere thought of staying home.  Ok, let's go.  I have higher hopes now that I feel like our blind is in a better spot, and the landowner told me there was a gobbler in that field Thursday afternoon.
  We get there early and get set up, hear a distant gobble, and then a few gobbles out on this same bird's ridge.  Oh boy, here we go again with this same stubborn bird. 
We only hear about 3-4 gobbles early and then nothing.  About 8am, I was just blind calling, and I hear a hen answer me.  After some back and forth with her, I see her come around the corner and into our field, walk all the way to us, and literally stand behind and beside the blind yelping like crazy every time I hit the wingbone.  This went on for quite some time, she's standing 3 feet from the blind, and making all kinds of racket every time I hit the wingbone.  About 40 minutes into this, all of the sudden I hear a gobble RIGHT behind us, maybe 50 yards, but across the creek from us.  My daughter and my eyes got about as big as dinner plates and I told her to get ready.  Well then the hen that's beside the blind walks off behind us and towards him, UGH. I feel like it's over at that point and thought he had just called that hen right to him.  We sit there defeated for about 20 minutes, and I look up and about 80 yards down the field I see a hen pop back out, then another hen.  Hmm, this might get interesting.  I hit the wingbone again, and here come both hens right towards us.  As they get to about 50 yards, out pops a gobbler and quickly follows the hens, right into the decoys.  Now the shaking starts, I don't know who was shaking worse, me or my daughter.   The gobbler goes into full strut, and starts walking slow motion circles around my jake decoy, about an inch from it.  I tell her to get up on the gun, and when he walks back around, put the dot on his waddles and squeeze.  Well, he walks around, she doesn't shoot, so I pull her off and say, when he walks around again, shoot, again she doesn't shoot so I pull her off as he walks around again - this went on FOUR times.  I was about to come unglued and said on the 4th circle, you gotta shoot him when he comes back around, squeeze harder.  He comes around again and she plows him with a perfect shot!  Before saying anything I bolt out of the back of the blind, almost tearing the whole blind down trying to get out to get my hands on him.  I walk up and grab him and turn around and see her walking up to me trembling and crying in pure joy and adrenaline.  It was the coolest thing I have ever seen in my life, and brings tears to my eyes just typing this thinking about her reaction.  I promptly hug her and express how proud I am of her, and then of course I had to video her reaction because it was priceless.  She was shaking so bad she could hardly speak.  Once we both regained some sort of composure, she couldn't wait to call everyone she knew and tell them about the "monster" gobbler she had just killed.   I could not be more proud of her, she was patient, persistent, stuck it out in the cold, didn't flinch, squeezed the trigger like we practiced, waiting on a good shot, etc etc etc.  Everything just went as perfect that day I as I could have ever hoped for.   I think it's safe to say she's officially hooked, and my new best little hunting buddy.

 

[JeffC]

Congrats to the young lady, and too you twyatt, for putting in the work. Great read and pictures!

[twyatt]

Thanks Jeff!

[Hoosier2]

Awesome read twyatt. Congrats to that little girl of yours! Some things just stick with ya forever and I'm sure that's gonna be one of em. T minus 10 days until Indiana opener. 5 full days of chasin.


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[zsully]

That story is what turkey hunting is all about. I remember when Easton (my oldest boy) killed last year I've never been so proud. On top of that I could tell how bad she wanted it. Congrats again man......I know that meant a lot.

[Meleagris gallopavo]

Congratulations!  I know how good a feeling that is when your child kills their first turkey.


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[twyatt]

Thanks guys, it was definitely a day I will never forget, nor will she.    I also don't think I had even finished packing up before she said "we have to call ZACH!".   I got a huge kick out of that.  Followed by this soft smiling question - "is my turkey bigger than his?"   Hahahahahaha
Almost honey, almost 

[Tom007]

Fantastic story, great job. Congrats to all..........

[a_jabbo]

Such a great story Twyatt. Again, congratulations to you both. Happy I was at least one of the calls in the line up to hear the full story over the phone.

[Yoder409]

FREAKIN' FABULOUS !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

   

CONGRATS to the young lady !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  (and all involved)

[twyatt]

What an awesome opening week and a half it's been.  I finally got on the board this morning!  After ZSully coming down and having a great 3 days, then my daughter getting a bird, my hopes for the season were already fulfilled, but I can't say I wasn't still anxious to get after one myself.  I wasn't planning on hunting this morning, I had originally planned on trying to go Friday before work, but I saw the weather forecast looked awesome for this morning, and decided to give it a quick try. 
There's not much to this story though, it happened so fast.  I pulled up this morning to my hunt club, and decided to just sit on the tailgate at one of the main road areas that's got pretty good elevation, and has always been a good spot to listen.  I figured I'd just listen for a little while, and if I heard anything I'd try to make a move, if not, I'd head back and just go to work.  Well right off the bat I hear a bird gobble WAAAY down the road.   In hopes of hearing something closer, I sat for another minute or two and he gobbled again.  Ok, time to go.  I think I have a good idea where he is, and I think there's a dirt road leading into that block of woods.  I walk 700 yards down the asphalt road, and hear this bird gobbling every couple minutes.  I sneak down this road a little, around a few blow downs, and see a nice stretch of road that looks perfect to set up on.  Put out the jake and hen in the road, and get seated.  I sit down and look up and I can't see the decoys because of under brush and a little hill beside the road, so I reposition, cut some stuff out of the way, and finally sit back down thinking, man I hope all that rustling around didn't mess anything up, it's been a few minutes since I heard him.  I get my call out and yelp a little and he fires back at me immediately, and sounds like he's probably 200 yards across a creek and up on the next ridge.  I call again, he hammers right back, so I put the call down and wait.  Few minutes go by and then he gobbles again and it sounds like now he's closer, and has come right out onto the point of the ridge and is gobbling right in my direction from about 100ish yards.  Heart starts pumping, and I get ready.  A minute or two go by, and he gobbles again just over the rise and about 50 yards away this time and I almost jump out of my chair.  Then I hear footsteps in the leaves, and see a full fan come up through the brush and up the hill, and he walks in full strut right into the decoys and I shot him at about 12 steps.   Over and done at 6:45 this morning.   Absolute textbook perfect hunt.  Doesn't happen like that often, but it sure is fun when it does.  The 700 yard uphill walk back to the truck with my turkey lounger, decoys, gun, and bird wasn't the most fun, but my fat tail can always use the exercise.  Then I get home to my youngest standing in the driveway jumping up and down congratulating me.   Couldn't ask for a much more perfect morning, and it's always so special when I kill one with a call I made.

[harleytom]

Congrats Twyatt! Those "textbook" hunts, no matter how rare, are what keeps us coming back again and again.


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[POk3s]

Great job Wyatt! I was grinning from ear to ear reading the story of your daughters hunt and wondering how it would all unfold with all those cold days.

Last weekend was my first go at getting after it since my Osceola hunt in early March. My dad and I were scheduled to go to merriams country as he and I both had a long weekend over Easter. We try to plan a turkey trip every Easter and it really makes the holiday even more special . Anyway, snowy weather and super cold temps (like highs in the high 20s and lows in the single digits) made us rethink it. We decided we'd head to Kansas, probably more for me to try and knock kansas off the list, as much as the nicer weather
. WOW! TOUGH! You never really know if it's lip service people are feeding you, or the real deal until you go experience it yourself. We were able to find exactly one group of birds with Toms in the bunch during the duration of our trip. We never even saw a tom AT ALL on private land. The cooler weather and high winds surely didn't help anything, but we got it handed to us. If you're thinking of going to Kansas just don't do it lol.

I ran into a couple guys from Alabama and they were completely bewildered. I said "well that makes me feel better. If a couple turkey killers from Alabama are feeling the same way as I am, then I don't think I'm missing a piece somewhere in here."

With all that said, I think we still could've killed a bird if I wasn't for other hunters. That's the name of the game hunting public but I really had my first run in with a couple turkey hunters I would've liked to have a word with. The first time these turkeys were all grouped up and in the corner of a corn field. We thought we had everything all to ourselves and worked around these birds a couple times trying to call with no results. I was going to have my dad crawl up and see what he could do when all of the sudden the turkeys bolt. I'm going "what the heck" when I see two "kids" walking through the field. I don't think they ever saw these turkeys and were just lazily walking around. Kind of just shrugged it off.

The next day, after driving to a high spot before sunrise we heard a turkey gobble. Nearly the same spot as the day before and no one is parked at the gate. SWEET! Bird flies down into the same corn field but on the other side as the day before. I wish like hell we would've just set up in that field before daylight. Hind sight. But we listened there the night before and didn't hear a peep. Anyway, we cirlce around the bird and it appears he's all alone from the glimpses we can get. Get my dad crawled up under a tree and start on him with the calls. He immediately gobbles back. I hit him again and he gobbles back. This is going to happen. 2 minutes later he gobbles on his own and is basically at the point where I'm hoping my dad can shoot him. I didn't answer. After another couple minutes I call and nothing. I call again, and nothing. 10 minutes go by and I crawl up to my dad to see what's going on. He never saw him but felt like he was really close. So I crawl up to where the bird was last and call. I'm met with hen yelps. Hmmm. I call again and am met with some more interesting sounding hen yelps and then a gobbler shaker call. Then more yelps and another gobblers shaker call. I start throwing my little fit, walk up to where I should be in site of these guys and call. Nothing. I'm kind of wondering how to approach this situation when I see the same 2 kids heading straight away from me right through the middle of the field...again.

A few other close calls in there but that was basically the gist of the trip.

I'll be trying some Rocky Mountain turkeys this weekend.

[twyatt]

Thanks POk, and sorry to hear about the poor Kansas experience, that stinks big time.  Best of luck on your upcoming hunts, hopefully they go better than that one.