2024 Killer B's Story Thread

[Delmar ODonnell]

Hey guys, figured I'd go ahead and start a story thread for this year.

I had a great opening weekend in Mississippi. The evening before opening day, I listened to three turkeys fly up, although they didn't gobble, neither on the ground nor on the limb. Based on only hearing the three fly up, I assumed these were the gobblers, and the hens were roosted further down the ridge. As forecasted, a thunderstorm came through opening morning. Nevertheless, I set up in the bottom below where I thought the hens were roosted in the pouring rain. Shortly after sitting down I was rewarded with gobbles at thunder, and they were exactly where I heard them fly up. 20+ hens pitched down and piddled past me at 20 yards, while I could not see the gobblers who were roosted to my 10:00 up the ridge. As then hens moved up the ridge behind me, I attempted to circle and get in front of them, hoping the gobblers were behind. Unfortunately, the gobblers were leading the flock, and had soon drug their harem off and shut up in the downpour.

After changing into a dry set of clothes, I moved locations, and after sitting for awhile, was awarded with a gobble around 11:30 from a distant field. I moved through a fresh burn and set up in the woods to shoot to the field edge, and gave my best itteration of "two bored hens." Shortly after noon I see a vibrant red head pop over the crest. As my red dot was trained on him, I was thinking, "come on man you are going to have to give me more than sneaking in quiet," and he proceeded to blow into strut and began waltzing into the burn. That was enough for me, and at 12:15 I claimed my first gobbler of the season.





The next morning, the weather was perfect. My dad and I set up a close to the flock I was on the morning before. After pitching to the opposite side of the ridge, we attempted to make a loop around to get in front of them. While doing so, I told him we needed to check the two turkeys we had heard in that direction from our inital setup. I cut on the trumpet and they gobbled two bottoms over. We closed distance, and before cresting the next ridge, I checked them again. They hammered in the next bottom over. We sat on them on a huge oak seemingly made for that purpose, almost seven feet in diameter. Within minutes the two gobblers appeared on top of the ridge. One showed no hesitation and bee lined to us. This gobbler, however, had only a 2-3 inch beard, and while I was confident he was a gobbler, I wanted to see his wing patch, and was unable to do so, as he was facing us. He got to twelve yards to our 11:00 with nothing but air between us. He was, in fact, a gobbler, but I wasn't about to tell my dad to swing on a gobbler at 12 yards. Dad remained focus on the more cautious gobbler, who stepped in a lane at 38 yards. I told dad to let me know when I should stop him. Instead, dad stopped him himself with a shot from his Benelli. It was a beautiful morning, and one we will never forget as this was my dad's first Mississippi longbeard.






I couldn't ask for a better start to the season, and I am excited as to what is to come.

[harleytom]

Congrats to you and your dad, enjoy those times, you'll always remember them.


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[POk3s]

Great job my friend! Can't beat those memories! As always, exceptional pics and story telling!

Life is good again when Delmar is posting recollections of a successful hunt!

[zsully]

I don't even know where to start with this. A_Jabbo and I have been dreaming up and planning an Osceola hunt for years. We finally made it happen and booked a hunt with Osceola Outdoors. Those guys run a really fine operation. We arrived in camp on Monday and they had us out the door and in the field within an hour and a half of getting there. We thought we would be early for and evening hunt but on our way in I glassed the field edge and there I saw my first Osceola strutter and he was glorious! He stood out on a dark road strutting and spinning for a pair of hens. The iridescence was incredible and he almost looked gold. Unfortunately we were 350 yards across an open field and really didn't have the option to close the distance. Turns out Florida is flat as a board! We hung with the gobbler the rest of the evening and ran into 3 covey of bobwhite quail on the way out. When I got back to camp I got to celebrate with A_Jabbo because his bird didn't hang up! The next morning dawned cool windy and made hearing a gobble darn near impossible. Calling seemed futile so we didn't do it and instead waited in our palmetto hide and hoped the wind would die. Around 8:10 I had to get rid of some morning coffee. With the mission accomplished without leaving my hide, I turned back around and saw a mouth call next to my left boot. It's here when I heard Josh whisper but couldn't understand what he said because of the wind rattled palmetto leaves between us.  I slowly reached down to grab the mouth call but before I got my hands on it I caught movement and found myself staring at a longbeard 7 yards away. Fortunately for me he was already locked on the strutter decoy and fully committed. He mean walked past me straight to the decoy at 17 yards and put on a show. A gentle squeeze of the trigger and it was over. This trip was a dream and it lived up to my expectations. Now it's back to waiting and fighting off cabin fever with the never ending rain in western Pa.

[harleytom]

Great story! Congrats to you both!


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[Tom007]

Congrats! Those Osceolas are incredible, their colors are unreal. Great memories for sure.

[Yoder409]

CONGRATS, fellers !!!

Osceolas are gorgeous birds !!!   I'm trying to fight (by way of reasoning) off the idea of heading back down to Florida to hunt for 2 days......

[JeffC]

Congrats on a fine Tom, and good read, especially for us still month away from starting.

[POk3s]

Well done guys! Anxious to hear the other story!!!

[Tom007]

Hey guys, figured I'd go ahead and start a story thread for this year.

I had a great opening weekend in Mississippi. The evening before opening day, I listened to three turkeys fly up, although they didn't gobble, neither on the ground nor on the limb. Based on only hearing the three fly up, I assumed these were the gobblers, and the hens were roosted further down the ridge. As forecasted, a thunderstorm came through opening morning. Nevertheless, I set up in the bottom below where I thought the hens were roosted in the pouring rain. Shortly after sitting down I was rewarded with gobbles at thunder, and they were exactly where I heard them fly up. 20+ hens pitched down and piddled past me at 20 yards, while I could not see the gobblers who were roosted to my 10:00 up the ridge. As then hens moved up the ridge behind me, I attempted to circle and get in front of them, hoping the gobblers were behind. Unfortunately, the gobblers were leading the flock, and had soon drug their harem off and shut up in the downpour.

After changing into a dry set of clothes, I moved locations, and after sitting for awhile, was awarded with a gobble around 11:30 from a distant field. I moved through a fresh burn and set up in the woods to shoot to the field edge, and gave my best itteration of "two bored hens." Shortly after noon I see a vibrant red head pop over the crest. As my red dot was trained on him, I was thinking, "come on man you are going to have to give me more than sneaking in quiet," and he proceeded to blow into strut and began waltzing into the burn. That was enough for me, and at 12:15 I claimed my first gobbler of the season.





The next morning, the weather was perfect. My dad and I set up a close to the flock I was on the morning before. After pitching to the opposite side of the ridge, we attempted to make a loop around to get in front of them. While doing so, I told him we needed to check the two turkeys we had heard in that direction from our inital setup. I cut on the trumpet and they gobbled two bottoms over. We closed distance, and before cresting the next ridge, I checked them again. They hammered in the next bottom over. We sat on them on a huge oak seemingly made for that purpose, almost seven feet in diameter. Within minutes the two gobblers appeared on top of the ridge. One showed no hesitation and bee lined to us. This gobbler, however, had only a 2-3 inch beard, and while I was confident he was a gobbler, I wanted to see his wing patch, and was unable to do so, as he was facing us. He got to twelve yards to our 11:00 with nothing but air between us. He was, in fact, a gobbler, but I wasn't about to tell my dad to swing on a gobbler at 12 yards. Dad remained focus on the more cautious gobbler, who stepped in a lane at 38 yards. I told dad to let me know when I should stop him. Instead, dad stopped him himself with a shot from his Benelli. It was a beautiful morning, and one we will never forget as this was my dad's first Mississippi longbeard.






I couldn't ask for a better start to the season, and I am excited as to what is to come.

Way to go my friend! Congrats

[a_jabbo]

Congratulations to you and your dad, Del!

Sorry I'm super late to the party fellas. As you heard from zsully, we had a pretty amazing few days down in Florida. My hunt was extremely quick. Like Z said, we got to the lodge and had just enough time to throw a sandwich down, and we were dressed and ready to rock. It was a little over an hour drive to the spot I was headed, and I was filled with excitement the whole way. We arrived, and drove up the trail to where it would open up, and we glassed the area, only seeing a single bird a good distance away headed away from where we would be setting up. We backed out, and had to circle around through the woods, and try to be as cautious as possible. We get out of the woods about 30 yards, and see 5 hens bolt from the direction we had glassed before and saw nothing, and they were toting a gobbler with them. We hit the dirt, and let them go off. We get to our tree, built up some good cover, set the decoys up, and sit down. I pick my phone up to send Z an update and respond to his, then Tanner said "He just came back out", which I responded "you're $#!^^ Me". I adjusted in my seat and grabbed my gun. It was magical watching this gobbler strut in the sunshine from 120 yards out into 20.

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get the weight and images needed to get a score for this, so we'll just have to settle for the story and memory.

[Zobo]

Great idea Killer BS, an area to post stories, for truth stretching, wild exaggerations
and flat out lies!

[Yoder409]

Congratulations to you and your dad, Del!

Sorry I'm super late to the party fellas. As you heard from zsully, we had a pretty amazing few days down in Florida. My hunt was extremely quick. Like Z said, we got to the lodge and had just enough time to throw a sandwich down, and we were dressed and ready to rock. It was a little over an hour drive to the spot I was headed, and I was filled with excitement the whole way. We arrived, and drove up the trail to where it would open up, and we glassed the area, only seeing a single bird a good distance away headed away from where we would be setting up. We backed out, and had to circle around through the woods, and try to be as cautious as possible. We get out of the woods about 30 yards, and see 5 hens bolt from the direction we had glassed before and saw nothing, and they were toting a gobbler with them. We hit the dirt, and let them go off. We get to our tree, built up some good cover, set the decoys up, and sit down. I pick my phone up to send Z an update and respond to his, then Tanner said "He just came back out", which I responded "you're $#!^^ Me". I adjusted in my seat and grabbed my gun. It was magical watching this gobbler strut in the sunshine from 120 yards out into 20.

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get the weight and images needed to get a score for this, so we'll just have to settle for the story and memory.

CONGRATS, A J !!!!!!!

Way to git r done !!!!     

[Tom007]

Way to go team! Nice job!

[zelmo1]

Flash in the pan, lol. Great job guys. Z