Most memorable solo bird

[Happy]

Alright fellows. I have been battling cabin fever and it'd been over two months since I have been in the woods. Doesn't help that almost all the snow has melted off and it was near 60 degrees out today. So since turkey season for me is still over two months away I figured we could at least relive some past hunts. So here's the question. What's your most memorable solo bird? I know that we all have favorite birds for different reasons, be it hunting with a family member or calling in someone's first ect.  But I figured to start out here. Thanks

[MK M GOBL]

I am having a hard time choosing, so many birds that are favorites for different reasons but if I had to choose one it would be the bird I called Hook! I had so many countless hours in on this bird and I learned him for how he played his game, I hunted this bird for a solid three seasons and finally took him during season #4 with my Cody World Class Slate. I have his story posted here:

http://oldgobbler.com/Forum/index.php/topic,58988.msg582805.html#new

MK M GOBL

[dirt road ninja]

Birds that got away haunt me more than ones I killed. Most memorable one of recent years was Good Friday year before last. I struck him at 8:19 in the morning a few hundreds yards off and moved on him. Got sent up about 150-200 yards and started calling, he responded. I cut and yelped a few times and every time he hammered away. I went quiet and so did he, after 20 minutes I called again nothing.  Start thinking I should have kept talking to him. Sat there another 30 minutes or so calling periodically with no luck. It's now about 9:30 and I'm getting up to leave and he fires off past where I was standing when I originally struck the first gobble. Off I go, chasing him through pine jungles. After another hour I end up back in the same place I started with him in the same spot. I said screw it I'll kill him here or start on him fresh in the morning, but I wasn't going to risk pushing him. Around 11 he got fired up and started moving in on me. At 11:20 I saw his white head slipping through cane and I killed him a second later. Twas 3 hours of gobbling action. Killed another bird the next day, but it wasn't nearly as fun.

[WNCTracker]

The one I got right after my dad passed. I had a several yr dry streak and this bird gobbled it's head off for 90 minutes while it sidewinded over 300 yards down a hill to within 20 yards of my gun. Dropped him cold.  A 1 1/4 spurred and 11 3/8 bearded tough (and dry) old bird. Since that I've gotten at least 2 gobblers each season.  I always thought it was my dads doing.

[Gobble!]

My first. It was just a jake but it's my most intense hunt.

[OldSchool]

Great thread.

I think other than my first, my most memorable was a bird I never did kill. I figured him to be three years old the year I met him. He'd been shot at a couple times earlier that season, and just wouldn't come to a call. I hunted him several times the last week of season that year with no luck, and couldn't wait to take up where we'd left off the following year.

I hunted him on and off the next season and t'd off the boss hen enough one morning that she came looking for me. I had him, and a bunch of hens in front of me shortly afterwards, but I couldn't get a clear shot at him through all the hens. Every time I thought it was a done deal, a hen would step in front of him, or another would be close enough to side that I didn't dare shoot, and ended up watching the whole bunch walk out of range.

I probably could have killed him one morning about a week later, but he was standing at the outer limit of the effective range of my gun, where a misjudgement in range on my part might have ended up crippling him, and that would have been a crime.

The last time I ever saw him, I'd gone up the backside of the mountain where he and his hens roosted extra early one morning, and sat down against a tree and relaxed. He gobbled, the hens made all kinds of racket, they flew down and wandered away down the side hill to the field below. He'd gobble once in a while but not much. Just enough to let me know that he was still in the field.

After they'd wandered off, I moved over the crest of the hill and dropped down to a little flat on the side hill where I'd known him to strut now and then. About three hours later I heard what I was hoping for. He started go gobble like crazy. The hens had left him all alone out in the field and he didn't like it.

I made a few yelps just loud enough for him to hear and he double gobbled. Then he gobbled again, but I didn't answer him. The next time he gobbled I could tell he was back to the side of the field at the bottom of the ridge.

From where I sat I could see about a hundred yards down the side hill in one narrow spot through the trees, the rest of what I could see was within gun range. He gobbled again and a minute later he was in the opening and headed straight for me. He gobbled once more and kept coming.

Then, right before my eyes he just vanished. I was sure I would  have seen him leave the opening if he had, and I wasn't sure exactly what happened. Did he move off when I'd glanced away for just a second to see about the rustle in the leaves uphill to my right. Didn't seem like he would have had enough time.

Then I decided that he must have stopped out a ways, and where he was lined up with a cherry tree that was about 25 yards in front of me. Of course he wasn't about to gobble at this point and let me know just where he was.

I sat there expecting him to show back up in that opening any minute, and hopefully still on his way. About ten minutes later as my eyes slowly moved from the opening to the ground within range on the flat, I caught a slight movement at the very edge of the flat by the cherry tree. As I focused on it, half of a turkey's head and an eye materialized tight along the side of the tree then disappeared.

I knew he'd seen all he needed to to know there was no hen there and my first thought was to rush the cherry tree, but what would that have gotten me? Another sketchy shot at best, so I sat there and tried to catch a glimpse of him as he left with that cherry tree between us. Not a feather did I see.

This was just one of the games he played on me, I could tell you more. That was a long time ago, and there have been others like him over the years, but I'll always have a soft spot for that bird. He gave me a lot of good times and taught me some valuable lessons. Whenever I think of him I have to smile.

Bob

[runngun]

Couple of years ago Me and my Daddy set up in the corner of a big field. In the corner there's a gate opening with a lane to where the turkey's are roosted. There's a old Farm-all tractor near the gate and the lane. We set up on the fence row, the tractor slightly out front.
Man he gobbled a hundred times as his hens were flying down. Once they were down, he flew down and was flat showing out.
My daddy, well he had to do the calling, because I was just about to hyperventilate, no this was not even close to being my first turkey. I could see the shadow of this strutting longbeard underneath that old tractor. My heart is beating about 9 thousand rpms.
I watched as he slowly rounded the front of the tractor facing me at 10 steps, full strut. My daddy putted once, he raised his old head up, I shot him in the face with a load of NITRO' COMPANY. 12 Gauge TC ENCORE. 11-1/2 inch beard 1-3/4 spurs. Heaviest bird to date 24 pounds. Not bad for a Rio.

HAVE A GOOD ONE
RAY

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G890A using Tapatalk

[chcltlabz]

There are so many memorable birds, but this is the first one that comes to mind.

I had just started turkey hunting completely on my own, as in going to areas I found and hunting those spots alone.  Up until then, we hunted alone sometimes, but always at least in the same place as my father.  There was a bird that was in one particular field every day.  Well outside shotgun range from the nearest treeline and always with at least 1 hen.  I never hunted him first thing in the morning for some reason, but I would always drive by him between spots, and was headed to hunt him late one morning.  When I got there, someone else was hunting him already.  I sat in the truck and watched these two guys for a minute.  One guy eventually circled around this bird in an attempt to push him out of the field to the other guy (very illegal where this was).  Of course, the bird didn't go to the other guy and I heard him take a hail mary shot and he never missed a beat.  I had no other spots in mind, so I decided to hunt a piece of woods across the road from these guys that I had never set foot in.  I didn't even know if there was enough woods to hunt at the back of this big field, but I gave it a whirl.

When I hit the woods, it was pretty tough to hear as I recall because of the wind.  I remember thinking I heard a gobble, but it was too far off in the wind to know for sure if it was, and which direction it came from, so I kept hunting the direction I was.  I finally got close enough to know it was a gobble, and knew with the wind I was close enough to set up.  I carried a pair of foam carry lite decoys with me.  A hen and a half strut jake.  Because he was close, I think I set those decoys about 15 yards in front of me at most.  This bird was hot and would answer back fast with every call, and he was moving to me fast.  He came into view through the open woods well outside shotgun range and hit the brakes to strut and wait out the hen.  He obviously knew the hen should see him, and he couldn't see the decoys.  It seemed like he was there a long time, but did at least give me enough time to calm my nerves a bit.  Just as I thought all hope was lost, the wind caught that jake decoy just right and spun it 90 degrees.  He spotted that right away and was none too happy that the jake found his hen before he did.  He immediately went into a half strut and bee-lined for that jake decoy.  I'm still never patient enough when this happens to sit back and watch the show, so the second he stepped out from behind that decoy I leveled him.  As I recall he had about a 10.5 inch beard and 1 1/4 spurs.

That bird probably more than any other I've killed defined my turkey hunting style.  To this day I hunt extremely aggressively, call hard and move in close.  It has probably cost me a few birds through the years, but it has killed way more that I never would have taken had I sat back and waited them out.  Plus, its way more exciting! 

[guesswho]

As others have said, hard to narrow down to one

But if I had to choose it would be a bird I killed 10-12 years ago.   It was an all day ordeal.  Short version is me and a buddy finally doubled up and sealed the deal around 5:30 in the afternoon.  When the smoke cleared we had two studs on the ground totaling almost seven feet of beard between them.   Mine had 56" and his had 26".   That's a memory thats deeply etched in my memory.

[tomstopper]

As others have said, hard to narrow down to one

But if I had to choose it would be a bird I killed 10-12 years ago.   It was an all day ordeal.  Short version is me and a buddy finally doubled up and sealed the deal around 5:30 in the afternoon.  When the smoke cleared we had two studs on the ground totaling almost seven feet of beard between them.   Mine had 56" and his had 26".   That's a memory thats deeply etched in my memory.

We're you using the Badonka-Deke then

[g8rvet]

I  have a more memorable hunt, but my nephew was with me, so I'll save for that for another thread.

My most memorable was the bird I killed with a crow call.  I was hunting a lease, had already taken a couple of birds, but was new to turkey hunting and still figuring out what to do after flydown.  Bumblin and stumblin instead of runnin and gunnin.  So I was checking a spot I knew they liked to be later in the day.  Blew my crow call and he answered, but about 200 yards away, along a sandy road that led to that spot.  Eased a little way back and blew the call again - he was the same distance, or maybe a little further.  Went to where I thought he had started and blew it one last time. He gobbled again, obviously heading away from me, towards the creek bottom.  There was an old tram road that paralleled the road he was on and I hightailed it to that road.  He had two options to get in to the creek bottom - on the road he was on, or cut over to the tram. I ran/walked to the intersection of the only road that cut over from his road to the tram - about 100 yards shy of the bottom.  I sat down at the intersection looking along the trail leading to the road he had gobbled on. Slipped on my face mask. Put crow call away.  Put mouth call in. Eased gun up and just as I was getting ready to call he rounds the bend, 30 yards away.  He stops before I can even make a noise and the bead is on his head.  Down goes Frazier!  Never used a turkey call once.  Just knew where he was headed and beat him to the spot.  We called that intersection "Crow Call" until we lost the lease.

[guesswho]

As others have said, hard to narrow down to one

But if I had to choose it would be a bird I killed 10-12 years ago.   It was an all day ordeal.  Short version is me and a buddy finally doubled up and sealed the deal around 5:30 in the afternoon.  When the smoke cleared we had two studs on the ground totaling almost seven feet of beard between them.   Mine had 56" and his had 26".   That's a memory thats deeply etched in my memory.

We're you using the Badonka-Deke then

No. Badonkadeke was just a dream back then.  Lot of R&D went into the Badonka line. 

On a side note, I'm working on another secret weapon that should be completed in time to reveal before this spring.   Keep an eye out and I'll introduce it here in another thread. 

[jepcho]

There are a few that come to mind but the most memorable was probably one I killed in 2013.  My dad had been hunting with me on a Sunday in May right after a big snow storm (gotta love Iowa).  We didn't have much luck but drove by a field and saw a flock with 3 toms and several hens that were a few hundred yards from some public land.  So a few days later I took off work and headed out there.  I watched this entire flock flydown into the field about 150 yard from me.  I sat there patiently for the next 2-3 hours, just calling lightly once in a while, and watched.  There was an albino hen in the group that I called in, along with a bearded hen.  I sat there watching these Toms strut, gobble, breed hens and just relaxed.  Then like a flip of a switch, the hens took off and ran away from the toms out of the field.  At which point it took all three toms about a minute or two tops to cover the ground between where they were and right into gun range, where I was able to drop the hammer on one.  This was such an amazing morning!

[jwhunter]

I can tell you "the hunt"when  I became hooked on turkeys.  My dad was and still is a die hard turkey Hunter. He started taking me around 8 or 9 years old.  But only a few times a year. Seems like he would kill a few birds then start taking me with him. I alwayse loved going. I killed a few birds with him before I could drive but once I turned 16 then I could drive myself and really began to learn. Before then I was alwayse the trigger man and never the caller. I asked to skip school one day go hunt by myself. Dad trusted me with a firearm and my grades were good so he said ok. This was the 1st time I hunted alone. We had a hunting lease of a little over 2,000 acres and at the time dad and I were the only people hunting it. This place was a turkey meca! Wish we still had it. But anyway.. So this morning it was going to be just me and the turkeys. I had to drive 45 minutes to get there and I remember being a little nervous to do it alone. It was misting rain that morning on the drive up but once I got in the woods it quit raining. Got on my atv and drove to the area I wanted to hunt. Then walked to where dad told me to hoot from. I didn't even need to hoot because a gobbler was hammering on the roost. I snuck down an old loggin road and got set up within 150 yards.my mistake was I set up in the bend of the road and didn't get hid good enough. I had few hens and jakes lead the way up the road and they saw me and I spooked them off. I was only inticipating one gobbler walking up the road. If that would of happend I would have killed him. So now since I screwed that up I began to  walk another road yelping on a box call every 75-100 yards. After walking a quarter mile or so I had a gobbler fire off about 40 yards beside me. I was walking a road on a ridge top and that bird was below the shelf. I dove into a honey suckle patch and aimed my gun towards the gobble. I was trying to be so still and I was staring down the bead of my gun so hard that I didn't see the gobbler slip up the road to my right. When I saw him he was 15 yards away standing in the road. I knew I could not swing my gun to shoot him so I froze and kept my gun pointed infront of me. There was a pine tree blocking me from swinging. I also knew I couldn't call he was to close. He walked closer headed infront of my gun. Literally my barrel is in the road and I'm in this honey suckle patch. He got to 5 yards and blew my doors off with a gobble. I almost pissed my pants. Then he started drumming. I can't even describe the way I felt. I am getting chills just typing this story. He stood there that close for 5 minutes drumming. I was so afraid to move I let him walk away. I didn't even try to swing/spook him and shoot. After he walked off I think I just went back to my truck and went home to tell my dad. That was 15 springs ago and I can remember that moment like it was yesterday.

[chcltlabz]

I love hearing turkey stories, so I'll try and keep this one going.

This one's from the year before last and goes down in my books as the fastest turkey kill ever.  I hit a spot first thing in the morning I had been seeing birds frequently.  Unfortunately, there was just too much road noise to pinpoint anything, and after a couple hours, I bailed out.

I hit the road to a second spot, pulled in and parked and grabbed my things.  For some reason, I decided to make a call from where I parked and got a response probably 200 yards back behind the field I parked by.  I loaded my gun at a trot to get set up on him and decided to stop and call at the back edge of this field to get a better bearing on him.  I'd guess I was maybe 150 yards from my truck.  I got no answer and decided to keep moving the edge of the field towards where he was.  As I got about 20 yards from a hedgerow in the field, I decided to call again to see if I could get a response.  This time he did, but he answered maybe 25 yards from me on the opposite side of the hedgerow.  I hit the dirt (probably 10 yards from the woodline and no way to set up proper) and pulled my facemask up, still kneeling down so he couldn't see me over the hedgerow.  As fast as I could pull up my facemask from around my neck, I see his fan over top of a small briar patch about 20 yards away.  I was already kneeling, so all I had to do was stand up with my gun shouldered and leveled him as soon as he broke strut.  I'm still not sure if he covered that much ground coming to my original call, or if I thought he was much farther away than he really was, but he took a truck ride either way.