I posted this story on another hunting forum and someone said I should post over here. Having never heard of Old Gobbler before I came and checked it out. Looks like a pretty neat place. So, here's my story about the opening week here in FL...
Thursday night prior to the Saturday opener of turkeys my dad and I were up until 11 pm fixing the last bits on the trailer (we were rebuilding the top to my popup camper), then I got it packed up, hooked up to the truck, and went to bed only to get up early to be at work by 4 so that I could leave work by 3. I tell ya, Friday all my coworkers were happy to see me leave. I was bouncy and excited because once I left work I was off for 9 days of turkey hunting at one of my favorite management areas to hunt turkeys.
So with having done no scouting prior to the season, I set off on my grand adventure. Maps in the truck, GPS fully charged with new batteries, plenty of food, LOTS of pie, beer to enjoy in the afternoons, some new juju and a fresh new camper top, weather is expected to be nice the entire trip and my spirits are high.
I spent the first five days in a frustrating series of nighttime walks through GPS Hell to get to turkeys that were getting pressure from a hunt club that allows their members access to the same place I go from 400 yards while I was slogging two miles through the mud and the dark and the snakes and gators and cypress knees only to be frustrated by them talking briefly and then not working after what little talking they did. One morning there was a big hen fight that got broken up by a fox barking and coming in after them. That was pretty neat. Another afternoon I found a dust bowl with three hens kicking and rolling up a sandstorm. I decided to hunt that area the next day only to have a gobbler poached from someone who had snuck (as in drove around the gate that is posted BIG TIME no hunting, this is not the WMA, violators will be prosecuted, through a fence that had been cut) into private land that bordered the WMA.
For those of you unaware, GPS Hell is a section of woods that I swear the GPS doesn't work in. In the dark I always hear trust your equipment, trust your equipment, just go where it tells you to go. That sucker is out to get me because I know that in the daylight I don't need to go in that many circles, or on so many "short cuts" to get back to the truck. But, it's an adventure and I eventually get to where I need to be.
Day 6 for once is not foggy, a bit windy and a little bit overcast. I creep into the woods, no lights, find my spot and get all situated and wait for light to come. I hear a bird gobble, which causes one close by to gobble and then another one or two further down the woods to fire off. OH MY GOD!!!!! THERE ARE TURKEYS EVERYWHERE!! I call very quietly and that first bird fires off again. I shut up for a little while and just listen. The bird gobbles at least a dozen more times in the tree before flying down and then the gobbling begins in earnest. He stays in one area for a while and I keep thinking OH please come this way, please come this way. No....don't be going away. No doubt all he was doing was turning his head but I kept silently begging him to not go away. We talked back and forth, when he apparently decided he'd had enough teasing and it was time to come see me.
I could tell he was moving through the woods as he gobbled and was getting closer when out of the corner of my eye I see a bird fly down. I look over there and see nothing, hear nothing. Still I'm calling, still he's gobbling and getting closer and now I'm watching to see what flew down. OH MAAAAAN it was a hen and she's heading straight for him. That little skanky hen is gonna steal my man! And then...SHOOT there are TWO! Then I think well perhaps the gobbler that gobbled close that one time is right behind the two ladies and he's gonna come walking out. If he was there he never showed himself.
But my gobbler is still gobbling and still coming closer and those two hens are gonna steal him from me. CRAP! The woods go silent, the hens have disappeared and aren't talking and the gobbler isn't gobbling. Lots of muttering and harrumphing under my breath going on at that point when I see the hens coming back my direction. My pulse picks up even more when I see a white head right behind them, coming this way. Can I shoot him?!? Oh can I shoot him?!? He's too close to the one hen, wait til she moves, wait til he's not behind the tree or bush. Can I shoot him now?!?! That hen is still there. Move! Get outta my way lady! This bad boy is strutting and gobbles a couple times and that hen won't get far enough away from him to shoot.
Finally, she moves and the gobbler is all by his lonesome and I have a clear shot. BOOM! I got him! As I sit there for a second, I realize he's flopping in the mud puddle of a creek and he's getting all ugly. I also noticed that it wasn't until I actually got up that the hens ran away. How very interesting. I wondered how long they'd hang around if I hadn't gotten up running to go get my turkey out of the mud. OH WHAT A BEAUTY....oh wait....what the heck is wrong with his tail??? He's one beat up gobbler that's for sure. Niiiice two year old though. BEAUTIFUL Osceola turkey. There is some dancing around in the woods celebrating, laughing and hollering DID YOU SEE THAT?!?! to the woods.
(his view of me in the blind)
Eventually I head out of the woods and just go driving the management area woods, looking for neat stuff to see as I slowly head back to my camp for some victorious drinks and some pictures.
(his tail...if you look carefully at the feathers you can see they're "cut" in a sort of saw tooth pattern...really odd)
(turkey camp)
That night brought wind and cool temperatures; so cool that I was shivering the next morning. Day 7 had me bundled up in my duck hunting fleece, heading back out to the same spot, not really expecting much because of the day before but hoping that I could find another area where gobblers are gobbling for the next day. So I sat shivering in my blind when two turkeys fire off from the same general location as the bird from Day 6. I get excited and talk a little bit, not much, just quiet and then shut up. Before flydown, there were at least 4 gobblers back there gobbling, but not really responding to me. They were just gobbling.
The morning slowly progressed and I was sitting there thinking Oh please come this way! Please come this way! Talk to me! Come on boys, come see me! But they weren't interested in me today. They just wandered off a little further into the swamp. I could still hear them, they weren't going far, so "who knows" perhaps they'd come back to me. And then BLAM! Someone shot one of MY turkeys! LOTS of mumbling and grumbling but I sit there and wait. I'm quiet for a little while and then start calling softly thinking that perhaps one of the toms would come wandering back my direction. They knew I was here so perhaps the guy scared them my way.
I'm sitting there shivering from the cold, calling softly and I hear something walking in the woods but I can't see it through all the underbrush and vines that direction. I'm not hearing hens and definitely no gobbling, but still something is walking around back there though I can't tell if it's coming closer or what. I up my yelping and "cutesy chattering" a bit so it's a little louder. Still nothing that I can see or hear. Even the walking seems to have ceased. Hmmmm. I talk and sit still and then as I'm watching I see what looked like a white softball move in the brush.
OOOOOHHHHHHHH MAN my heart beat started racing. Did I really see what I thought I saw? Is it? Oh pleeeeeeaaaaaase let it be a tom! And then I see a flash of white again between some trees, coming right on in. IT IS A TOM!!! I call a little bit more, watching him pick his way through the trees, before picking up my gun. I lose sight of him for about a minute as he was behind some trees, perhaps stopping to strut. But he walks back out, I've got my gun on him and he pauses to strut. He's behind some brush, too much brush in the way for me to be happy with that shot. C'mon big boy come on in. He slicks down and starts walking some more, looking for that hen that is me. But he's walking the creek bottom. He stops to strut, presenting me with a gorgeous shot. I hold off. He's standing in the same creek and I want this boy pretty for some pictures. Off he continues and finally he steps out of the creek, stands with his head up, looking for the hen, half strutted when I take my shot. He is DOWN! OHHHHHHHHHHHHH MAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNN that is when the shakes began and lordy I was vibrating I was shaking so much. I had to sit there a moment before I was sure I could stand. I went over to my bird who when he dropped didn't even kick once and just stood there, shaking. I looked around for someone to shout DID YOU SEE THAT?!?!? to but alas it was just the woods, and besides that I couldn't do much more than whisper it to myself. I'm not sure I could've yelled it anyway.
I pick him up: a NIIIIIIIIICE three year old Osceola with a gorgeous tail, not soggy wet and I head back to the blind and have to sit there a while. Shivering, from the cold too but more from the excitement. I probably shivered for 15 minutes like that. What a rush.
I looked at the time when I shot him and thought WOW! Two birds, within minutes of being 24 hours apart from each other, I'm sitting in the same butt print, and they fell within 15 feet of each other. THAT is quite neat. Who knows what the odds are of ever duplicating that, but it sure is neat.
And was QUITE the adventure
With two days left of my nine day trip, and no desire or need to go home, I spent the next two days learning more about my WMA, watching hawks and kites, chasing turkeys with the camera (only to end up with more frustration like the five days, but HEY I already tagged out, I couldn't complain too much), eating pie and drinking beer. A GREAT end to a GREAT adventure.
Dani
