Tiny gobbler

[silvestris]

What you are seeing is a real trophy, an extremely old turkey.  A friend of mine was embarrassed at the small, Long-bearded, long-spurred gobbler that he brought to Ken Morgan's house one day.  It was all we could do to convince him that he had killed a real trophy, an old timer.  What really amazed us was that we didn't know that the turkey existed as we thought we knew them all on that piece of property.  He must have been one cagey gobbler whose time had come.  They lose a lot of weight in their old age.

[mtns2hunt]

A guy killed this giant mini buck on one of our wma's this year. Smallest buck I've ever seen.

Looks like he killed it with his truck!

[Marc]

I believe this is one of the few times I have seen men discussing "who has the smallest one."

[silvestris]

After looking closely at the feathers and spurs on this one, he might have been diseased.

[GobbleNut]

I believe this is one of the few times I have seen men discussing "who has the smallest one."

  Now that was just plain funny, Marc!

[THattaway]

May be totally unrelated to anything in this thread but on at least two occasions I have killed toms with what I considered very low live weight for the area I was hunting and both appeared to be mature toms. When cleaning them I found lead shot embedded in either their breast bone or hip/pelvis bone area. Seemed as if it was rotting around the pellet, from past seasons. Figured that was the culprit on those two birds.

[Meadow Valley Man]

After looking closely at the feathers and spurs on this one, he might have been diseased.

And,looking at the turkey, I'd say he's deceased.

[cwb04]

The fella holding that tiny turkey looks familiar.  His initials aren't C.J. are they? 

[FullChoke]

Everything is relative and it's hard to determine exactly what you are looking at. Fer instance this hunter might clock in at 450 pounds and stand 6' 10" and then that 18 pound gobbler would suddenly look about right.

BTW, that illusion works both ways. That's why I married a woman with little hands.

Cheers 

FullChoke

[FullChoke]

On a different note, this subject was discussed several years ago in Lovett Williams column here on OG. He says that what he has there might be a hen in gobbler plumage. The poster referred to a "Mossy Head"  turkey.

http://oldgobbler.com/Forum/index.php?topic=8981.0

[Blong]

The fella holding that tiny turkey looks familiar.  His initials aren't C.J. are they?

Yep, how do you know ole Jones?

[turkeyfoot]

for sure small for eastern I've killed some light weight merriams 13 pound range but never seen eastern longbeard that small

[THattaway]

On a different note, this subject was discussed several years ago in Lovett Williams column here on OG. He says that what he has there might be a hen in gobbler plumage. The poster referred to a "Mossy Head"  turkey.

http://oldgobbler.com/Forum/index.php?topic=8981.0

That was my first thought but the bird pictured has spurs. I've got video footage of a hen with gobbler plummage and Mr. Williams confirmed it as such when I sent it to him. She didn't have spurs but ran with a group of 5 other toms, at least when I would see her during deer season. For all purposes she looked like a very small bearded tom. Was sharper eyed than the toms as well, was first to pick me off in a deer stand every time I saw them.

[supremepredator]

"Hold me closer tiny gobbler!" sorry, couldn't resist.

[THattaway]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0SOgshTufs

Older camera, sorry for the resolution but it's all I had at the time.