On the board...UPDATED

[trkehunr93]

Sorry for the delay but this was a busy weekend, so once I got him home and cleaned him I was doing a lot of running around afterwards.  I started out our opener here in VA at my usual haunt and around 6:29AM I hear one gobble once but he's way up on a mountain on property I cannot hunt so I sit there and keep listening.  I hear another hunter yelping across the road from me as I had seen his vehicle parked on my drive in.  Finally at 6:40AM one gobbles not 100 yards from me on the east facing side of the ridge, wind had been gusting around 30-40MPH on Thursday evening all day Friday and into early Sat. AM before it finally laid so I was hoping my gut was right about where they would roost and it was.  I start slipping towards him and he keeps gobbling but as I get closer I am noticing my options for a set up kinda suck.  The property was logged in 2014 so it's pretty open where he was and with all the blowdowns and limb piles left behind by the loggers trees that looked decent had too much junk in front of them.  He keeps gobbling and I look at one tree but I think that other one looks better and gives me a better view of the logging road if he pops up the ridge in front of me, so I opt to ease over there.  I stop to get my mouthcall out and as I take a step I hear a limb shake but I ease on over anyway and start doing some calling but I got no response.  After about 30 minutes of nothing I finally accept that the limb shake I heard was him pitching out of the tree because he spotted me moving, rookie mistake but it happens.  I get up and start trolling around some but I cannot get a response from anything and since I had not heard another turkey I opted to drive over to a spot I regained permission to hunt after 22 years, I had heard 3 birds over there so I felt like I might be able to strike something up.  I get over there and park, as I'm walking around to get my stuff I'm sure I hear a gobble, so I walk along the field edge and just ease up a ridge into a patch of woods, find a good tree to sit against and start calling.  After a few minutes one  gobbles straight across from me in a stand of pines.  I call, he gobbles, I call, he gobbles, I call, he gobbles.  I think things might work out so I'm gonna sit tight and hit him with the whole flock, so I get in one of Gooserbats mouth calls, my push pin, my glass call and my crystal and an assortment of strikers paired with a stick to scratch in the leaves and after a while it was killing him.  You know something's going to happen when you scratch in the leaves and he gobbles.  I had already adjusted myself based on where I thought he might come up the ridge and finally I hear wing beats and I watch him fly across the small creek that separated us and I hear him walking up the ridge so guns on my shoulder, safety's off and I'm scanning straight ahead and I finally see his white head, wait for him to go behind a tree so I can move and meet him on the other side at 20 yards with a load of 5's once he takes a step to clear some branches.  Son of a gun flopped straight back down to the creek and fortunately I got to him when he flopped into an old road and got a boot on his neck.  Nice 2 year old with a 9" beard, 3/4 and 7/8" spurs and weighed in at 20.4lbs.  I picked him up and slung him over my shoulder to carry him about 30 feet before I went back up the ridge to get my stuff and he bled like a stuck pig on my pants, it was worth it though. 



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[davisd9]

Awesome buddy! Been checking cause i figured it would not take you long

[dirt road ninja]

Congratulations.

[Rzrbac]

Congrats

[BABS9]

Awesome congrats!

[Turkeykiller12]

Heck Yeah! Congratulations!

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[SwampRooster17]

Way to go man! Can't wait to hear the details


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[WNY Bowhunter]

Congrats! Nice looking gun too! 

[Bowguy]

Congrats!