My oldest son has been my favorite hunting partner since he was old enough to follow me squirrel hunting. He loves it more than all my other kids do. In 2016 he scored a nice Merriam on a hunt we took together in Nebraska. During his early college years he spent each spring unsuccessfully chasing long beards around my family’s land in MS. Now as a teacher/soccer coach and husband and father of 3 small boys he has been unable to really hunt much the past few years. I have been telling him about a large gobbler I’ve been getting on camera sporadically around his great grandparents place. After much discussion we decided he would break away from his daddy duties and we would hunt together today. The morning started off cold, wet and windy, not ideal turkey hunting conditions and we heard nothing off the roost. We saw one lone hen around our initial setup and after several hours decided to break for lunch and then hit an old pasture where the bird had been seen strutting. Not long after we sat up a very vocal hen came into our decoy set and we watched her with much amusement for several minutes. Suddenly I heard what I thought was drumming coming over my left shoulder. I peered around carefully and saw him standing at the edge of the pasture staring at the decoys/hen. I whispered to my son to get ready for him to come in on my side but the old bird knew something wasn’t quite right and began to drift into the brush and walk away from us. I gave him some purrs on my aluminum pot and he did an about face and came back into the field edge. Just as he cleared the brush my son let my old 12 gauge speak and he flopped at 31 yards. Coronavirus/Covid or whatever, father and son had a huge hug standing over the vanquished foe and the smile on my boy’s
face was something I’ll never forget. Blessed to be able to share this passion of mine with a fine young man that I’m proud to call my son. The gobbler weighed 18 $ 1/2 pounds with 1 inch hooks and 9 & 1/4 inch beard.
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