This morning, my dad and I hit the woods for another day of turkey hunting. It's the second to last day of the season here, so I was really hoping to at least see one gobbler. It's been so bad with all the rain we've had, and this is my first season of turkey hunting, so I've been getting anxious. Well, we settled into a treeline spaced about 10 yards apart with a hen decoy between us about 15 yards out from the treeline. Not 30 seconds after we got settled in, we heard the gobbling. My dad did all the calling, since he's been turkey hunting for several years and has bagged lots of birds. He would answer their gobbles with some tree yelps or clucks here and there, and you could tell they were getting excited. About 10 minutes after they came down from roost, four big gobblers crossed the fence about 40 yards below me and started making their way to the decoy. Up the hill, a hen was making her way toward the decoy as well, so that really helped draw those toms right to us. Only one was strutting and he had one on each side of him so close that I couldn't shoot one without almost hitting another. I picked the bird on the far left who was separated from the group by a few feet, which was ok, because he looked the biggest and had the longest beard for sure. I waited for him to get within 20 yards and lift his head up high, then I sent a 3" #5 down my Baikal MP-153 and landed a perfect shot on him. He dropped clean and my dad tried to get a shot at one of the others before they flew off, but they weren't sticking around for one second! By 6:30AM the hunt was already finished. The bird had a 12" beard, 1.25" spurs, and I'm not sure what the weight was. I really couldn't be happier, and I think my dad was pretty proud, even though he did the hard work with all his calling! I can't wait to get out again in the fall. Here's a pic of me and my bird!
