What to do while your waiting to return to Africa

What to do while your waiting to return to Africa

You hunt what you can!

I left straight from work for the long drive to Kentucky. The thunderstorms and heavy rain did not help along the way. Opening morning of the Ky turkey season dawned soggy and brezzy but rain free for the most part. The first order of buisness was to try and get my sister in-law her first turkey. My brother had been out watching this pasture serveral mornings in the past week. We set up a double bull blind and waited on daylight. The longbeard he had seen every morning never materialized. We did see 8 hens and 3 jakes. I called the jakes into 10 yards but Jennifer refused to shoot one. The lady wants a longbeard !!

That afternoon the wind was howling with gust up to 40 mph. Zach and i decided we would still hunt around the farm and try to sneak in close to longbeard and go from there. All the birds we saw were hanging out in low spots were they could get out of the wind. We were easing along the edge of a pasture when i almost stepped on a nice deer antler. I deposited it in my turkey vest and continued the stalk. I took about 10 steps when around a big bush comes a gobbeler. I froze, luckly he had his head in the grass feeding. I would have prefferd to back up and call to him, but i doubted i could back up without getting picked off. I could not see his beard to confirm he was a longbeard. Even though we were both fully cammoed he picked me off. As he stood fully upright i could see he had a decent beard on him. With only 4 days to hunt i decide to take him. The heavy shot did its job and anchored him on the spot. He turned out to be a 2 year old bird with a decent 8.5" beard and both spurs broken off.



Sunday morning dawned clear and cold. We only have a short time to hunt before church. The cold seems to have excited the turkeys. We can hear 4 different birds and they are hammering it this morning. We are setup in ridge top field were Zach has been seeing birds on a regular basis. I am running the camera and zach is doing the shooting this morning. We have birds on opposing ends of the field. Every time one gobbels we answer with hen calls. We have a hen come in and raise cane at the hen decoy. One off the gobbelers has shut up, the other sounds like he is strutting back and forth in the same spot. The hen heads off in that direction. Just when Zach says " looks like its not going to happen this morning" we hear a bird spit and drum right behind us. I am trying to look behind us when Zach whispers dont move. The bird spits and drums again. I peek around and he is less than 5 yards from the blind. When he turns his tail fan to us i rotate the camera around and focus in on him. He is between the decoy and the blind. I get some good close up footage of him drumming and gobbeling. Finaly Zach says i am going to take him. He cuts at him and makes him gobble, before he pulls his head back in Zach pounds it with a load heavy shot. Later watching the HD footage in slow motion you can actualy see the shot blowing through his head and going into the woods. Good stuff.



Monday we head of to a different property. The birds are way across a huge bean field next door. We can barley here them. Zach ask if i want to go try a new property. The turkey hunt turns into a deer scouting mission as the property is 80 percent overgrown thicket. The amount of sign and the sheds we find make it hard to think about turkey hunting. I found a 130 class dead 8 point and a 140 class 10 point shed. We have an encounter with 5 longbeards in the afternoon but couldnt seal the deal.





Teusday, last morning. We set up on another ridge top field. We can hear 2 birds gobbeling but they dont seem to be together. Every time i call one of them cuts me off. Finaly a hen steps out at about a hundred yards. We hear a gobble behind her. Another hen steps out close to us. She comes straight to the decoy and starts yelping loudly. The gobbeler comes into the field 200 yards away. We watch him strut and gobble all the way to us. He swings wide around the blind but not far enough. When he gets even with us Zach calls to him, he comes halfway out of strut and i pound that head for him. He has a 10.5" beard and 1 1/4" spurs. It was an awsome trip made better by getting to spend quality time with my brother and best friend.

Nice birds! I am sadly missing turkey season this year. But I leave for SA next week! I guess that is worth missing turkey season! Thanks for the stories!

Thanks Thunder head! Beautiful birds.

And a fine looking hound! Congrats on the birds, the one trophy that continues to elude me.

Hi Thunderhead,

Beautiful birds , thanks for sharing .....

Monish

Nice longbeards Thunder head. Thanks for sharing.

nd

Great birds; I didn't get to do any turkey hunting this year.