After 4 days of turkey hunting, today was the day. I had hunted this group of birds several days and learned a little more about them each day. First, there were 4 toms in the group with as many as a dozen hens.  As a group, these toms had no interest in going to hens. One day I had set up two hen decoys and had the biggest tom gobble back at my calls several times, then they continued feeding their way across the field. If they weren't coming to him he wasn't going to them. The next day they came across the field again, this time showing no interest at all in the decoys. At least I wasn't spooking or educating them. 

On Saturday I moved to a different spot. Since there was gobbling from several locations around the field each day, it was tough to know which spot to pick. One day I had them to my left and behind me. The ones behind me never came out but instead went the opposite direction. On this particular day, the majority of the gobbling was in the lower corner so I headed that way.

JD was with me and we had action up close from a pair of hens. The decoys were 10 yards from the edge of the field and we heard gobbling from the opposite side and from our left. The left got quiet and we were focused across the field. Suddenly a pair of hens came running to the decoys. After checking out the new girls on the block, one felt comfortable enough to engage in a dust bath. Her purring and dusting just 10 yards from us was a real treat. She was thoroughly enjoying herself and when she stood up and shook herself off there was a cloud of dust. The other hen was all business and did her best to call the toms over to them. But they were not budging and both hens eventually made their way across the field to the toms. This is not the first time we've had other birds do the calling for us and it's an unbelievable education. The group wandered along the edge of the field and disappeared back into the woods. 

I had to wait until Monday to try again and I chose the lower end of the field about 100 yards from the corner. There was active gobbling on the middle edge of the field, where I had been the week before but I stuck with my original choice. I set the two hen decoys out and heard gobbling just 30 yards into the woods. I hurried to the woods and settled in, confident that the birds would appear on my right. They were close enough that I could hear their wings. I was ready, or so I thought.  I caught a glimpse of movement out of the corner of my eye and turned just in time to see a tom fly down in between the two decoys. I must have walked right past him and he never made a sound. I watch him check the girls out and for about 10 seconds I thought " I'll just wait for the big one- he's just on the other side of the brush" as I turned back to the tom in the field he was in full strut and I came to my senses- don't be greedy; here's a nice tom 20 yards away- take him! Only problem was I needed to make a 1/4 turn to reposition myself for the shot. I slowly moved, taking advantage of when he wasn't looking.

There were several times I thought he was looking right at me but he didn't get nervous. Just as I was in position, he decided the decoys weren't interesting after all and turned to walk away. I took the shot and had a nice 19lb tom with an 8.5" beard and 1" spurs to take home. It was 5:20 am and I sent a text to JD asking him not to leave for work yet. He coaches varsity softball and usually I am not allowed to talk to him on game days, (he says it's bad luck) but I knew he'd make an exception for this.

When my turkey comes back from the taxidermist, where he will assume the position of full flight forever, he will join the other mounts in the lodge and be the inspiration for stories for many years to come.

© May 2008