Spring time means turkey hunting... for some.

POSTED BY CHRIS:

Friday after work found me taking Jackson to G&G Syring's so they could enjoy him on an overnight visit so Michelle and I could get up early to turkey hunt Saturday. After dropping him off I went to the farm to put an Ameristep ground blind in a spot that looked "turkey". The next morning started at 2:15am so we could get ready and arrive well before first light. The first turkey encounter was right as it began to get light, one flew down from across the open field and almost landed in the blind! During the next twenty minutes we had three Tom turkeys gobbling like crazy. Two moved away from our setup but one mature Tom came out about 500 yards from our blind. We called a little and he began to run to us. Every time he hung up we called and he would begin to strut and come running. Once he was about 100 yards out (the field has some pretty good hills running through it) he saw our turkey decoys and stopped. We had a full strut Tom decoy out and he must have been a subordinate bird because he dropped his fan and turned into the woods, just to the left of where we could shoot. We had brief encounters the rest of the day with deer and other turkeys walking right through our decoys but no shooters.

Michelle got a little antsy about 4pm so we left the blind so she could get in a run through the pristine scenery. It was a beautiful day so why not. After I picked her up we were going to head out and get Jackson when I spotted a turkey strutting in a field we could hunt. Michelle was out of her camo at this point so I asked if I could go after the bird and she said yes! I army crawled down a lane for about 200 yards to get in front of the birds, there were seven hens with the one strutter. I was pretty sure where they were going based on past experience. I knew if I could get there I might have a chance and the lay of the land was perfect for me to move fast through the pine needles and stay out of sight. When I approached the field I slowly raised up and could just see the top of the Tom's fan. I had pulled it off and he was coming to me. I didn't call to him I just waited. When he and his harem closed the gap to 15 yards (I wanted no doubts about the distance) I said "this one is for Jackson" and I pulled the trigger. Down he went and the hens flew everywhere, it was awesome!

When Michelle came back to pick me up we retrieved our blind from the first field, registered the Tom and headed to G&G's to show Jackson. He loved every minute of the unavailing, right down to playing with the bloody head. I was so proud, our little hunter in the making.