An Easter Morning Double

[rhine16]

~~A Sunday ago(3/29), I was able to make my first hunt on my main farm since a gobbleless opening weekend. The birds had finally turned loose the day before for Dad, and my little brother and I waited for daylight positioned in between the three groups he'd heard. High winds and cold temps had diminished our hopes, but a faint gobble well after normal gobbling time lifted them a bit.

The birds were roosted just across the gravel road and on a different property. Now why the birds have taken a liking to this roosting spot the past three seasons is a mystery to me(well, I guess I do have a theory), thick woods except for the area just off the road. They almost always end up on us, but unless you can call them into a small block of woods, you're left chasing them around the pastures.

With little gobbling, we decided to wait the birds out. Finally at almost 8 on the dot, a hen crossed the road into our pasture at about 100 yards. She was followed by another twenty, yes twenty, hens and two strutting longbeards bringing up the rear. With the high winds, I'm sure my yelping was barely audible to them, though the longbeards would spin around and look at me every time I yelped. The 21 hens were too much to leave though, and after we followed along behind the flock for a couple of hours, they finally went onto the neighboring property on the other side.

Our Uncle hunted them a couple of days this week, but they were mia... except on the days that he hunted a different group of birds. On those two days, the duo was out strutting in the pasture on his way back to the house.

Good Friday found my 22 year old brother that has never killed a turkey wanting to hunt. I elected to go to a friends place and let he and dad have the run of the farm. They were going to setup on the duo and try their luck with them. At a quarter til 7 I got a text, "Gobbler Down".

I got a text later that morning from my youngest brother saying that he didn't think that was our bird. Once I heard the story, it was confirmed for me that it wasn't. A jake and loudmouth two year old all alone, no hen to be found. No way that was our two gobblers with their 21 hens from a few days earlier.

Dad worked a different bird Saturday morning while I was at a different place, bird only gobbled a handful of times and seemed henned up bad. The plan for Sunday morning was that he, my youngest brother, and I would get on two sides of the bird. I was excited to work a hardwood bird that was on the center of my land, as it seems like all I've found this season are property line birds.

That plan was changed at 6:10 when the duo cranked up in their normal spot. We made the mad dash to setup in the little block of woods, dad sat back about 15 yards in the woods and got behind a blown down cedar, we sat near the edge on the same tree in hopes of doubling.

The birds were hot, but knowing that they probably had ample hens, dad got in their minds early with some tree talk. They cut him off each time double gobbling, and then the pair pitched down, unfortunately staying on the opposite side of the road.

The first turkey that appeared in our pasture was a hen that flew out of a treetop from above us and landed about 80 yards out. Shortly after a jake came tearing across the road on a dead sprint. He was given a few moments of glory as he chased the hen around in circles in half strut.

The rest of the turkeys joined the party; 6 or 7 hens with the two longbeards in tow. They sprinted out to the jake and commenced to running him off and corralling the hens. At some point we noticed a curious little button buck had joined the show, he'd walked in nose to the ground to a mere 10 yards of the strutters checking it out. Dad, not being able to see what was going on and not getting any signs from us, decided that it was time to let the birds know that there was a hen over in the woods. The double gobble he got from the birds sent the little deer scrambling back and I'm still not sure how the birds didn't see/hear me and the little bro laughing.

We soon realized that play time was over however, as the birds broke away and began the death march. We had two pine trees out in the pasture that would be obstructing our view, and realizing that a double was going to be tough to pull off, I whispered to Ru to make sure we come away with one.

With the first one several steps in front of the other one, I gave him the green light to take the bird when he stepped out from the pine tree at twenty yards, "No", "you better shoot", "No, here he comes". Sure enough as he said it the other bird cleared the first tree and I had him standing at forty yards though it was a brushy shot. Ru immediately started the three count like we'd done it a thousand times, which we have; however it has just always been at the house, in the truck, or listening to two birds gobbling on the roost.

On three, the shots were almost simultaneous, but with much different results. His bird tipped over backwards to never move again. Mine took to the air. In the few seconds of that bird being in the air, a million thoughts went through my mind; the sickening thought of wounding an animal and the bragging I did before season about how I hadn't missed a turkey since I had to sit in dad's lap to shoot to name a couple. What didn't cross my mind is what happened, the bird hit the ground dead at 150 yards. I'd much rather hunt turkeys in the woods, but I'm lucky this shot took place in a field.

His bird had 8.5" beard with 1" spurs. Mine a 9.5" beard with .75" spurs.

Have to believe that it doesn't get much better than calling in a gobbler for each of your three sons over a three day period.

Edited April 7, 2015 by rhine16

[Rhino]

Congratulations to all of you on the 3 gobblers in 2 days. Congratulations on the double coming together too. Sounds like you may have a happy jake with a lot of hens to tend to there now. Count your blessings on the 150 yard recovery. I only know of one other instance where a bird hit the air and flew off only to fall dead while still airborne. They usually hit the ground running to parts unknown. That's excluding birds hit with a 2nd or 3rd shot...done that.

[RangerClay]

Nice birds, congrats!!

[pruts]

Nice birds, and story. Congratulations

[wtnhunt]

Nice turkeys and good story. Congratulations to all.

[3seasons]

That's awesome. I know you're dad is on cloud 9. Congrats to all of you