My first longbeard!!!


Lil Strut10

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it was 5:00 in the morning when i got up. yesterday my dad went to try and roost a turkey. when he got in the field he saw 3 longbeards go right where we were going to go. when me and dad got ready we went were he saw them. it wasn't an hour before 2 longbeards came up over the hill. i was going to shoot the one that was strutting but the other one came in sight first.i lined it up and shot. i'm happy i shot this one because it has a 10 in beard 17 pounds and 3/4 inch spurs.i am happy with this bird but you take a look.;)

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I am hugely proud of that boy!!!

I likened this morning's hunt to a carnival ride. You wait and wait and wait (for turkey season to come) and then it's over in 3 minutes.

I had seen 3 mature birds going up on to the knob behind the house right before flyup time lasy night. I knew exactly where they were going to park their feet. This morning me and Lil slipped out the back door and up on to the flat where they had headed. Lil was sitting against a tree about 10-15 feet to my left...........and about 15 yards from where he sat to kill his bird last year on youth day. As soon as we got sat down the birds started gobbling.....either 3 or 4 of them about 80-90 yards in front of us. They were just down over on the steep drop across the other side of the flat-top. I got the camera set up on the tripod and got it running. But I wasn't happy with how I had it positioned. I gave a few tree calls on my slate then went to work adjusting the tripod to suit me. As I was fiddling around the birds kept hammering away. Then I thought I heard wingbeats. I looked over at Lil and gestured "flydown??" and he nodded his head. Holy crap!!! I don't have a call in my mouth, I don't have my gloves on or my net up!!! Lil isn't in the best shooting position either. I threw a mouthcall in and gave a quick flydown and a few groud cutts. They hammered back hard!! I cut them off with some rael sassy cutts and they roared again and closer!! I look over and Lil doesn't have the hammer back on his NWTF 20 ga. I'm half whispering half gesturing "get the freakin' hammer back now!!" to him. I know these things are on a hard march and I do not wanna get caught with our britches down. Then I hear the unmistakable "pfft oooohmmmmm" of a bird in strut and it was right on us!! Here came a strutter and another up out of a little depression about 30 yards and slightly right of straight out in front of us. I did what I could to find them in the viewfinder as it wasn't what you'd call "real good camera light" out yet. I whispered to Lil "take one as soon as you get a shot!!". The strutter stayed in strut. The other one walked a little left of us, looking right through us (ain't RT Hardwoods great??) the whole time. They took a couple more steps and I again told Lil "you better take the shot!! You better take it as soon as you can get it!!"

Ker-Wham!!!!!!

The 3" 20 startled me, even though I knew it was coming. And the bird which had not been strutting dumped over like he'd been hit by a ball bat. Lil jumped up and ran to his flopping prize, but a walk would have sufficed. The little swarm of 6's from the little 20, at just 22 yards, put a severe whoopin on that tom's noggin. Total time from flydown to smackdown (and I'll have to go back into the footage to verify) was in the vicinity of 2 1/2 - 3 1/2 minutes. No time was wasted on the part of those two toms.

But the boy's learning. He didn't really have time to fidget. But he got his act together quickly and smoothly when we figured out we were about to be busted by hard-charging gobblers. He also showed great patience and composure waiting on his shot with two beautiful longbeards doing the x-ray stare from inside 25 yards for what seemed like an eternity. I believe the boy will make a turkey hunter some day.

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