WV Fall Turkey Hunt Success {Pics}


Rem308

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I bowhunted on Friday and had a great day, but never connected. Saturday, Fall Turkey Season opened for select counties so I decided to leave the bow at home and take the shotgun out to break the monotony.

The morning started out with the temperature at the farm saying 29 degrees and a heavy frost. As I drove in to the farm, I saw a shooting star shoot across the sky. From bowhunting, I knew where the birds were roosting, so I got in there before daylight and was waiting on it to break.

Well I never heard any cackling, any fly downs, or anything from the turkeys, but I did see a few deer sneaking through.

I began thanking that the cold weather may be keeping them in the trees longer, so I didn't move, but by 7:30 I started wondering if I was just in the wrong place. I was about to freeze too, with so much walking ahead of me I didn't wear enough warm clothes, so I decided to sneak out and check a field where the sun hits first. Sure enough, as I looked I could see a small group of turkeys here but they were several hundred yards away. Through the binocs I could see that they were just standing, not feeding, and I believe they were just soaking up the heat.

So I ended up deciding to try to make a move on them and sneak around the field, and as I went, I saw another small group of turkeys in a closer field. I believe it was a different group because these were feeding by the time I got to them. I tried to use the lay of the field to my advantage and sneak to within shotgun range, but I got picked off when I was about 80 yards from the birds. My sneak turked to an all out sprint and I ran up and straight towards the flock, which broke them up...some flew left, some ran right, by they got broken up quick.

I hustled straight to the woodline of a steep hill, sat by a pine and got my call out all the while rushing to get my facemask on. I made several quick regrouping calls and immediately could hear one running in the leaves straight up the hill towards me. I got my shotgun to my knee, forgot about the mask, and pulled the trigger. The 3" Federal Turkey load hit hard and he went to flopping at 10 steps! As steep as the hill was, I couldn't see him until about 12 steps.

He ended up being a 17.5 lb gobbler with a 7" beard and 1/2" spurs

First I setup my camera and got a pic right where it happened:

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Then, when I got back to the truck I had to take a few more because the 8AM sky was lit up BLUE'r than I remembered.

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