Well when you are in a fraternity and you start bringing birds back to the house, word gets around quickly that you seem to know what your doing. Well I have been blessed to have such good friends that think I am good at Turkey hunting.
The other day one of my fraternity brothers said he had about 350 acres about 30 minutes from here and that he had hunted it 3 times this season and heard birds every morning and had called to one of them but had no luck, so he came and asked me to go with him this morning. I was a taker immediately. Well the alarm clock went off at 4:15 this morning and I was out and about doing my usual morning routine before hunting. He met me here at the house at 4:40 and we headed out.
When we got to the gate it looked like the woods were really dense in cover with pine trees everywhere, boy was I wrong we got about 100 yards past the gate and it was nothing but open hardwoods. It looked absolutely great. We parked and started walking and the set up was great there was a green field in the middle of the road that was probaly no more than a half acre. I said to myself I hope that a bird roars from a limb close by. Well no sooner that I said that, two different birds let the owls know they were there.
We set up on 2 big pine trees that were in the field and waited for the right time to let those TOMS know that we were there. The pine trees were about 5-7 feet apart, perfect I said to myself. Around 6:05 I figured that the light was enough for the birds to fly down so I hit 2 soft yelps and no sooner through my 2nd one they let me know that they heard me. I set my calls down and told him to get ready, that they will be here shortly. At 6:24 according to my watch they let loose agian and I knew they were on the ground coming this way as they sounded as if they had pitched down torwards us. They gobbled thier heads off wanting me to respond, my buddy thought that i should call but I knew better and told him to hang in there.
I told him that the more I call the longer it will take, well at least right now, I figured they wanted me to come to them, so I made them come to us. At 6:50 I saw two blue heads coming through the woods. They soon entered the field and I could see that there was a jake, a tom and a hen. I was a little discouraged with only one being a shooter, but he said i will shoot the jake. I thought about telling him not to, but since it was his land and I was a guest I kept to myself. They got about 60 yards from us and went into full strut and began to drum, I could tell he was nervous as his breathing was very heavy coming through his face mask. Finally the moved in about 30 yards and seperated. I said on 3 shoot the jake, so I bared down on the tom and counted to 3 he shot and his went down the tom wheeled and started to quickly ease off the field but that 3inch layed him on the ground.
That was the first time I have ever killed a double. We took pictures and I will post them and my others when I get them developed and scanned. The measurements on the birds were as following. The JAKE had a 6.25 beard and 5/8 spurs and weighed 16lbs. The TOM was 9.75 beard and both spurs were 1 1/16 and weighed 19lbs. To say that was just another hunt would be down playing it. Thats by far the best time I have had in the woods.
Sorry for rambling on with my story, I like to write so I get caught up in the moment and just keep going. Good Luck to all. I will be back in the woods tomorrow morning after another one. Remember to call with a LEGACY!
Chalk another one up for the home team!
