Well, here's the bonus part of my morning hunt
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...............and now here's the morning hunt
It started off chilly and a forecast of scattered showers, so I set up in a field the birds like to hit on days like this. Heard only one bird gobble on an upper ridge from my set up and decided to hold my ground in the lower field. By 6:30 the field had 3 visitors, 1 gobbler (I think) and 2 hens. The birds have been running in the other direction when called to so I just sat quietly hoping he'd make his way by my set up. Well, he never did, and after about an hour the rain started to pour down so I packed up to head out. I worked a gobbler last weekend in an upper field so I thought I'd check to see if the bird was there. On my first time by I saw nothing, but as I was getting ready to head home I had to drive by the field again and this time he was out. The only problem with this was that he wasn't alone
. Last weekend I had the gobbler about 75yds away when this $#$^%^ showed up to lead him off in the other direction.
They were feeding across the field from where I normaly set up, so I decided to cut them off in the middle of the two fields. I used the creek running between the two fields for cover to get in the middle and wait them out. The second I sat down, the sky opened up with a wicked down pour which wasn't good since I left my rain gear in the truck[:@]. After the rain stopped I couldn't help it! I had to check where he was. He was still there but alone now so I started to try to call him in. Like the story of my 2004 VT hunting, the gobbler just walked away. So now, I'm soaking wet and I just got the bird to leave! Not the way I figured it to happen. I quickly got back to my truck to move around to the woods he was heading to hoping I could re-set up on him. More bad luck! The land was posted and I was heading home cold, wet and mad at myself.
Just before I started to leave, the sky opened up again so I waited to see if they would return to the field. They did, and this time I wasn't going to waste any time trying to call a tight lipped gobbler with a selfish hen. I started up the bank just below the gobbler and then started through the knee high hay field. I don't care to stalk a gobbler like this, but I knew I was the only hunter on the property, and it was in a large open field, so I figured I was OK. I got within 35+ yards of him before I stood up for the shot. I took the shot and knocked him back and then he went into a run over the hill away from me
After calling myself a few names for a split second, I looked up to see him flying straight towards me. I put the gun up and took a second shot which he avoided. I then took my last shot at him which folded him up and over again and again. I checked the spot from where I took the first shot and did find that I rolled him. I must have dropped the gun just before shooting. Tired from the stalk or just got too excited, either way I wasn't a good shot. Made up on it with the third shot
The turkey was awesome but the morels were the icing on the cake for my morning. My first VT gobbler and I'm sure he's one of the guys that gave me a runaround last year.
VT turkey down
