Well I'm back from my last hunt of the season. Here is how it went.

I decided to sneak in to where I had roosted them the last 2 evenings. There are several trees in about a 100 yard area and I was able to get in the middle of them on the public hunting side. As dawn approached the hens started doing their cuttin when wouldn't ya know it a big flash of lightning and clap of thunder and gobbles started going off all around me. Luckily the thunderstorm moved off quickly and pretty much just left the sprinkles of rain with an occasional clap of thunder in the distance. Especially since I had just walked a little over a half mile to get in there!

At about 8am or so I decided to do what I had planned and got up grabbed my deke and started to head out to the other spot where I had called a few in. (its about 25 miles from there). I got about 100 yards down the fence and heard 5 quick gobbles that sounded like they were a couple hundred yards in on the private side. I set the deke right on the fence and sat about 15 yards further down the fence line. After around 15 minutes of playing with them I had a hen come by about 30 yards out and then went right to where the toms were. I waited about 15 more minutes and started yelping and had the hen start right back. Eventually I guess she had enough cause here she came looking for the sick hen (which is what I'm sure I sounded like) and the the tom came right behind her. Instead of headed to my deke she headed right at me. She got about 5 yards before she noticed something wasn't right and started puttin. The Tom stayed about 40 yards out and when she started puttin he turned and started back to private.......BUT he never made it

The curse has been lifted. He's not a giant but with how hard I had to work at it the last 5 years he is a trophy to me. Next year I'll try not to wait till the last minute of my season to get it done..lol I'll get the measurements and photo here in just a few.