Good looking public land bird Blackheel, congrats. I hit some public land yesterday where a buddy of mine killed a double bearded bird last week. He had to take me in there because I had no idea where it was, and I tell you what I will probably never go back. The climb back outta that place was completely insane. We did get on two birds gobbling at about 7:30 about 200 yds down in a steep hollow. They were gobbling back and forth at each other and after we got set up we started calling to them. After just a few minutes of calling to them and getting good responses, we heard some idiot hit a crow call right down where the birds were gobbling. Why he felt the need to crow call to birds that were already gobbling is beyond me. He crow called several times right in close to the birds and must have spooked them off because we never heard them again or saw them. We sat there another hour waiting for any sign of them and the fool down in the hole threw every stupid call he had at them, including a dern owl call at 8:30 and several horrible gobbles with what was probably one of those dumb shaker deals. After he started doing that we left that spot and started walking some more. Never heard or saw anything after that.

I went back to my place today and sat in the rain for 6 hours and saw one hen walk by early in the morning. I might give it one more shot later toward the end of the season but right now I'm just ready to get moved into my new house and just relax with my little girl on the weekends. Two seasons in a row of this is tough but I guess it happens.