Hello To every one

Well another fall season has came and went. Out of it many good lessons were learned, hopefully not to be forgotten. If you are a first time turkey hunter, or a veteran of many hunts, you know or will know that it is easy to forget the mistakes you made in seasons past. My fall season started off looking great. Mike and I had high hopes of getting a pair of fall gobblers. In the Pre season I had my eye on a buddy group of three gobblers. I didn’t know to the detail what they did every day, but I knew they were in this 80-acre wood pretty much every day. With minimal Pre season scouting I found a dusting area they used almost daily and I found their fresh tracks on a logging road every time I would slip down it. Things were looking good until the week before season when the landowners son told me he took a poke at one of the three gobblers wile bow-hunting deer on the land. This guy has been a friend of mine for a good 10 years; He had no fall turkey tag and he knew that I was after them gobblers myself. To say that his actions made me mad is an understatement. After the encounter with my buddy the bow hunter I figured those three gobblers would be in the next county. When opening day came we had no clue where to find an unmolested group of gobblers. As the season moved along Mike and I had our share of opportunities and mess-ups. We had family flocks of hens and their young in gun range a couple of times but passed on them waiting for a mature gobbler. We even had a couple blown opportunities at mature gobblers. Mike and I found our selves in the woods on a warm sunny Saturday morning on nov. 9th. The last weekend of the season. I decided I would take the first bird that I had a shot at regardless of age or sex. A gobbler would be nice, but any turkey taken in the fall is still quite an accomplishment. Mike and I spent a couple of hours set up on a logging road we knew was used occasionally by the three gobblers my buddy the bow hunter shot at. Mike and I were hoping the three would wander down it one last time. But after a couple of hours our patients and faith wore thin. Mike and I got up and decided to try a little sneak and call. Basically Still-hunting and calling combined. On our way down a sunny autumn ridge we discovered a place that looked like a bucks bedroom. It was full of Buck droppings, beds, rubs and scrapes. Five minutes later we heard something coming toward us up ahead. It was the buck who’s bedroom we were standing in. The young buck spotted us and stopped to check us out. Mike and I both grunted softly at him using our voices and coaxed him to within 20 yards. Then the buck worked down wind of us and slipped away. That’s the fun of hunting to me just getting out there to witness and interact with nature.
Mike and I slowly worked our way further down the ridge. We had covered about 500 yards when we finally struck up a conversation with a hen. We were on a high knob that split and dropped down into two separate ridges. The hen was coming down the ridge to our left. After a minute or two of talking back and forth with the hen we could tell she was getting closer, so we moved back from the edge and set up. We continued the conversation with lost yelps and kee-kee runs mixed with some leaf scratching. Before long a jake entered the conversation. As he worked closer he started to drift further to the right and down into the valley between the two ridges. This would make getting a shot at him difficult so Mike and I got up and slipped back another 50 yards. After the move things were quiet for some time. Mike and I began to worry that we might have got busted when we moved. But soon we heard a few yelps come from the ridge down to our left. The birds grew closer and closer, then went silent again. The next time we heard from them they were further to our left. It now seemed that they were going to work their way around us just 30 yards bellow the lip of the ridge. I slowly got up and inched closer to the edge. Near the edge I spotted a bird down bellow. And the bird spotted me. I told Mike I could see one, and Mike said take him. At the shot a bird flopped down the side hill, and six other turkeys busted and flew. I made my way down the hill and retrieved my prize. A young of the year Jake. I don’t think he weighed more than ten pounds, but I can tell you that young gobbler made for some good eating.



Thease pictures were taken on the 9th my camera is off a day


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The Worst day In the turkey woods is better than the best day at anything else I have done.

Jerry

Edited by - Turkey Addict on 11/11/2002 12:38:36

Great story and Great photo's , that fellow kinda looks like me <img src=icon_smile_big.gif border=0 align=middle>...BT

Great story Jerry,congrats!

good story and congrats on the turkey!!! Did you turn your buddy in for what he did with the bow?

Robb92

Your Question is a tough one. The guy has been a good freind of mine for a long time, Over ten years. He has got me through some tuff times in the past. Then There have be times when he has been sort of a thorn in my side too. None the less I told him what I thought of his actions and he apologized for himself and swore he would never do something like that again. Even if he would have killed one of those gobblers I don't know if I could have turned him in. Although he would have deserved it in my opinion. The thing that made me the most upset was that he messed with gobblers he knew I was planing on hunting. I real friend would left them alone and told me where and when he had seen them. This subject makes for its own topic of discusion. I bet we have all had friends who we knew poached or tried to poach. Everyone knows the right thing to do is to turn people like that in. But when it's close friends or even family its not always that black and white.



The worst day in the Turkey woods Is by far, more fun, than the best day of any thing else I have ever done.

Jerry

Edited by - Turkey Addict on 11/12/2002 11:42:44

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Turkey addict,
That was a great story. I really enjoyed reading it. I encountered a few gobblers this fall but they wanted no part of our calling so we decided on our next hunt we would take anything that came to the gun and we were fortunate enough to call up about 15 jakes so my dad and I both took fall jakes.
Great story . Thanks for sharing!

TA,always enjoy a good turkey hunting story and sounds like you and Mike had a good one!!Congrats on your fall tom!Mike if you hunt long enough you'll encounter individuals like you mentioned,turkeys,deer,whatever its not about the challenge or the experience of the outdoors its all about killing something to support an ego that steers them in a direction to make unethical decisions.These types give real hunters an ugly name and create images that the do-gooders thrive on!! <img src=icon_smile_dissapprove.gif border=0 align=middle>Doesn't matter how good a hunter anyone is sometimes the game we hunt is gonna kick our butts afield,so take it like a man,learn from it,and move on!Poaching aint nothing more than a sorry lazy #ss excuse for somebody who proclaims to be a hunter!!Success aint how big a bird we bag but in the experience of being in the woods outwitting our game and enjoyoing the surroundings we call the great outdoors!Take all that away and hell we might as well just go to the shootin range!!!

Monarch isn't a butterfly it's the King of the Spring!

Thanks everyone for the kind words. And Bobgobble2, you hit the nail right on the head. Mike don't feel bad about getting that off your chest. We done our best to start that guy off right. Sooner or later he will learn the hard way.

The worst day in the Turkey woods Is by far, more fun, than the best day of any thing else I have ever done.

Jerry