Well I've been super busy getting married and moving to a new city, but here is my first turkey ever. I tried really hard with a bow, but couldn't get them in close enough. They did not respond to calls or decoys, so we ambushed them. I shot the boss tom at 33yds and he dropped like a rock. Come to find out he only had two holes in him from BB's! I was so excited I almost shot right over his head. God cut me a break on that one and the couple BB's must have hit him in the exact right place! He had a 10" beard (would have been super thick but beard rot got part of it, 1" and 3/4" spurs, and weighed 22lbs. The other two toms he was with actually came back looking for him but my husband wasn't ready (too busy making sure mine was down) and they left again. Here are the pics of my bird and the nice wall hanging we made ourselves with advice from White Falcon and excalibur43. For the beard thing, I used fishing line, the shotgun shell I shot him with to hold the beard, and then natural bone beads from Hobby Lobby with the spurs and the toenail claws from my turkey's feet!! Its not perfectly symmetrical but I think it looks AWESOME for my first project, and altogether only cost about $7 (already had the wooden plaque).










Thanks for looking and let me know what you think!!!

It looks awesome. Congrats on your first bird. The mount isn't perfect, but since it's your first and you did it yourself it is far superior to anything a professional could have ever done for you. It will always mean tons more to you this way. Great job all around!

rw

You did a Marvelous job on that! Now you have a memory for life!

JW

I don't think I've ever seen a better looking display,it is perfect in my humble opinion. It looks like your bird had some beard rot like mine,but mine was much worse with almost all the strands missing except for 3 or 4 which gave me some idea how long it was. Good looking bird though a great bird for your first one.

congrats and very nice

Congrats on your 1st bird, the display you did looks awesome

Thanks for the replies! Yes he did have beard rot. In the close up picture of the beard you can see a darker line across the long part of the beard where it looks like it might break off again. The broken end is all brown. This project was really fun to make and is very satisfying when you can do it yourself for little cost.

Yes very nice!

you did an awesome job on that mount !!!

Nine looking tom and mount.