Well a interesting morning for sure. Started out with heading to the turkey spot. Deer were out like crazy. I was going slow because of this and not in a hurry. I saw some deer about 300 yards in front of me. So as I started to slow to around 40/45. Out of the corner of my eye I see a flash and then BANG!
A yearling buck jump off the embankment and plowed into the side of the jeep. Hit the front corner drivers side and the side mirror caught him right in the head. The mirror shattered and broke off and the deer went flying. I came to a stop and said a few bad words. Then backed up collected my mirror, and went to grab the deer. Thinking well at least I get to eat you. Deer was in the ditch with legs strait up in the air. Gave him a kick and he jumps up and give me a WTH look. Can not believe it did not crack his skull. After about 30 seconds he walks off. What luck lol
So after that event. I made it to my turkey spot. Pretty quiet and after a good bit I got a tom to pipe off. I crossed a creek and was working into a setup to call him in. Just about to the tree I wanted to get to and then 3 hens come busting out alarm calling and head right towards the tom
Of course I pleaded to him to come see me but he wasn't having it. After dogging them for a bit they finally crossed the creek and I gave up on him.
As I headed back down the canyon. I crossed the creek and started up the hill and saw some hens picking their way in and out of the oaks. I found a good spot and got setup without them spotting me. I let out a few yelps and a tom fired off. Game on! I knew I had to sell the hens to have any chance at him. So I started calling and they listened and kinda answered but not the way I hoped. I thought they might loose interest so I tried one of my trick and turn on the loud mouth hen and started being overly loud and raspy. That did the trick. They turned down hill and started my way. They got to about 60 yards and I saw the tom bringing up the rear full strut. He wasn't talking as much with as loud as I was being. None the less he was coming.
He followed them down to the opening in front of me that was about 45 yards across. He was in the back with the hens in the front. They didn't want to come across the open for some reason and I knew that was the end of their effort to come in without seeing any decoy or birds. The hens started to twitch there wings and move off. I started calling pretty loud and they didn't like that but the tom did. He fired off and went into strut. Then he cleared to the right and I touched it off, BANG! Tom drops like a shack of hammers. I pull down and wait for him to start flopping. Nope motionless. By now I knew something was up. I jump up and start his way. I get to about 30 yards and he notices me coming. Jumps up and takes off on a sprint. I throw up and must have led him to much on the first shot as he didn't even seemed fazed. Then he turned to go strait away and that made it a lot easier. Touch off my next shot and he went rolling into the dirt.
I am use to this gun ammo combo turning lights out to 40/50 yards out. Not sure what happened but must have got more body and spine and shocked him to knock him down on the first shot. Pretty good lesson in trust your gut and be ready for a follow up until you have your hands on them.
Beautiful heavy bird with a nice beard. For my area the spurs normally get warn pretty hard. This bird by far had the sharpest longest spurs I have ever got on a bird in this area.
Pic of the deer and the mirror and one of the bird for y'all.
