Figured I would share now, since the depression of turkey season being over is setting in strong
.
Started the year in Idaho on opening day. Pulled into my spot about an hour before shooting light and wouldn't you know it, someone else was there. Oh well, public land hunting, that's the way it goes sometimes. I decided to head over to another public spot where i've had success in the past. Got there right at shooting time, so I quickly unloaded my gear and started walking. For the first 2.5 hrs of shooting light, not even a peep. I was seeing some sign though, so I knew that there were some birds frequenting the property. Finally, I heard a faint gobble about 500-600 yards away up in the hills (Gotta love those mountain birds). I made my way over until I thought I was about 100 yards from the bird. Set my decoy out and started making some soft yelps... nothing. 30 minutes passes and I still haven't got a response, so I stand up to stretch and I hear the dreaded "putt, putt, putt" behind me. I slowly raise my gun and turn around to see two hens that have fed into 10 yards. They quickly exited the area
. I walked up another 75 yards onto a nice plateau.and got set back up and immediately got gobbles from multiple directions to my slate call. Here we go. I had a group of 4-5 gobblers below me going off (jakes i figured) and one tom about 200 yards behind me. They were gobbling to my calls fairly frequently, but not super interested. After about an hour of not really budging them, I suddenly heard two toms gobble from up above me a couple hundred yards. At this point, i'm surrounded by birds lol. However, these two have hens with them and the lead hen was cutting me off every time i called. While this is going on, all of a sudden, the group of jakes gobble from 40 yards below me. I quickly divert my attention back towards them and within a minute, I see white and red heads coming through the brush at about 20 yards. Unfortunately, they were all jakes, so they got the pass, but it was still fun to see them come into about ten yards. After they moved off, it was about 10:30am. At this point, I hadn't heard the toms gobble for a while, so I let out a few yelps and the two that were above me gobbled immediately. I was in some thick brush, so I quickly got to an open plateau that was about 100 yards above them. I laid on the call with some hard cuts and they went off about 4-5 times each. Within a minute, they belted off again and were just out of sight at this point. I settled in on my sights and then saw two white heads coming through the brush at 10-15 yards, they saw my decoy and began to strut. Just before they got into my clear shooting lane, the lead bird saw something he didn't like and started to putt. Unfortunately for him, he came out of the brush to get a better look and with one blast of the shotgun, it was over. Awesome bird, my biggest to date. Double beard 9 5/8", 7 1/8". 1 3/16" spurs.
Now it was time for Washington. Got out on the first Saturday of the season and called in a nice tom that came running/strutting/gobbling in to about 15 yards. 7.5" beard, 1/2" spurs. At this point, I'm a little bummed with how perfectly this season had gone
. Two hunts, two nice toms that played the game to a tee.
The rest of the season proved to be much more challenging. I called in a group of toms in early May, one of which came into about 8 yards and I missed
. Worked dozens of other birds through the season, but just could not get them to fully commit. Finally, on May 18th, I called in a jake and he just hung around too long. 4.5" beard.
Was a great season as always. Nothing gets me quite as excited as get my ears blown by a big ole tom running in! Can't wait for next year.