Finally my 13 year drought of not a single bird taken I have finally broken my drought! 7:20am this morning 5/25/2020 I finally slammed a monster! While I admit I haven't gone nearly as hard on all of those 13 years or so the past 6/7 have definitely been out as many weekends as I possibly could have trying to get a bird. The season started strong with some great noise from the birds in the begging stages, then they would shut up and never make their presence known. Today all that changed!!! Was calling earlier in the day finally decided to use my box call to try to call the birds from the lower part of the property up towards me. The peacocks on the property were going wild with their usual other worldly noises. As soon as a peacock would sound off then the turkeys would start really hammering it. Around 5:44am I was texting with[mention=4567]turkeyfeathers[/mention] and he suggested some sexy clucks and purrs. I had been trying some yelps to get the turkeys to know where my sexy self was seemingly to no avail. Finally around 6:20am things started to get real exciting with the Toms really starting to go crazy as the peacocks squaked. I texted Jay that I heard one coming up the property to my right. I hit my box call for some luscious yelps and then got an extremely aggressive response from the toms. I was thinking to myself oh man this guy is aggressive, like wanting to fight aggressive. Luckily I was armed with my trusty 12 gauge so don't think I really had much to worry about from a bird. 6:44am I hear another gobbler going off around 60 yards ahead of me behind a hill. GAME ON! Then I heard a hen yelping from behind the hill too! I started to relax a bit and around 6:56am the birds went quiet again. I thought to myself well shit this seems to be another strike out skunking for me. I figured the birds must have been gobbling at a hot hen and figured I wasn't worth it. Around 7:10am I turn and saw a massive hawk but as soon as I looked at it, it decided to fly away bumming me out. Apparently my gaze can kill if I look at something of the avian variety for long enough and the hawk must have known that and decided Not Today! 7:13am things are really heating up now! I have hot hens yelping at my 1:30 or so and then I also am hearing birds hammering behind the hill to my 11:30! At this point my heart is starting to quicken and my taste starting to disappear as my focus becomes hyper vigilant and my adrenaline really starting to pump! 7:14am I text[mention=4567]turkeyfeathers[/mention] "My calling must suck because I hear that one yelp they go crazy I try it they do nothing...I see a big TOM!!!" 7:15am "In yard hes looking. cant see me I'm behind a massive rock. Hopefully he finds my hen and I blastcoming to me". It was a rush text job making multiple thoughts into one as things were really heating up! 7:16am HENS COMING IN! They came up the property and entered into the woods in a break in the stone wall. The hens were looking all over and less than 6 feet away from me as they were coming in looking in the stone and log blind. They were looking me right in the eye as I was trying to do my best impression of a statue of leaves holding a shotgun on my knee. They must have been trying to figure out why there was a big pile of leaves holding a shotgun with eyes looking out at them sitting in front of a giant rock. Apparently they seemed to approve of my stealth. All the while these two hens are within grabbing distance there is an old school wagon caravan worth of birds making their way to my set. There had to be 15-20+ birds all mixed between probably 10+ toms and jakes along with hens as well. It's as if all the birds I was supposed to see all season long decided that today was the day they would finally make their presence known. The lead long beard the guy pictured below with a posterior lobotomy seemed to be the dominant Tom of the flock. (those with more turkey experience may be able to confirm this for me) I'm looking at you[mention=5029]blackbeltbill[/mention] At any rate the time is now near 7:20am and the big boy is attacking my jake decoy who at least in his head must be trying to invade on his harem. Well let me tell ya that was a bad move big boy! Once the two hens finally determined I wasn't a threat I only had to contend with 40+ other eyeballs. Luckily I had no trouble getting my sights on the overly aggressive Tom. He is no more than 15 yards away at this point. The Shot rang out! He Flopped! My left ear is ringing as the blast echoed right off the big rock behind me and seemingly directed it back into my ear even louder. Oddly enough my right ear was perfect normal hearing; the jury is still out if that was a good or a bad thing. He is still flopping as I jump out of the blind and start pumping my fist. He winds up flopping damn near 25 yards which I have no idea how the hell that is even possible when you just had your brains turned into a pink mist. All the birds scattered at the shot and as I walk up to my Toms final resting spot I hear the hens start up again around 80 yards further down the property and gobbling continues. How dumb are these birds really? And now for the moment we all have been waiting for. The ever important stats! He weighed in at a hefty 19lbs with a luscious 10.5in beard(almost as glorious as mine, but not quite) and 3/4 inch spurs which was pretty odd given all his other stats leading to believe he was an older bird. His beard is a thick dark color all the way through. Currently he is sitting in my fridge awaiting his trip to the taxidermist tomorrow and possibly this weekend a trip to my dinner plate! After all these years finally connecting on my first solo bird and a tom of his quality makes all the long sits so worth it! It was a hunt I definitely will not soon forget! Hope you enjoy the pictures and sorry ladies of the forum, this guy is already taken. More pictures in the next post Sent from my SM-G988U using Tapatalk
