2019 Pennsylvania youth turkey hunt

[reeltime]

the following hunts took place is Pennsylvania on 4/20/19 during the youth turkey hunt including the mentor youth program which allows kids under the age of 12 to participate also under the guidance of an adult mentor. worked a ton of hours to be able to take a few days off to take the grand kids down to camp for the weekend. Gavin and I arrived wed. evening after finishing up with my electrical inspection on a new cottage build I have going on.   We got camp opened up, truck unloaded and were off to put birds up for the night.

Thursday morning we were back out to listen as best we could with the wind, and then it was off to run and scout as many properties as possible. we were able to find a handful of gobblers through out the morning and had to run to town for early dinner to meet the rest of the gang that was on their way to camp.  we were back in time to put up birds on some properties to free up others to be hit Friday morning off the roost.

Friday morning was a perfect morning clear, sunny, and fast rising temps and not only greeted with numerous gobblers but even laid the spotting scope on a few of the target birds to confirm locations. Friday evening we hit all but 5 of the properties and I left Scott to put the flock of birds on my place to roost. while Gavin and I headed off to find his bird. We had birds put up to roost and had all the gear ready and kids to bed just after dark.

Addison and Scott ( her dad)  were off to my hay field where I told them to set up, Gavin and I were off to a different property. we were in and set up well before gobbling started and we had birds all around us except the target bird had flown way down into the stripmine during the night when a massive thunderstorm moved through.  we got the text picture of Addison with her 3yo longbeard about 7:15. we had been having lots of response to sporadic calls but birds were being stubborn so we decided to go be aggressive and see what we could do.

we walked south about 100 yards stopping a few times to call and got responses each time and finally the bird we had wanted to set up on opened up back to the northeast and we started back and just before cresting the ridge I gave a call to confirm his location as he was closing fast it seemed. we had our hats about blown off with 2 gobbles directly behind us. we sat down quick and as fast as possible got Gavin in position just as 2 white heads came running down the edge of the field right to 20 yards and stopped and stood there and blasted a gobble right at us.  I guess the excitement was too much as Gavin completely wiffed the shot.  His first miss in 6 years and at 12 years old won't be his last.

so back to camp to shed some gear as it was warming up considerably. off to the races again, I drove up to my field and there were gobblers there but decided to leave them and go hit a piece of public land I have killed a pile of birds on. We were greeted with finding 2 longbeards all alone about 800 yards out with my spotting scope and I knew exactly how to enter the block of woods south of them and have had good success accessing from that direction.  We parked the truck and as we were trying to hustle to get geared up they gobbled twice, it was 10 am.  We had a main deer highway to sneak along with huge boulders between us and the field.

We could only go 125 yards without being picked off in the sparse woods cover, I got Gavin set up against a huge rock and belly crawled 20 yards and stuck myrtle on a little dirt mound on the edge of the logging road. Crawled back to Gavin and they gobbled again. got him in position and my first double cluck into a 3 note yelp on the bomber was blasted with a quad gobble.  I told Gavin to watch out front I made another call and  received no response, I told Gavin they are coming get ready they can pop out from behind one of these rocks in a hurry.

All of a sudden 2 white heads appear from behind a big moss covered rock at 25 yards. I could see the birds and could of killed either of them but Gavin setting just to my left couldn't see them.......they moved to our right and he can see them but they wouldn't stop walking and strutting, every time I would cluck they would stop and he couldn't see them, finally they get to a spot in the open at 20 yards and he is on them and as the barrel is doing figure 8's he fires and missed they gobble and as he racks another shell they gobble again and I am clucking and purring and as they stood there I said calm down put the crosshairs on that bird on the lefts head and shoot him.  at the shot the bird dropped in its tracks another solid 3 yo gobbler. 

Gavin was on his feet in a split second and said he is laying right there I can see him. LOL   time of kill 10:11  did some pics, filled out his tag  and headed back to camp for pics, bird cleaning and packing up to head back to NY so I could get back to work to get caught up so I can head back for regular opener this weekend.

pics to follow

Edited April 23, 2019 by reeltime

[reeltime]

Pics of them with their birds.

Sent from my LGL58VL using Tapatalk

[Zag]

Great 2nd pic

[turkeyfeathers]

Great story, great pics.  Congrats to you and the youngsters.  Look at those smiles !

[doebuck1234]

Great story and awesome pics to say the least!!!congrats to all involved

[mowin]

That a mile of smiles.  Congrats to the hunters and the mentors.  

Great story, felt like I was sitting beside you two, and shaking as much as Gavin. 

[moog5050]

Good stuff Lee!

[landtracdeerhunter]

Perfect story book. Congrats and thank you for sharing.