First of all, thanks to all the well-wishers, even us blind hogs stumble on one every once in a while. Sorry Mike, my son showed up for a surprise Easter weekend visit when i got home so i didn't call you--in fact, the only two people i did tell were Terry and Matt and that was only because they called me about something else.
Now for two stories: this years longbow turkey and, a few years back, one of the dumbest things I've ever done.
One bird was gobbling from across a county road while i was calling to another, much closer tom. The closer bird was gobbling quite a bit, cutting in on my calls and sounding off whenever I went silent for longer than a few minutes, getting closer all the time. About a half-hour after I first heard the farther bird gobble from the roost, i heard him again, coming closer. Pretty soon the two toms were gobbling at each other and cutting in on my yelps. A group of five jakes walked into the decoys and began "group gobbling" at every call i made and the two I'd heard earlier shut up. i stopped calling and eventually the jakes got bored and walked away. i didn't want them to come back so didn't call for probably a half hour. As i was getting ready to call again, the farther gobbler sounded off and he was only a couple hundred yards out. I called and he gobbled once and never gobbled again. Just as I was thinking of calling it a day (had to be at work at 11), i heard what at first sounded like a small, very hoarse dog barking off to my left. I dropped the window cover on that side and was going to shoo the dog off but instead of a dog i could see the silhouette of a turkey on the other side of the privet hedge. Ducking back out of the window, i raised the flap and then opened the next one to it, one with a shooting lane to the left side of the decoys. The bird was moving right along and went through that lane before i even got my bow up. While i was fumbling with an arrow, the bird walked up to my strutting decoy and gobbled and immediately the tom to my right (the first one i'd been calling to) gobbled back. I'm thinking this is great, i'm about to have two big boys in my decoys. Unfortunately they had other plans and the bird in front of me kept walking toward the other one. I waited till he was about seventy yards out and called but he only gobbled and kept going away. I'm ready to pull my hair out (what little i have) by now and then I thought "hey, if he's going to a gobble, why not give him one from here ?" I grabbed my gobble tube and rattled at him and he gobbled back but kept going away. He went out of my sight and didn't gobble any more. I decided to start gathering my gear and was putting everything in my pack when i heard some soft clucking out front of the blind. Thinking one of the two hens I'd seen was investigating the decoys, i didn't bother to pick up my bow, just leaned up to the one window I'd dropped the flap on. Holy cow ! the big boy had slipped back in on me and was now passing right to left behind my strutter. i grabbed up my bow, nocked an arrow and shot in what seemed like one motion. The WWW (first W is for wicked) smacked him in the left shoulder and he staggered, then started to run directly away with two-thirds of the arrow sticking out on my side. After about 50 or 60 feet he slowed to a stop, settled like a balloon with the air going out and was still, fluttering just a little as his head touched the ground. His left wing was sticking up like a sail, i would find when i got my hands on him that the broadhead had shattered the biggest bone of the wing right below the shoulder joint and gone on in to cut both lungs and stop in the off-side shoulder (I use a Zwickey Scorpio to help keep the arrow in the bird and it fits these shafts pretty tightly ). The left side was not pretty and that's why all the pics are from the right side. His spurs measure just a fraction over an inch, longest part of his beard's eleven inches but most of it's closer to ten and he weighed just a little over nineten pounds---probably just a very healthy two year old but he suits me just fine.
Whoops, look at the time, gotta get to work, i'll get back to the tall grass story on my lunch break.
Topic: 4/14 pretty morning, big birds and a longbow (Read 4535 times)
