And then they were gone,…
My 11 year old son, Cameron, and I are turkey hunting partners. Of my three sons, he’s the one that will roll out of bed early to hunt and fish. The other two are ‘afternoon’ hunters, preferring the comfort of the pillow in the morning. We live in northeast Nebraska where a thriving Eastern turkey population provides wonderful spring and fall opportunities to bag a trophy long tom. He’s killed three turkeys over the last two years, with one sporting three beards. Our typical modus of operandi is to pre-scout an area locating the birds, then set up strategically the next morning well before daylight close enough to get their attention with a little calling.
Earlier this season we followed our usual protocol and found a perfect setup along a power line right of way underneath the low hanging bows of a large red cedar tree in some dark shadows. In full camo felt like we would be invisible. Just before dawn, when the eastern sky is beginning to turn just ever so slightly yellow and orange, the gobblers, just as we had hoped, started rattling the tree tops with their throaty gobbles. About 6 am they flew down and with a mouthy lead hen, started making their way in our direction. Within 30 minutes we had the lead hen, who had a beard, and three long toms in full view headed our way. The lead hen was a full 30 yrds ahead of the long toms and fed to within a mere 15 feet of my son. I whispered to him “Cameron, don’t move. Don’t move a muscle son.” As she fed closer on our left, he lost focus on her and had his eye on one of the gobblers plotting to drop him with his 20g Benelli. Next thing I know he shifted his weight to get better aim, the hen, about 10 ft away now noticed the movement and sounded the alarm,….’putt, putt, putt’ and flew for her life. The gobblers spooked he shot three times and I fired twice,…all misses with tight choked turkey tubes at short range.
No turkey,…just blanks stares at each other,…then alot of laughing at our rookie mistakes. We gathered up the empty shells, took a photo of him holding them and headed to the truck with another memory and bewilderment at what one minute looked like the perfect setup to bag a trophy gobbler and then a few seconds later,…nothing but misses. Guess that’s why they call it hunting and not shooting. We still laugh about it.
A few days later he bagged a 9-1/2″ beard, 1-1/2″ spur tom with one shot at a different location. A week later in the same area where we had the ‘shooting fiasco’ I bagged a 9-1/2″ beard gobbler. Stay with it guys.
