Team 3: "Fan Tastic Toms"

[hugonian1]

Way to go Powerstroke.

Sounds like a great trip.

Looking forward to the story.

[rkhinrichs]

Powerstroke great job! cannot wait!

[DonBo]

WTG Andy! Waiting patiently for the story....

[Powerstroke]

I'm sure you've all forgotten, but I did actually shoot a bird this year. In fact, it was our best year ever in terms of success. I'm the one in the ballcap, my daughter is in the middle and my friend Dan on the left.

I'm proud to have taken a bird, but mine was the least exciting and required the least amount of hunting of the 3. My friend Dan had made contact with a guy in Nebraska who was buying some of his grafted trees. As part of the deal the guy offered to let us hunt turkeys on their property. So, after hunting in Nebraska on public land for 2.5 days and having one contact with birds (my daughter did take a jake so its wasn't all bad ) we decided to drive the extra half hour and meet up with the farmer.

After meeting up and grabbing lunch in town, the guy hopped into the truck with us and we set out on a guided tour of the area. He asked if he could bring his own gun along seeing as he had a tag in his pocket also. Of course we said yes. It was his land afterall.

So we piled into my truck and we went by a few spots that weren't all that promising. Either he was sandbagging to see if we knew our stuff, or he was likely more interested in showing off the habitat work he had done on his own property. Either way, we were putting in our time.

After an hour or so, we went by a cattle lot where we saw a large group of turkeys. There was a group of 6 or 8 red heads in the group, but they were hard to see through the trees. we drove past the birds twice to see and then we parked just down the road behind a shelterbelt. There was a sharp rise between us and the toms.

We stalked up the hill until we thought me were close enough. the four of us set up behind a couple of trees, but because this was a cattle lat, there was no cover to speak of. I gave a couple yelps on my diaphragm and the gobbles were THUNDEROUS! I yelped again and then added some purrs. Very quickly we started seeing little red heads start popping up over the rise. Several of them came to investigate. 4 of them were Toms and the rest were jakes. Dan and I positioned ourselves for a double and whispered our plan.

FInally once a set of birds were free from the group and in range we let them have it! My bird dropped and Dan's bird ran away with the rest of them. We chased the flock around a bit for the next half hour or so, but they had learned their lesson.

I had gotten my bird!

Mine was pretty shot up in the tail fan, but the meat was perfect. Thats all that matters to me. I will add the other two stories later, because they were both more fun and mroe exciting for me. I called all three birds in this year and helping my daughter get her very first turkey was definitely the highlight of my trip!

[Borch]

Looking forward to hearing more Andy.