Since I shot my first bird on the 20th, I have to wait until may 10th before I can chase a second bird on the Proving grounds. That being the case I had 2 friends that want to go out and I suggested an area where I'd seen 4 LB with 6 hens the day before. We park on one end of the area and start looking for the birds. about half way to the other end o hammer on a crow call and we hear gobbling in the distance. We move closer and I hit the call again. This time we can pinpoint there location, they're roosting over a creek the other side of an earthen bridge from us. We find a clump of trees and I sit my friends there and move behind them about 20 yards after sitting a jake and hen decoy. I hit the crow call again just to check our placement and multiple birds gobble the other side of the creek and a tom and jake gobble our side of the creek. Now we wait for better daylight to start calling. The Turkey are gobbling on the own now and I toss a few clucks and tree yelps out. Wait for more light and do a fly down. Nothing. I wait a bit and do some clucks and yelps, nothing. I know these birds are called to a lot because they are near roads and aren't shy. After about an hour I'm thinking the hens led them away. Soon we hear a car sounding it horn on the other side of the earthen bridge. Good sign. Just then 6 Van's start heading towards the bridge, oh know, we think they will scare the birds off, however, the Turkey were used to traffic and we notice their brake lights meaning they're still coming. About a minute later I see the first Turkey on our side of the bridge. When the Tom's clear the guard rail they see the decoys and 4 LB march into the spread and are about to tear up the jake and boom, one of the 4 hits the ground. A few seconds later boom number 2. One of my buds starts running across the field. The first guys Turkey gets up after the first guy runs past and it gets up and starts to run for the woods. Up jumps shooter number 2 chasing his bird to the woods. The bird gets struck in some briers. When he gets to the edge of the woods, boom, he shoots his bird again killing it. When I get up I see the Shooters walking back with their birds in hand and I'm very happy, double. Both hunters come over and talk to me very excited. At that time I look at the bird that was shot once and noticed its head was up. I tell the shooter he might want to make sure his bird is really dead, he runs over and jumps on the bird laying on top of it with its neck tightly clutched in his hands. He's choking it out. It takes about 5 minutes and the drama is finally over and high fives and fist bumps ensue. Both birds weighed about 20 lb, 10.5 inch beards and 1 inch spurs. It was a fun hunt and we finally got the birds to stay dead.
V

amazing hunt an awesome double it would have really sucked if the one bird would have gotten away

Wild Bill

Congrats to all..

Oh man Vic, those military birds are hard enough and with all that other drama what a great successful hunt.


Earl