Well after having a great couple days with TNTurkeyman we headed to West Virginia to visit family and friends and try our fortunate luck at those WV birds. Sunday morning found me listening to a bird ripping it up on the roost. Listened that eve to roost him to no avail. But heard one gobble 1 time on neighbors that we could hunt.
We decided to try the vocal bird first thing Monday. Silent!! Then we heard that other bird couple times. We rode around and set up as we heard him gobble once more. Silent bird. No gobbling... We did not use Freddie's rule to be patient and we decided to sneak around to the edge of the hollow. With our thumb up our a@! We called with no response. Then there is noise in leaves and drumming Says Jonnie. We hit the ground and there he flies. Not 40 yards behind a tree coming to our first setup. Game over. Jonnie headed back to TN afterwards.
I heard that vocal bird last night gobble 50 times or so going to roost. I knew where to go. Set strutter and hen up in field and fell in amongst a fallen down tree in the field. He started gobbling hard and I stayed silent. After fly down he answered the few series of calls and could tell he was getting close to the field line fence. He flew into the field and landed instantly in full strut. He started running to a fight with "Bee" but as he got to about 15 yards from the deeks I ended the show at 6:35.
21# 1 1/8" spurs. 9 3/4" beard.
