2019 will be one for the "Books"

pushin_30

Very Active Member
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1,084
Like the title says "2019 is going to be one for the "Books""!!
A year I have waited my whole adult life for!! While I spend all of my hunts with my family and friends, My middle daughter will be hunting her own tags the year! She past hunters safety this past November and since she will not be eligible for the fall deer/elk hunts do to her not turning 12 until mid December. She is eligible to spring turkey hunt, as luck would have it she drew the early season and was excited as ever to finally get to be the "shooter" on the hunt.
With the help of a great friend and some pre season scouting we where able to get some birds patterned and set up a ground blind with high hopes of a successful hunt soon to come.

The night before the hunt my daughter was up all night pacing back and forth with anticipation of the mornings hunt!! Like a kid on Christmas Eve!!!

With the alarm sounding off at 430am it was time to get in the truck and make the drive to our spot and hike into the blind in the dark. We had positioned the blind about a 100 yards from the roosting tree and had to take our time and be extra careful getting into position not to spook the birds. As daylight began to break the morning sky the birds started to gobble and fly down from their roosts and began feeding in the field out in front of us!


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As hunting sometimes goes the birds did not cooperate with our set up like they had the days previous on our scouting trips. They decided to feed straight away this morning and headed for the river bottom. We kept calling and waited hoping that we could get them to come back our way. With a little persistence we were able to call in a lone hen right to the decoys. While this was exciting for a change we just could not get the gobblers to cooperate. We kept at it finally a little luck started our way 3 jakes made their way out of the river bottoms and started heading towards us slowly. With the consistent calling we finally had our opportunity at a level bird. At a mere 20 yards all 3 Jakes came into the decoy spread, while I was anxiously waiting for my daughter to take one of them she looks over at me and says "Dad this is so cool but I don't want to shoot a Jake, I want a gobbler". While I was kind of caught off guard at first and told her it was her hunt and she could shoot the bird she wanted so we just sat back and enjoyed the encounter with the 3 birds out in front of us. They decided they had had enough and they made their was off into the thicket once again. About an hour later I heard a lone gobble coming of the hill behind us and so we just sat tight and kept calling away. After calling and getting him to respond back and forth for what seemed liked forever we finally got the break we had been waiting for first along comes this hen form the left of us mere feet from our blind right into the decoys. While all morning long the birds had came into the set up for our left. Out pops this Tom from the right of us strutting right into us and our decoy spread. I will NEVER forget the look on my daughters face as she finally make eye contact with the Tom as he came in from the right.

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Do to the direction in which this Tom came in from we had to carefully make a shooting adjustment and get the gun moved to the opposite window for a shot. While the decoys kept mr Tom entertained we made the switch and Ayda readied for the shot. My heart was pounding out of my chest and as I watched her concentrate and ready herself for the shoot, time began to sit still as this all started to unfold. Then the sound of the Remington 870 20ga. barked and mr Tom was down! I lost it!! She had just accomplished her goal of shooting a gobbler! Luckily for US I was able to capture all of this hunt on camera with the help of my good buddy Mark running the calls and camera 1 and myself with camera 2 this hunt will always be one for the "Books". Hunting has always been a huge passion of mine and having my kids enjoy it also makes it that much more enjoyable for me to want to get out even move and enjoy the great outdoors with my kids!!! 2019 was off with a bang!! We were both on "CLOUD 9"


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