- Joined
- Jan 7, 2016
- Messages
- 2,041
This one has been a long hard road. My daughter started hunting deer when she was 7 and killed her first that first season. She never showed any interest in turkey hunting til last year, at 14. So I brought her opening morning of juvenile last year, called one up….and she missed. That lit a fire in this kid to kill a turkey. We hunted hard all last season. Never could make it happen. She couldn't get on them for a shot, or they would bust her trying to move to get on them. We worked hard going through possible scenarios and being ready and fast target acquisition. Still never made it come together.
Started out this season with some of the same issues. I could have already tagged out but I'm not killing one out from under her. But she kept at it. She's kept learning.
Her mother wanted me to use a blind and decoys to make it easier. And while I know that's true, it is easier. I refused. I at least wanted her to kill her first one the fun way, the hard way, running and gunning in the timber. (No offense to anyone who chooses to hunt with blinds and decoys. I have no problem with it. It's just SO BORING.)
I've walked her legs off the past two seasons. Never any complaints. All those 3:00 AM alarms going off. No complaints. And she's never laid out me when we had plans to go…even if we were just running (literally most times
) on 3-4 hours of sleep. There's been lots of disappointments. But never any complaints.
It finally came together right at 7:00 this morning. It was so dang windy, we didn't hear anything early. I was just about to set down for the heck of it and call and hope for awhile (I hate doing that, but it's nearly an hour drive to get there and I hated to just turn around and go home). Then one fired up on the ridge where we had started out listening. She said, "What do we do?" I said, "We go back! But you're not gonna like the way we are going."
The ridge tops on this property lay like a horse shoe. We walked around the bend of the shoe to get to where we were. Fastest way to get back was down in the holler and straight back up. Stopped for one rest on the way back up and told her once we hit the top we've GOT to keep moving…it's too open there.
Made it to the top and out of the little log yard clearing back into the woods and they gobbled about 100 yards away. Picked a tree where we could just see about 30 yards in their direction and sat down. Called one time soft but I don't think they heard me for the wind. Gave it just a minute and waited for another gobble. I returned it with a louder yelping sequence. Gobbles everywhere!
I just sat my slate down and told her to be ready, this will happen fast!!!!! 2 minutes later we had 3 long beards right in front of us!
I didn't think she was EVER going to get on one! It seemed like an eternity but it probably wasn't 5 seconds when she finally pulled the trigger. One hit the ground, the other two flew off. I jumped up and ran to him. Got my hands on his neck til he was dead, DEAD, DEAD! Then handed him off to her.
You can't see it in the picture, but her face mask was soaked with tears of pure joy.
18 pounds. 10-5/8" beard. 1-1/4" spurs. Remington 11-87 20 gauge with a Burris FF3 shooting Apex TSS 3" #9. Right around 30ish yards. No decoys. No blinds. No fields. Running and gunning.
Started out this season with some of the same issues. I could have already tagged out but I'm not killing one out from under her. But she kept at it. She's kept learning.
Her mother wanted me to use a blind and decoys to make it easier. And while I know that's true, it is easier. I refused. I at least wanted her to kill her first one the fun way, the hard way, running and gunning in the timber. (No offense to anyone who chooses to hunt with blinds and decoys. I have no problem with it. It's just SO BORING.)
I've walked her legs off the past two seasons. Never any complaints. All those 3:00 AM alarms going off. No complaints. And she's never laid out me when we had plans to go…even if we were just running (literally most times
) on 3-4 hours of sleep. There's been lots of disappointments. But never any complaints.It finally came together right at 7:00 this morning. It was so dang windy, we didn't hear anything early. I was just about to set down for the heck of it and call and hope for awhile (I hate doing that, but it's nearly an hour drive to get there and I hated to just turn around and go home). Then one fired up on the ridge where we had started out listening. She said, "What do we do?" I said, "We go back! But you're not gonna like the way we are going."
The ridge tops on this property lay like a horse shoe. We walked around the bend of the shoe to get to where we were. Fastest way to get back was down in the holler and straight back up. Stopped for one rest on the way back up and told her once we hit the top we've GOT to keep moving…it's too open there.
Made it to the top and out of the little log yard clearing back into the woods and they gobbled about 100 yards away. Picked a tree where we could just see about 30 yards in their direction and sat down. Called one time soft but I don't think they heard me for the wind. Gave it just a minute and waited for another gobble. I returned it with a louder yelping sequence. Gobbles everywhere!
I just sat my slate down and told her to be ready, this will happen fast!!!!! 2 minutes later we had 3 long beards right in front of us!
I didn't think she was EVER going to get on one!
It seemed like an eternity but it probably wasn't 5 seconds when she finally pulled the trigger. One hit the ground, the other two flew off. I jumped up and ran to him. Got my hands on his neck til he was dead, DEAD, DEAD! Then handed him off to her.You can't see it in the picture, but her face mask was soaked with tears of pure joy.
18 pounds. 10-5/8" beard. 1-1/4" spurs. Remington 11-87 20 gauge with a Burris FF3 shooting Apex TSS 3" #9. Right around 30ish yards. No decoys. No blinds. No fields. Running and gunning.
