14-15 April 2017 turkey hunt

So got skunked in am hunt. I stayed on the hill to listen at sunrise. Did not hear anything so went to swamp and heard nothing.  Hunted till 930 am. Decided to go to breakfast. After I left decided to go back hunting.  Went to a few spots and called. No answer. Finally as I was walking away and saw a Tom. I set up and called him in within 35 yards. I was waiting on a better shot and moved a little. He heard me and went the other way. He came back out in a clearing, I missed judge the distance and you guessed it, I missed. THEN I went about four hundred yards down the path and set up. A gobbler answered. He came in within ten minutes. He gobbled 5 times but was behind some brush. I finally heard him spitting going to the left towards a deer trail. I fixed my gun on that trail. As he came around the brush pile he came out of stroud and turned down that deer trail. He only got two steps down the trail and I rolled him!  20 lbs 10 inch beard and 1 inch spurs. The next day Jack built his own civilization so I felt obliged to to include it. See below.

Bear Creek Youth Turkey 2017

So the twins and I hunted Saturday morning and it was crazy. Isaac was up first. On Friday we went to put our supplies in the blind. Funny thing is someone stole it. We went back to the barn and got another and set it up. 0 dark 30 we get to the blind only to find the cows had overturned the blind and scattered our gear. We finally got set up. We heard some gobbling but nothing close. At day light a hen flew out of a tree right by us and out in the center of the field. She started to go away from us when three deer appeared from over the hill.  Some cows started chasing the deer towards us.  When the cows stop chasing the deer, the deer started chasing the HEN!  The chased her so much she took flight and pitched in a tree above us.  She was making some noise.  It didnt take ten minutes for the other turkey to show up.  We had 5 jakes six feet away from the blind.  Isaac could not shot bc he would have killed all of them, they were so close together. Finally they separated out some.  I asked him if he wanted to wait and try for a gobbler or take a Jake.  Without hesitation he said shot the Jake!  So he let it rip and missed.  They took off to the woods but came back in 10 mins.   He tried his luck again and missed.  To be fair, i told him to put his face down on the stock, he did but i did not notice he put it down sideways, thus the miss.  Two Jakes left behind us and the othe three went off to the right.  In about 30 mins the two flew right past us and pitched in trees in front of us.  With all of their noise a gobbler and hens came in but not close enough for a 410.  When we left, i checked out where to two jakes had come from.  Come to find out, someone had walked out to the pond to go fishing and scared them.  Everything was pushing them back to us but we did not get one.  We then left and went to the NWTF competition in Snowhill.  That is the pic with all of the turkeys. Notice the white one in the middle.  The second pic is Jacks afternoon project while Isaac went on a pm hunt.  We actually got on a nice gobbler and he was sounding off, an hour before dark.  As he made his slow way across the cut down to us, a hen appeared.  She got fifty yards from us and then took off with the gobbler in tow.  LOL i then noticed i had my Bear Creek hat on with a bright oregane logo, which I forgot and we were not in a blind. I had moved my head a litttle and she picked us off.  Dang it.  Well that was our day.  Had a blast!