Bird down!

[thunderchicken]

Man, its been a while since I have been on! Hope everyone is well!

Shot this one 10/14/09 at 8:30 am in NH

18.5 lbs
7 inch beard

My first Fall gobbler! Headed to VT this weekend to try and fill my last turkey tag for 2009!

 

[Turkeybuster]

Congrats. thunderchicken hope you do good in VT.
Jon [:D]

[mark hay]

'AT A BOY T'CHICKN

[JW]

_____________________________

Congrats Thunderchicken on your first fall gobbler!
 

[thunderchicken]

thanks guys! Now for the details of the hunt.......

Arrived at parking spot at 5 am. Geared up and headed across field to cross pasture. After avoiding getting tangled in barbed wire twice, I made my way along a small brook to the edge of another field. Skirted the treeline til I got to a point between 2 clearings. My main objective was to listen for birds flying down into clearings. It was still another hour before light! Well, dawn came and no birds flew into clearing. Now, I picked this spot because of various turkey sign I was seeing in clearings ( tracks, feathers and dusting bowls). I had scouted this area out yesterday afternoon ( This is the farm Coalman and I spotted birds on Monday) after getting some intel from LIVE MAP. On Monday I had seen 3 Toms in the green field to the east. I decided to work my way towards that area at 7:30 am. I started to follow a brook when I came open a group of birds! They scurried down the hill and I continued down stream! I decided to try and get to a high point above where I last saw the birds and gave a few lost yelps. Immediately I hear a turkey yelping below me! Not A NORMAL HEN YELP.....GOBBLER YELP? I set up a decoy and sat to see if anything would come up the hill.......nope, but I could tell the turkey sounds were moving up the hill towards another clearing. So I put it in drive and started to make a huge circle to get above them. Well, it worked! As I started down an tote road........THERES SOME BIRDS! So down on my belly I went keepin a big beech tree between us. Closed another 10 yards on them. every now and then I would see a little head pop up! As soon as they cross the brook I need to roll over and sit up to take the shot. The first bird crosses the brook...then the second crosses.......BANG! BIRD DOWN! 2 birds fly off into the clearing and one bird is doing cartwheels! Now he is minus a few feathers off his full fan because of a minor OOPS when trying to keep him from going into the brook!

It was a fun and great hunt!

I am hooked!

[Steve_In]

Luck and a plan can go a long way together. [:D] Congraulation Thunderchicken

[eggshell]

sounds like a fun hunt..congrats

[Turkeybuster]

That is a good story thunderchicken especially the Minor OOPS part I can invision that senario.
Jon

[Cut N Run]

 Congrats. Nice to hear of your success.
 
Jim

[turkeydoghunter]

 congrats on your turkey.....what happened to your dog[:(]...