Today couldn't have gone any better. Myself and two of my friends decided to sit up together this morning and let the chips fall where they may. My concern was to put everyone within shooting distance of a bird between daylight and dark. As soon as the sun came up, birds were sounding off all around us. Of course, they avoided the decoys early on because they already knew where the real hens would be. We chased a few gobblers up and down some hills before the call came that a son had busted his lip in a soccer game. One buddy had to hit the road. Luckily he would be able to come back in the afternoon. Joel and I dropped off Hohman and headed back out. We caught a single hen leading a nice Tom across a field and worked out a plan for a sneak that ended with a nice bird down.
I decided I would do some walking around lunch to see if any birds were visiting a common strutting ground. I had an hour-long adrenaline rush watching 8 birds strut around with a large group of hens about 100 yards across the property line. I headed home, as the wife demanded, and happened to catch a nice long beard beating the crap out of my decoys, I had left from the morning hunt, and put him down.
This afternoon Hohman came back and we spotted 2 big boys strutting in a field on a separate property. Once again, a plan was put in to place that ended up being stressful, exhausting, and time consuming yet very rewarding.
In all, we put a little over 70 pounds of birds on the ground. We will all be eating well for the next couple of days. The pics are in order of the kills. I am finally getting to eat a ham sandwich as I make this thread and will lay down and relive the day before falling asleep. Good friends and good hunting last a lifetime and make a long day worth living.
I decided I would do some walking around lunch to see if any birds were visiting a common strutting ground. I had an hour-long adrenaline rush watching 8 birds strut around with a large group of hens about 100 yards across the property line. I headed home, as the wife demanded, and happened to catch a nice long beard beating the crap out of my decoys, I had left from the morning hunt, and put him down.
This afternoon Hohman came back and we spotted 2 big boys strutting in a field on a separate property. Once again, a plan was put in to place that ended up being stressful, exhausting, and time consuming yet very rewarding.
In all, we put a little over 70 pounds of birds on the ground. We will all be eating well for the next couple of days. The pics are in order of the kills. I am finally getting to eat a ham sandwich as I make this thread and will lay down and relive the day before falling asleep. Good friends and good hunting last a lifetime and make a long day worth living.
