Saturday morning up at five for some coffee and steak and biscuits (from our leftover ribeyes of the previous evening). We were out the door and heading through the woods at six. Our walk was a ten minute trip up onto the ridge behind the house. The field is planted in winter wheat and a clover mix for the deer. It is surrounded by typical Georgia pine woods. The woods had a controlled burn a couple of weeks prior that cleared out a lot of the underbrush. It also has a typical red clay dirt road that runs between the field edge and the pines on one side. We choose to set up on the opposite side of the field about five yards deep into the trees. We put our turkey decoys consisting of a jake and a hen about 15 yards out into the field and set up to wait for ol' tom turkey. And wait we did. We sat for about two hours and heard a few gobbles but saw no birds. After awhile my son decides his sittin spot next to me is uncomfortable and he moves to find a spot about ten yards down to my left where he commences to sit and wait. After awhile i glace down in his direction. As I was looking towards him I noticed some movement in my peripheral vision. I turned my head slightly left and low and behold between us about five yards back stands ol' Wilie Coyote. He appears to be stalking our decoys. My son is oblivious to this encounter at this time. Sooo I ease up my gun and try and turn left but am unable to get the gun mounted correctly. (Awkward for a righty to try and shoot back over his left shoulder.) So I do my best and squeeze off a load of sixes with the gun mounted on my bicep. It hurt like hell but not nearly as bad as it hurt the coyote. You can imagine my son's reaction. He jumps up to see this dog thrashing around not five yards behind him. Truly a Charmin kinda moment.
Well thinking that we had spoiled the field we packed up and headed back to the cabin for a second breakfast and to powder our noses etc. Son crawls up on the sofa and commences to nap. I'm wandering around for awhile and says to myself, self we didn't come down here to stay in the cabin we came down here to hunt. Son says he thinks napping will do him just fine so I head back out alone.
I return to the same field we had left an hour earlier and decide that rather than sittin on the ground I will avail myself of the folding chair and shade of that comfortable looking box stand on the upper end of the field. I place the aforementioned decoys out about 15 yards away and climb up into the box stand for a comfortable sit. I'm up there about 30 minutes or so when I hear a faint gobble down in the hollow below the field, so I let loose a little hen talk from the box call in response. I wait about five minutes, but no response so I hit the call again and sit back and wait. A few minutes latter I see this black blob emerge out of the woods at the end of the field about 100 yards away. Having no glass with me all I can say for sure is that it's a turkey. I watch as it steps out on to the road and then it blows up and starts strutting. So now I know not only is it a turkey, it's a male turkey. I ease the gun up and watch this bird promenade on up the road strutin his stuff the whole way. The closer he gets the better he looks until at some point during his approach I see that beard and know that ain't no jake, that fella is a nice ol' tom. I watch as he gets parallel to the decoys and steps off the road and into the field. He walks right up to the decoys and blows up again. At this point my bead is on his head. (I had sixes in the right tube and fours in the left) I ease off the safety at about 25 yard and let loose with the right tube. He rolls and then hops up running. HOLY SMOKES I throw down on him and let loose with the fours and then the party is over. Turkey down.
Now this all occurred on April 1 but this isn't an April fools joke. Here are the pictures for your viewing pleasure.
