Keep them in your thoughts and prayers....

Cassidy the Longbeard

Cassidy you say???

This ole boy was hoppin along all morning long....all season long actually...

Hop along Cassidy....get it?

Paul had seen him a couple times but I dont think he knew the sheer size of this rascal or he wouldnt have shot the bird he did this week to tag out....

I belly crawled an Avian X feeder hen out into the edge of the tall grass and crawled back...

He was in love....well kinda...he strutted once and looked our way when we called but he just took his sweet ole gimpy time....

Paul was praying for another tag as this bird was hopping toward us at an extremely slow pace due to some sort of leg injury. The wind was howlin' and the behemoth beard on this guy (which ended up going 14") was blowing sideways and landing on plants in the field....he would stop and his beard would be all over here and over there.......

I told Paul repeatedly that the beard had to be over a foot....then he said, while looking through his binoculars at the approaching freak of nature......

"I hate you....I should never have shot that bird!!!" 

I said...."Thats not very nice...He has giant spurs to doesnt he"?

he said...."yes"

hehehe....salty much???

It took a long time for him to come to us....he actually got run off by 3 Jake birds at one time......Well, I say run off....he looked more like a one legged sack race runner....

The Jake influx finally subsided...I have no idea why they never approached the decoy unless the feared the old boy that just ran from them???

The Tom looked toward the fake hen as if he was late for his date and commenced to hoppin'.........

He hung up at 30 yards....my leg was sleeeeeepy....my azz was asleep....Paul cut on the mouth call and I squeezed.....

Enter High 5's and fist bumps!!!

Here are the stats...

14" Beard

1 1/2" and 1 3/8" Spurs

A hair under 19lbs

If I was to enter him......Looks like he would be top 15...#3 beard in WVA

Couldn't believe the size of the beard and spurs on this guy....Thanks to my little 5 yr old rugrat Riley for the MWC Team Turkey competition pics...

Paul was at it again...goin solo

Here is Pauls story about crushing yet another Turkey!!!

Everything comes together

Morning started wondering where I was going to go since I had 3 hours to spare before my first client. I decided to hunt a farm that I only hunted twice both being after 10. This farm has always been good to me and from scouting early in the season I knew there were several toms running around on it.

Since I didn't know exactly where the birds were on the farm I slept in for an extra 20 minutes knowing I would have to listen for them then make a sneak on them. Ended up hearing one gobble about 1000 yards away at around 540 and waited for a second gobble to pin point him. He was right on a 20 acre sycamore patch of woods that was between two cow pastures. I had in hand my gun camera and two avian decoys and headed to the tom.

I cut the distance I realized that he was on the ground already and I was pretty much out in the open. I decided two leave the decoys and camera behind knowing they would get me busted. I crawled about 100 yards knowing that he was in the open and could bust me very easily if I walked in. I ended up getting to about a hundred yards two where I heard the tom last gobbled and heard a hen yelping to my right about 70+ yards Of course I'm thinking its another hunter until I peaked over a little rock break and saw the real thing. She was walking to my right and as I was watching her I noticed two white heads 15 yards right behind her. As I was looking at them through the binos I heard several Jake's going off to the left of the hen in the sycamore patch and right after that I heard the Tom. There ended up to be two hens that were zig zagging in the field feeding on bugs and where getting closer to me. The two toms ended up to be Jake's and then three other Jake's appeared behind them. Then I saw the Tom to the left of the hen peaking his white head over the hill.

  It turned out to be in a good spot and decided to settle in. I pulled out a mouth call that sounded similair to the hen I heard in the morning and thought if I did some light purrs and clucks the Jake would get curious and check me out. Turned out they all were curious and were heading my way.

  At this time I have two hens at about fifty yards 5 Jake's to the right of the hens at about 60 yards from me and a strutter with 3 other birds that were puffed up behind the tom at about 80 yards all headed my way. The hens started to walk away so I did a couple light yelps and purred and clucked a couple times and the Jake's started to head my way.

  Got as comfortable as I could and waited them out. The tom started showing off and started to do the hump dance at about 60 yards in front of me. While I was watching the tom I already had a Jake with a 5"ish beard sneak in at about 15 yards with 3 more right behind him that had about a 5" beards on them. I turned on the go pro and got ready and here they come. The strutter was heading my way and hit the 30 yards mark and I put the bead on him and the next thing you know it there were 6 Jake's trying to kick this toms tail with I think 3 watching. They all are at about 20 yards from me and I cannot get a shot. This tom is standing his ground and is fighting all 6 at the same time. I'm still trying to get a shot and I can't because there are way to many heads in the way. As I was watching this fight I noticed all the birds had full fans and they pretty much had a high pitch full gobble. At about 2.5 minutes into it my dang go pro dies....looks like I forgot to charge it. While the birds were going at it I actually turn to my right without them noticing. This fight went on for about 5 more minutes and they ended behind a rock break that was 10 yards in front of me.

   They started heading back to my left and the tom did a no no, he hopped on a rock that was about 25 yards from me and I let him have it. The tom does a flip backwards and the super Jake's started to kick his tail until they saw me at about 15 yards and scattered.  Running up to the tom I was thing he was going to be a brute until I saw his spurs.  He was only a 2 year old with about 3/4 " spurs and a 10" beard. When I picked him up he was light as a feather and would guess he weighed around 12 pounds.

I bet these Jake's ran this bird to the ground everyday and he was definitely feeling it. For what it was worth he stood his ground pretty well and gave me a heck of a show. Definitely was a awesome way to tag out.

Still Layin' down the Longbeards

and a short beard too....but it was for a good cause....

Hinky got his first bird ever thanks to his buddy Brad...Brad and his family are some turkey slayers and took Hinky out when he got back from his 2 weeks out of town for work...(could not have had a worse date for training...pretty sure I would be searching for employment at this time cuz I cant miss the first 2 weeks of turkey season)

Congrats to Hinky on this fine first bird and sone pretty cool video....Longbeards are great but this one was yummy fried last night...thanx bud!!!

Paul and I were so excited for this past Saturday with Andy...We had our azzez handed to us the previous two days and were ready to just get some video...Andy had quite a few talkers the last time out so we had high hopes...The birds were vocal but far away on another property that we could not access in the morning....We knew if we were patient and stayed put on this edge where we frequently see strutters that we could be in for a show...One bird was so vocal we figured he either had someone else firing him up with continual yelps on the next property or he was just extremely horny....Paul and I simulated a Jake fight on a couple slate calls...The gobbling went into the bottom...We did it a little more and it got a little closer....he shut up for a while so we shut up for a while...I laid back to listen and soak up the morning for a while....I think I was drifting off when I was startled by his gobble a lot closer....We all shifted ourselves and prepared....We had my strutter deke in the field and he was coming from the right so he would see it as soon as he popped into the field. Then we then heard that gobble that lets you know its gonna happen!!! He was in the field but we could not see him yet...That only took a second though as he came running with a sidekick Jake in tow!!! Paul told Andy not to shoot til he cut on the mouth call. The Tom was givin stinkeye to the impostor but then seemed to lose his stones...He went out of strut and turned to leave...He looked at the hen deke one time and Paul cut on the call but the bird put his head down...He cut again as the bird started to walk away and the deal was done...Andy was tagged out in MD!!!

And More Turkeys!!!

I have now stumbled into my best Turkey season ever by the numbers... Today makes 2 doubles for Paul and I in the last 6 days and 3 in the last 2 seasons... I really dont know where to begin...Im exhausted....cant wait to sleep....but will be back behind the camera tomorrow Am and the next day and the next.................... Paul had been watching his bird for weeks....he has footage of him strutting numerous times...I would hear about him daily...We knew he was a good one...We knew where he should end up after fly down....Paul called sparingly but the bird was a no show....or so we thought...maybe hunting preasure around the area  shut the gobbler up as Paul ran two jackaloons off of the farm two days ago...Luckily they were on the other side of the farm but today all was silent after the birds feet hit the ground.... Patient Paul actually got up to creep over and see if he was strutting over the rise....I took the opportunity to take a whiz...I zipped up and turned around just in time to see a hen cresting the hill less than 15 yards from Paul who was now crawling up the hill.....I whistled and motioned frantically for Paul to bail out....he dove in a ditch and scurried back behind me as the birds came over the knoll.....Their view obstructed by brush and the swale that Paul had run down in to....Paul could not get back to his original spot in front of me so I grabbed his gun and pushed it back to him...I readied the camera and plugged my left ear with my finger as the gun was right beside my head now and we had no other choice........ The bird made his way into view and did something I had never seen....got all the way to the decoys and kinda freaked....he putted and turned around....I heard Paul swing left and I let go of the cam.....Boom......Dusted....Im pretty sure the wad went through its face.............. We quickly went in search of another bird........ I really thought the chances of another double were slim to none but we were gonna give it hell.....we slapped a high five when we spotted a strutter in a field and quickly formulated a plan....we got a jake fan out of the truck and proceeded to run...crawl...scurry...climb...call...belly crawl...sweat....huff and puff.....and call some more...for an hour....This stud had a hen with him and they put on a show....we got cool footage of the most awesome mating ritual....including this ole boy dry humping the ground in front of the hen after he bred her as if to show her what he had just done to that thing!!!! Paul threw a super raspy call at the pair and the hen freaked......he ran after her but kept stopping to strut...he was lovesick and confused... I put a final stalk to within 35 yards of him with the jake fan....Im pretty sure his mind was blown....he seemed to hide in the grass.... I handed the fan to Paul and told him to hold it up and distract the bird...we rose up together with cam and gun....and we finished the day with 17 minutes left!!!! Unreal end to an unreal day!!! And then to top it all off....Andy finally scores on a dandy....After repeated attempts and numerous people trying to help call to some of the most unkillable birds on the planet...Andy packed it up and headed to a farm where he has had great  success in the past...He and Paul capped off a great weekend of Turkey hunting with this big old Gobbler!!!

Turkeys Turkeys Turkeys!!!

I had been scouting hard on a farm on the shore I have hunted for years and had never even seen...let alone killed a turkey. Paul and I were there shed hunting and came across a ton of turkey sign. I made the trip back down setting up a Primos DPS cam (reason being...Turkeys are so quick I didnt think I would catch many on cam...this one takes a pic every few seconds like a plot watcher so I figured I would get more.) They were there alright...not a ton but enough....and pretty regular in the oaks...I even had them passing by a few times on cam on the WYLD mineral site!!!

We hit that farm for the opener....and we were done by 7:30!!! Right after fly down I got a little more aggressive than I thought I would have to on the calling because of the distance...(they were roosted on a farm I cannot hunt so we got as close as we could) As the Gobbler first came into view he was calmed and intrigued by the hen scratching in the leaves behind....kind of a perfect storm....But when he caught a peek of the pair of Zink dekes...He lost his composure (and then his life) The dude walked up and basically winked at the hen deke....how you doin....and continued a few yards to take care of his light work.....

I will never forget the look on this birds face when he looked back over his shoulder at the fakey jake....right around the 10 yard marker he looked like he wanted to kill that lil dude....and I couldnt take it anymore....

I freakin missed!!!! the first shot.....he flew up and hit the ground gittin it!!! I cut his legs out from under him as he started to fly again and hit him in the face with the third shot dumping him like a goose.........

Below is the GoPro angle...

I have never missed a gimme like that before....The shot looked good....Im blaming it on the super tight pattern....Its the size of a baseball at 20 so who knows at 10?!?

After some pics we hit the road toward our second spot an hour away....Public ground that we doubled up on last year mid morning....We got some play but nothing commited....

At noon we were haulin azz even lower on the shore to scout some more public property for the next day and hopefully find a prospect. Just about the time Paul was whining about being to far to drive in the am he spotted a strutter....I spotted the dude at the house on the property and pulled in.......... We were in business and had a plan for the next day!!!!

2AM came awful early but we were ready to get on with it!!! I had every intention of only videoing but when we were gearing up at the truck the sound of multiple birds was too much to handle so I brought the gun for back up.....

Long story short........cuz it is long.......4 hours long........4 hours of watching these gobblers strut, fight, spit, and attempt a little love with two hens that only wanted to eat and dust.......before finally heading into our corner where we had seen the afternoon bird the day before........We were waiting with a plasti hen....... It looked real good to the biggest strutter and he came over to flirt....Paul made quick work of the bird and commenced to cutting and purring on the mouth call......

And then the craziest thing happened.........with only a few minutes remaining.....a bird we had been hearing across a paved road came running across to check out the commotion.......I knew he would hang up on the flopped over gobbler so I belly crawled out into the tall grass almost 6 feet from the hen decoy....Paul seduced the bird and I shot him as he picked the head of Pauls dead gobbler up in his mouth!!!! Bam....2 birds in a heap...2 doubles 2 years in a row!!!

Above is Pauls view on the cam and below is my hat mounted GoPro video angle...

Pauls bird made it easy for pics as we just hung him from his dagger spurs on a limb......I was stoked to have just taken my first double bearded Tom and tag out in Md. for the first time!!!