Well, my persistence this year paid off by shooting a Turkey with a bow without a blind. Ended up going to one of my favorite public spots this morning that's in the mountains. I was going to check it out and see if I could hear anything while on the roost. NO LUCK. Decided to go to a farm I can hunt close to the spot and do some mid to late morning hunt there. I started my hunt by getting out of my truck and seeing a big, bodied deer about 200 yards away. Put the binos on the deer and it turned to be a nice-looking buck with about 2-inch nubs on his head. I was looking at him for a second when I caught movement in the binos that was closer to me. Turns out to be two hens headed my way about 80 yards away. I had nothing ready for this situation and decided to just keep on getting my stuff together. The hens ended up taking off and I decided to go hunt one of the fields that they just plowed. Found a good spot with a big tree in the shade about 20 yards inside the tree line of the plowed field. after getting settled in I Looked at my phone to see the time and it was 7:45. For the next hour and a half I would do some light yelps with a purr and a little calling every 12 to 15 minutes, alternating calls (mouth call, slate, Box call) and during the waiting time I would nod off here and there( hey you're the most still when your sleeping , just have to have ears like a dog).
9:30 came around and no action, so I decided to move spots. The next spot that I went to be an old fence line that was in the woods. Sat in the shade next to a huge hickory tree with several trees in front of me to mask me when I pull back to shoot. Did the same thing I did at the last location with the calling, but this time I increased the calling because of the wind picking up. After about 6 little cat naps (10:15) I was about to call it quits.
This is when the fun starts. While I was sitting down and about to get up and leave, I decided to see if I could actually pull back my bow the way I was sitting. I was getting into the position to pull back my bow when I caught movement in the woods about 80 yards away. Looked like it could have been a turkey-neck or a squirrel tail. I concentrated on the area that I saw the movement, and about two minutes later I see this turkey head bobbing around in the woods heading my way. This time the head was about 70 yards away and slowly coming my way. I did some light purring and a little yelping, and the turkey kept on coming.
At about 50 yards, I realized that it was a hen that was feeding in my direction. Knowing that this was a hen and at this time it was almost 10:00, I decided to play with her and see how close I can get her to me. Zig zagging her way to me to about 35 yards I started hearing this spitting sound behind me... I'm saying to myself that there is no way that there is a Tom behind me. I just stayed put and I could hear the spitting getting closer and closer. The next thing I hear are feather dragging on the ground behind me (I'm thinking to myself holy %$$@ this can't be happening). The hen is now about 28 yards away from me and the next thing you know it I'm have a strutting tom walking by me at about 8 paces from me. During this whole time, I have my bow uprate standing between my legs with my hand on my Just-B-cuz. The tom sees the hen and starts walking her way at this time he is about 12 yards away and about to walk into my shooting lane. The Tom steps behind the tree, I pull back and he catches movement... I start cutting with my diaphragm in my mouth and he stops and about 22 yards. I let my rhomboid do the work and thwack. My G5 MONTEC hits the sweet spot right above fan. The turkey is flapping and trying to take off and all of the sudden I get this burst of energy and bolt as fast as I could towards the Tom dodging things in my path. I'm running so fast I actually see the hen about 10 feet from me at one point. Zig zagging trying to catch up with this powerful bird, graze him several time but just can't get a good grip. After about 30 yards I think the G5 Montec started taking its toll on the tom because he started slowing down.
Finally caught up with the tom and went for a grab and ended up pulling half of his tail feathers out (oh well) the next grab went for his neck, and he ended up going buck wild in my hand with feathers going everywhere. I ended up stepping on his head to put him out of his misery. After all was said and done, I had a bird on the ground with me jumping up and down with excitement.
I can say that this was a hunt that I will never forget.
