I'm going to throw in a turkey hunting story in here even though this is the deer forum. (Actually a two parter as the whole story is just to good not to share).

One of my best friends in the world and I used to hunt in the same hunting club back in the early 2000's. He had a little ornery teenage son named Nick who used to love to aggravate us and play pranks. Nick would deer hunt religiously but in the spring he was always too busy to turkey hunt with us much. Well it just so happened that Nick got to join us one weekend. His dad really wanted him to kill a turkey so he asked me to take him which I was happy to do. I knew of a couple of birds that had not been messed with but had no clue where they would be roosted. So Nick and I slip in there quietly the next morning and sit down on a ridge overlooking a big creek bottom. About daylight it sounded like a turkey farm down on that creek and we were right above them. I knew they weren't coming up that big ridge we were on and told Nick we would have to get down there with them so we carefully and quietly slipped down the road that led down to the creek. By the time we got down to where the road met the creek there was a wall of brush and privet that we just could not get through and I look up the creek and there is a line of red headed gobblers walking right to us. I immediately started assessing the situation but there was no way to shoot through that mess. The birds were closing fast down the creek and in desperation I got down low and lo and behold there was a hole through that 15 yard wide brush that some animal had made him a tunnel through. I grabbed Nick by the collar and pulled him down as the first red head passed through that hole. I told him "The next red head you see walk through that opening, you kill". Two gray headed hens went by and all of a sudden a red head appeared. Boooooooooooooooom and I hear the wings go to flapping. The kid had killed his first gobbler, and I have never heard so much yelling and celebration as he waded through that sea of brush to get to his bird.

Some of you may remember Nick.

K9 Officer Nick O'Rear (End of Watch 2/5/2020)




Fast forward to 2021 (a little over a year after his death). Nicks dad called me one day in late March of 2021 to shoot the bull. I asked him was he hearing any turkeys and he shared with me how he had really been struggling since his son's death and he just had not been able to bring himself to go hunt since Nick had gotten a little older and accompanied him a lot. He just said it was too hard to go alone. I told him to pack a bag that he was going with me and he wouldn't be alone and after a little coaxing I got him to agree. We drove down to a little piece of property I've got access to in Barbour Co and I had been getting some pictures of a couple of dumb 2 year olds which I figured was just the medicine he needed. Fate had other plans and it was raining at daylight. We cooked some breakfast and waited out the rain which was scheduled to end around 10 am. At 11 am we got on our camo and headed to my spot to see if we could get one of those 2 year olds to play. We hiked up the road and the closer I got to where I wanted us to be I could see the sun popping out from behind the clouds which were quickly clearing out. I got to my first spot and we just sat down up against a big oak and started talking about the good ol days and Nick and how much he was missed. I guess 30-45 min went by and I decided to take a call out for the first time and let her rip. I started off with some light yelping and then progressed into some pretty aggressive cutting. Immediately I was cut off by a gobble down the ridge. I set my buddy up and got behind him but close enough to see the action. A few minutes goes by without hearing anything and then I see a red and white head bobbing through the hardwoods directly in front of us. It slipped up into the edge of the greened up cutover and proceeded to put on a show like I have never seen. He strutted all the way to us with the sun shimmering off of his feathers which almost made him glow bronze. He got to about 25 yards and I whispered to Dan, "Kill him" and I heard his Browning shotgun go off. The turkey crumbled upon impact and I got up and walked over to Dan who was just sitting there in disbelief..... it was the first time he had been in the woods since his son was killed and we had one down within an hour. We walked over to the downed bird and the first thing I noticed was how huge it was. He picks it up and I can clearly see as it's coming off of the ground that it had multiple beards. I had him put it down and we counted 3 long beards of 9 - 10 inches each. Holy cow I said...... I didn't even know this bird existed because I've never gotten a picture of him. He looked me dead in my eye and said "Nick sent him to us" and then he pulled a little green urn out of his jacket pocket and said "He's been here with us the entire time". I'm not going to lie...... tears were shed. We finally composed ourselves and got some great pics to remember it by. He even let Nick get in on the pictures.