Well, here it is, opening day of turkey year two for me and my buddy. The morning was going bad from the start. My buddy forgot to buy his turkey tag (thank goodness we now can get them online in inutes,) and was late to begin with. We were bracing for bad weather, but the rain did not come and the warmth was with us. So we set up on the edge of a big corn field. We set some decoys about 20-25 yards away in the open. We hunkered down and just started calling. About 20 minutes later we heard it...garrrroooobbbblllleeeee. The heart started pumping and the adrenalin began flowing. So I switched to purrs and slight clicking. The bird popped out of the woods and began his little ditty dance for our decoys. My buddy had to readjust as he was sitting expecting the bird to pop out almost behind us instead of off to our right. After it cleared the tall grass my buddy finaly glimpsed it. KAPOW, my buddy lets loose with 2 oz from his 3 1/2 inch mag............and nothing. That bird just stood there looking at us trying to figure out what the hell was going on. No flinch, no feathers....nothing. My buddy clean missed. And whats worse.......the shell rim got ripped and the empty was now jammed in the gun. He was trying for dear life to pick that thing out. I told him to tuck in tight, I was gonna give it a try. I really shouldnt have bothered cuz I couldnt get my muzzel to far over (I wasnt about to fill my buddy full of holes for a bird) but I couldnt just sit there helplessly while the bird just stared at us and my friend without any way to follow up a shot. Long story short, we done clean missed that guy. Wasnt really to big. We think it was a subordinate jake that was looking for some side action because my friend ran over to see down the hill and viewed the flock with one Tom that had a beard dragging on the ground. We repositioned and got them to call back. But by this time they were not falling for it again. Im disappointed we missed that bird, but overall happy that for the first time we could see something we could shoot. Our first year ended with us see a single hen all season. Nothing more. Well things are looking up at least. We are gonna again Saturday. We will see if they wanna play again.
Brian M.
