Lucas and I left home at 6:30 p.m. on the 25th of May to meet our friend Dave for a hunt the next day. We were to meet up with Dave at his parents house at 4:00 a.m. Lucas and I drove straight through and arrived at 3:15 a.m. We had a half hour nap and then the three of us headed out to where Dave had roosted some turkeys the night before. We had to walk about 700 yards to the birds and Dave managed to get us to within a 100 yards of where the birds were roosted. We set up our decoys, camera and ourselves and waited for first light.
It wasn't long till we heard the first hen give a few soft yelps. Lucas answered her to let them know we were there. As it slowly got light, we heard pheasants crowing out across the river bottom. The sky was clear and the temperature was cool. A beautiful sunrise along the Cedar River bottom.
After a back and forth between the hen and Lucas for a while, a gobbler joined in on the conversation. Finally they started flying down about 70-80 yards from us. There was a lone Jake with 4-5 hens but, no mature Tom. Lucas tried calling them but the Jake wouldn't budge. One of the hens was ready to mate and we watched and videoed the Jake taking care of business. When they were finished all of the birds headed up the draw next to them. As soon as they were well out of sight, we picked up everything and headed up a draw that paralleled the one they were in. We reached a gap in the fence at the top of the hill where Dave had taken a nice Tom the year before. This is a natural spot for the turkeys to cross into another pasture where they go to feed. We set up just to the side of the gap in the shadow of a cedar tree. We had been there maybe 15 minutes and were busy watching the draw the turkeys were coming up when Lucas whispered "Don't move". There were 8-10 turkeys coming straight toward the gap from the draw we had just sneaked through. I slowly turned the camera on them while Dave and Lucas very slowly repositioned. At this time the turkeys were about 45 yards away. We stayed motionless and watched them as they fed closer. One of the hens came through the gap and was only about 5 yards from us. She got nervous and walked back through the gap clucking. There were 4-5 Jake's and no toms in the group. Dave shot the closest Jake at 18 yards and then Lucas stood up and shot another one as they were starting to run away.
Here is a picture of the draw they came from.
Here is a picture of Dave on the left, me in the middle and Lucas with their birds.
Here is a picture of the Cedar River. I managed to catch some geese coming in to land on the water.
Here's another picture of the Cedar River.
On the way back to the truck, Lucas chased this snake into a cedar bush. We don't know what kind of snake it is, but it sure is cool looking.
Here is another picture of some of the country we were hunting.
I didn't get a turkey permit. I was going to run the camera for Dave and Lucas because my time was coming later in the day when we started shooting prairie dogs. It was time to warm up the .204's. We spent the rest of that day and the next one shooting dogs.
It was a fun time by all and looking forward to doing it again next year.