Turkey Hunt for the Record Books

Longtime hunting buddy, Eric Lawler, and I set a goal for this turkey season. The goal was to harvest a double, meaning each of us would take a mature longbeard together in the same setup. This is not a new goal, however it is a hard task to accomplish and the probability of it happening is very low.  Nonetheless, we still have our group of guys that roll in for the opening weekend of the season each year. Aside from harvesting birds, our other goal is to have a good time, the probability of which is much higher! With all the boys accounted for, there was plenty of time to get out in the woods and roost some birds.  While making the rounds through our properties scouting for potential toms, we all ogled in amazement over a Facebook photo of a bird shot on opening day in Herkimer County, NY that sported a quadruple beard. Little did we know how epic our 2018 New York turkey season would become and that we would be ogling over our own photos soon enough.

After putting multiple mature longbeards to bed that night, the anticipation for the next morning was high. Two groups of us set out to brave the high winds of opening Saturday. The normal coffee ritual took place around 4:15 A.M. and we walked into our setup by 4:40 A.M. Eric and I were looking to set up approximately 150 yards off the suspected roosting area since we didn’t know which specific trees the longbeards flew up into the prior evening. From past experiences in the area, we were quite confident they would pitch down and naturally work their way past our location to get out to the known morning strut zones.  As we traversed the edge of the woodlot looking for the perfect tree to lean up against, we passed by two giant concrete culvert sections. We both stopped and looked at them, then looked at one another. Instantly we knew what the other was thinking. If we could roll one of the culverts out just a bit, we could sit right down between the two. It was still dark enough to pull off a move like this without getting busted, and that is just what we did. It was the perfect concealment of a makeshift stone bunker. We were all settled in by 5 A.M., just waiting on that first grey light to begin to poke through the eastern horizon. We joked around about how the absurdness of sitting between these two giant pipes could quite possibly be the most comfortable setup we had ever been in. Shortly thereafter, the first gobble erupted from exactly where we thought it would come from, then another slightly farther out. At 5:14 A.M., Eric looked over to me and says, “Hey, one just pitched down into the field already!” All I could think was, “Wow! It’s practically still black out”! Then, 2 minutes later the other bird crashed down through the canopy of budding limbs and into the field. Both birds were gobbling to every call but just out of sight over a roll in the terrain. After 10 minutes or so, rather than working in our direction, they went into an open hardwood flat and acquired a severe case of lockjaw. How dare they! We sat tight for some time only to have a coyote come through and send everything in the vicinity scattering, including the birds.  Best to abort this mission and head to another location.

After fueling up on some fresh Dunkin’ Donuts coffee, we parked the truck in a tractor path, shed a few layers and were back out to run and gun some ridgelines and pastures and see what we could stir up. Not long into our next adventure we found a group of 3 longbeards completely preoccupied with a single hen. We called and they would gobble time and time again, but they stood stern and were reluctant to move even an inch.

To pull these birds away from the hen was an impossible task that had us stuck in a permanent stalemate 150 yards away. Belly crawling like a pair of reconnaissance soldiers, we made our way closer, inch by inch. Dirty knees, pricker laden hands, sore elbows, and an adequate number of ticks later, we had closed the distance, undetected by 4 pairs of keen eyes, to only 60 yards. We decided to set up lying on the ground, as the cover was far too sparse to risk advancing any farther. A few soft calls on the slate again elicited more gobbles but the birds still wouldn’t budge. They were all locked hard onto the hen that was just milling around an old apple tree, pecking at the ground. Then one of the tom’s broke off from the group and closed the distance to within 30 or 35 yards but the other two birds remained out around the 50 yard mark. Possibly in range of a 10 gauge load of Federal Heavyweight, but a little too far for comfort, we decided it wasn’t worth the risk of wounding a gobbler. My eyes shifted off the close longbeard for a second to shoot Eric a glance, silently giving him the go ahead to take the brid. My glance was immediately met with the slightest head shake of disapproval. Our goal was “Double” or nothing and we both respected that fact.

All the birds ended up eventually working off over the hill, so we threw in the towel for the day and headed for the truck. It truly was a great and memorable hunt even if the ultimate goal was not achieved and not a single bird was harvested. To us, that fact didn’t matter at all.

Sunday morning found us on the same property as the previous morning. We had planned on going back to our culvert pipe setup again, mostly because it was just so darn comfortable! However upon arriving to our pair of pipes well before first light, we could see the silhouette of a turkey directly above them. We had amazing cover and camouflage from every direction except from above. We knew, without question, that when that bird woke up we would instantly be picked off. A little disheartened that we could not take advantage of the prior days blind, we continued down the edge of the timber, gaining yards on the roosting area. We got to a spot where we felt we had a solid vantage point of the field, but this spot came with greater risk. The last thing we wanted to do was bump these birds out of the roost. We knew they would be awakening any minute, so we needed to make a decision and find a spot quickly. An old stone wall served as the cover this morning. Moving a few rocks around, we made our new spot work but it was nothing like the Lazy Boy setup from the previous morning that was only 50 yards away. The wind was a different direction, our setup was different, and our hopes were high that the gobblers pattern would also be different. They gobbled hard off the roost and stayed up in the trees for much longer this go-round. 15 seconds apart, a pair of mature longbeards glided from the cloak of the treetops and hit the ground strutting. Over the next 5 minutes or so they were joined by 5 or 6 female counterparts. After watching the show for a good half hour the entire group began to move. As suspected, the birds were moving in an entirely different direction than yesterday, however it was not the direction we had hoped. Once the last head disappeared over the crest of the hill, we knew it was time to make our move. This is where knowing the ins and outs of the terrain and having familiarity with your hunting grounds can pay huge dividends. We button hooked hard and hastily covered lots of ground, but to no avail because they had already beaten us to the punch. We slithered over a stonewall through a thick hedgerow to the edge of the corn stubble field. Somewhere along the line, the flock gained another longbeard and a few more hens. We watched helplessly from our vantage point about 200 yards above as they worked farther and farther out into the basin of a giant 30 acre field. The jig was up and we knew it. There was no getting around them to setup at another location. Instead, we hung are heads again, accepted the defeat, backed out, and headed to a different property a few miles away.

We employed the run and gun tactic Sunday morning as well. As we parked the truck, adorned our gear and loaded our guns we didn’t have the slightest idea of what was about to happen. Walking through a small clearing into the woods, we decided to jump down one ridge to take the edge off the wind a little bit.