Opening Morning Ohio Heavy Weight Down for the Count!!

I went to my buddy’s Mom’s woods Friday afternoon & set-up a blind at the far end. This is the woods that was timbered last year & where I had to get in this summer with a chain saw & cut a 4-wheeler path from the north side to the south. I placed the blind facing south with a swamp to by back. It looked like a real good area with a large open space where I though birds might come if it was raining. As it turned out, it was a great spot.

Looking from the blind south. The dekes were sat at about 25 yards just past the branch laying on the ground on the left.


The swamp behind the blind.


The swamp behind & to the left of the blind.



Looking north towards the blind from where I set the dekes.




There was a lot of rain & high winds last night & I wasn’t sure if I’d be going out. When I got up at 4:40, the wind was strong but it wasn’t raining & in the mid-50s. I left the house at 5 & was in the woods ready to go at 5:25. The wind was screaming & the spring peepers were sounding off in the swamp. About 20 minutes after I got there, I heard something hit the water behind me with a big splash & then heard some more splashing that sounded like something walking. I thought that, if I was hunting in a spot like this in Florida, it was probably a gator & I would have been heading south at top speed. I know turkeys will roost about water for safety but have never seen nor heard of 1 flying down into the water. I figured it was probably a coon. A few minutes later, I heard something plop into the water which could have been a bird relieving itself. Nothing else.

I didn’t call until shortly after 6 using a Primos Dome mouth call. I tree yelped about every 15 minutes with absolutely nothing heard except a woodpecker that seemed to be responding. Of course, if there were gobbles any distance from me, I probably wouldn’t have heard them anyway. At 7:15, I pulled out the Mike Lapp traveling call & sent out a few yelps & then some cutts from the raspy side followed by the same from the sweet side. I put the call back in it’s holster, tucked it back into my jacket, &, as I zipped up, I heard a yelp close to the dekes. Then 3-4 more yelps followed by a single gobble that sounded like the bird was a long ways away. I had moved my gun into a more suitable position in case a gobbler showed up. Then a hen walked into the dekes followed by 2 more then a flock with a gobbler in full strut running in. At 7:15, I sent a load of Federal #7 Pixie Dust into his head at 25 yards. From the time I 1st heard the gobble to dropping the hammer was less than 5 minutes. I didn’t even have time for my heart to go into it’s normal race horse pace.

He had 1 ¼” spurs that had just started to curve so I think he was a 3 year old. His beard was 9 ¼” with a lot of beard rot, you can see the rusty ring part way up the beard. I have killed a lot of big birds in this woods in the 22-23 pound range but this bad boy was the heaviest weighing in at 24 pounds 10 ounces.



Where he died.









The Mike Lapp LS Traveling Call.












The pertinent parts with the Mike Lapp call.







I plan to start my great-niece, Lily early.



She wouldn’t touch the fan because it was: “Yucky!!” But she didn’t have a problem with the beard.