With schedules coordinated and new permission attained I had my cousin joel out to chase some Turkeys with me. Joel uses a Barnett cross bow now for a few years and I was excited to watch him dart a big Gobb.
A few days prior I set out with my matthews and my brother lincoln on the call to get my bow bird. We had watched roughly 15 birds roost in some trees next to a slough the night before and set up about 200 yards away across and a field. Morning came and we were greeted with 25 mph winds, mist, and fog. I figured the birds would have to do most of the work for us this morning. 45 minutes in and the birds had not made much progress. Some purrs and cluck were answered by a few old raspy hens with no gobbles from the Toms. We were both looking at the group of birds when all of a sudden from the right behind a rw of bails we had 2 gobblers on a dead sprint headed for my DSD jake. The next thing u know the decoy is spinning like a pinwheel and I’m at full draw. The big Gobb stopped long enough for a shot and my arrow hit him right in the wing joint. A few steps and he was down, my first bow bird. What a rush, and the best part we snuck away for the morning the rest of the flock unknowing to our presence.
Fast forward a few days and me and joel are in the same area new setup with a different wind and roost location and birds broken up more. After the entire flock gave is the slip the day before we were running more decoys and had moved our setup. The birds closed from 200 to 50 the way they needed to but then threatened to split up and head into another crop field. I gave a few irritated putts on the slate and the lead hen answered back. She started responding and basically it was an “on me flying v demolition team right into the turkeys. All the birds were worked up and I was trying to direct Joel to wait for the long beard in the back. He eventually split the crowd and presented a great a facing away shot. At 415 fps the arrow passed completely through and Joel Gobbler was dead befor he even hit the ground. Two bow birds down and a few days to chase walleyes. Helping Joel get his first bird was an neat experience and sometimes it’s just as fun to run the call as it is to pull the trigger or drop the release. Few tags left and the action is really heating up. QB
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