I went Saturday and was headed to another destination but decided to stop at my grandpa's farm which I own now. I said I'd listen for a minute and go on. As soon as I opened the door a gobbler was red hot. Sounded like he was behind my home place so I moved the truck and got out as soon as I could. He was right where I left. Got as close as I could and scared the hen out of the tree. He gobbled still for thirty minutes, and I knew I had him. But he flew down and gobbled going away, apparently to the hen. He finally shut up when he found her. I guessed he was going to a hay field. Went there but no luck. So I decided I would come back late morning after the hen(s) left him.
About 11 my phone rang with a number I did not know. A notorious turkey hunter told me the gobbler was in the bigger hay field with a hen, and wanted to know if he and his grandson, a distant relative could try to kill him. What bad luck. If I had not answered that call. If I had not left there. Anyway how do you turn down a fifteen year old turkey hunter. I made sure he was going to let his grandson shoot and gave permission. It was an easy sneak since the gobbler was next to the interstate highway and noise sneaking up close would not be a factor. Just what I had planned to do.
The phone rang after hunting time ended and the grandpa said the young hunter wanted to talk to me. He thanked me for letting him kill my ace in the hole gobbler I had been saving all spring season. The bird weighed twenty-one pounds! He'll never forget that one as it only took a few calls and the bird came right into him. That could have been me but better for a fifteen year old. I'm at the end of my hunting but he is just beginning and is a good kid and a die-hard hunter already. He said it was forty yards with his Benelli Black Eagle. His second bird for the year and his first one was reported to me to be a twenty-six pounder!
