Funniest turkey hunting stories....

[GunnerJon]

Thought I would start a post about your funniest turkey hunting stories. I always love a good turk story. Here's mine:
A few years ago, I was hunting with a buddy of mine on his farm trying to get his first bird. I had treed a bird the night before as he hunted with another friend and knew exactly where the big tom was going to fly down. I was pretty pumped as I told him that night where the bird was. The next morning we woke to a pretty nasty thunderstorm, but with some determination (and stupidity) we went out into the pitch dark. As we were getting out of the truck we realized we had forgotten our flashlights so we had to use the lightning flashes to sprint out into the CRP ridge we had to cross. Between flashes we had to slowly stumble around feeling for anything. Through the course of the field we managed to get tangled in the ONLY 2 pieces of sumac brush in the whole field before finding the ravine edge. We walked along the ravine and soon came to some barbed wire fences that were NOT supposed to be there. We crossed them anyway....which took us around 15 minutes in the rain and blackness. Soon we were really close to the treed bird so we needed to set up.....but there were NO TREES TO SET UP ON. All the trees were in 2 t-joining ravines....I had failed to see that while watching the bird tree the night before from a ridge over. So, we laid on the ground on a terrace and waited for the bird....shaking and shivering. It got lighter and the bird plopped down within 40 yards of us, and Eric harvested his first bird.....a nice 24 lb'er with big hooks and a 10.5" beard. It was awesome. On our walk out we realized that the 2 sections of fence we crossed were only about 10 foot sections coming out of the ravine which ended and disappeared in the grass.....all we would have had to do was step around it! Man, did we have a good laugh!
There is my story....sorry it is so long.

 

[muddy]

Cool story! I gotta pretty good one too. Last year I told a friend that I'd guarantee him a turkey if he bought a tag and came down from school for a weekend. Anyway, I get him set up on a bird that I practically knew by name (the pine ridge tom) and told him to just wait, by 6:45 or so he'd come strutting along the pines and we'd be finished. Yeah, right. Everything went exactly as planned other than my buddy was shaking so hard when the ol' boy showed up he couldn't get the gun safety off!! The tom strutted right behind me and gobbled his head off!! Eventually the bird strutted off and we picked up shop and moved to the "lonely cornfield tom" area. This bird I had observed several times in a big picked cornfield, he would gobble, get his hens to come to him, and then stay in the field. Well, we got set up and sure enough he was out there with a friend. I gave a few yelps, had a double gobble and here he came. The bird got to 60 yards when suddenly 3 hens busted out of the edge of the field and started running right at our decoys! The toms spooked and walked off while the stupid hens stood there looking at the decoys. Strike 2. On the way back to the vehicle I told my buddy that I was sorry I couldn't deliver and that I had to leave at 11, but we'd try one more spot. At that time I told him "If we could just get a gobble that'd.....GOBBBLEOBBLEOBBLE....help." I told him to follow me and took off on a jog. We got set up and I yelped 3 times and had the loudest gobble i've ever heard. About 30 seconds later Jason says, "there he is" and I told him to take off his safety. CLICK. I yelped to cover it up and tell him, "he's pretty far wait for him to get to 30...BOOOOM!!...yards" The birds drops and starts running so I pull a Carl Lewis and take off. I eventually chase the bird off the bluff and he flies off. DAMMIT! Jason puffs up to me and says "Did I get him?" I told him what happened and said let's go try another place. We started walking back to the trees when we hear "flapflapflapflapflap" in the leaves. We run up and there's his first tom laying there under the multiflower rose bush that he rolled under when he dropped him. 2 birds came in, we each saw different birds and when he recovered from the kick of the gun the one bird was out of sight and the other was hauling a**. We had a good laugh, shook hands, and hauled our own butts out since I had to get to work!! Sorry so long but it's one of my favorite hunts ever.

 

[MO-Antlertips]

Heres mine...

I love to turkey hunt, and I love to call in birds for other people even more. A few years ago, I took a buddy up on the top of a ridge and and we set up on an old logging road. Perfect set-up, and on our first set up, a jake and a hen come walking down the road, towards our decoys which are 25-30 yards out in front.

My friend had told me earlier, that if a jake came in, he would shoot. So, as the bird is walking towards us, I know what is going to happen.

Folks, we are sitting at the base of the same large oak tree, my friend to my right, the incoming turkeys coming in at about 12 o'clock to me, about 10 o'clock to him. Out of the corner of my eye I see the end of his gun barrel, which is pretty close to my ear.

Now, I have a delima....and the bottom line is there was one dead jake, and my right ear rang for two days!! I should have gone ahead and covered my ear, and risk spooking the jake. I'm pretty sure I could have called him in another bird, maybe even a longbeard.

There was a lot of discussion about the shot later, most of which was light-hearted. Although the gun was pointed in a safe direction downfield, and I was NEVER put in his line of sight, I highly recommed being mindful not only of your target downrange, but also the location of the muzzle of the shotgun in relation to your hunting buddies ears!!

(ear's ringin') MO

 

[Old Buck]

This story happened over 20 years ago in Arkansas on my first turkey hunt. I ran into some locals who invited my to join their camp. I was hunting with a bow and knew next to nothing about turkey hunting so I think they took pity on me. They were a fun bunch of guys who really enjoy the annual gathering.

At the usual lunch meeting one day we were all taking turns telling how our morning hunts had gone when we noticed one of the old pros who was first back in camp wasn't saying much. With a little pressure we finally got the story out of him.

Seems as he walked in the dark to a hot roost area he had to stop to answer natures call, the number two variety. After finishing in the dark he stood up pulling up his camo coveralls but as he brought them over his shoulders in he rapidly figured out he'd made a miscalculation during the squat and discharge faze of the operation. Suffice it to say that the results pretty much ended his enthusiasm for hunting that morning.

Since then I've always tried to be very careful when answering natures call in the woods, especially when doing so in the dark.

Old Buck

 

[Ghost]

Well here goes mine.....

I still get my tape out once in awhile and view my funiest turkey hunting story as I was the video man on this outting.

My long time hunting friend and I were going to set up a blind and a nice spread of decoys to try and capture a spring bow hunt on film. We were all set up and waiting for the morning music to start. Not long after daybreak the cattle pasture was full of birds just as planned. Five mature gobblers were all in a circle strutting to be the BOSS Gobbler. Our calling was not doing much good since the real hens were plentiful. Eventually, one of the lesser Toms was ran off by the big boy and decided to make his way toward our decoys. He came right into the decoys and I filmed waiting to hear the release of the bow. Shot one, bird jumped into the air and came straight down going back into full strut like nothing had happened. Shot two, right through the tail fan and the bird becomes alarmed and starts walking out of range.

Now, the funny part..... my friend decides to go collect his arrows because the pasture is still full of stutt'n Toms. I film him crawling around on his hands and knees looking for his arrows in the wet grass around the decoys. I would zoom out every now and then filming the Gobblers still in the pasture and then zoom in to my buddy desperately searching for his arrows.

 

[dewclaw]

I was about to be married so I decided for my bachelor party I would round up some buddies to do some bowhunting for turkeys in Nebraska. A friend and I shared a blind the first morning and he brought a video recorder along, so we agreed that he would take first crack at shooting and I would video him. He ends up shooting a big tom right off the bat. Later that afternoon we went back out and set up about 1/4 mile from where he took his tom in the morning. We got set up and started some calling and soon enough we had some responding and getting closer. It sounded like a number of different toms gobbling back at us. The first ones came into view and were good sized toms, they came in front of the double bull blind at about 15yds. I got to full draw and had the pin on one of them, after a few seconds my buddy says, "what are you waiting for, shoot!" I figured, there's more coming and the biggest ones will be at the rear and that we should get some good footage before I shoot. I let down on the bow and wait for the rest of them to come into view. Here they come, single file and they are all jakes and hens, damn! I kept looking back to the end of the line and no big toms. I figured I better get something for my first bird with a bow, so here's a jake at 7yds right in front of us. I get to full draw and let him have it, perfect hit and hit does the crappie flop right there. Then another jake comes running over and gets on top of him and I zip that one off of the dead one. All on film, ya had to be there. By the way, it is legal and I did have (2) tags on me at the time of harvest. They weren't huge birds like I had dreamed of, but none the less I will never forget it. Heading out there in April for the annual turkey extravaganza-what a blast! Good luck to all

 

[Rackaddict]

My story wasn't funny to me at the time but I shake my head a get a laugh out of it now.

I had set up on a long field where I had seen Turkeys several times before. I was trying it with a bow for the first time. I tucked myself away in the brush and had called from time to time with no response. I was about to call it a morning and try it somewhere else when I heard a gobble. I looked out across the field and saw 7 red heads poking up out of the grass. I looked through my rangefinder and they were 190 yards away. I gave the best "sexy hen" yelp I could muster up and looked down to pickup my bow. The time it took me to pick my bow up and look up they had closed the distance to about 50 yards and still running. Geez! Those things are fast! I had a panic attack and got all flustered and there they were, one nice big tom, full strut, right in front of my decoy facing me and 6 jakes running around like there tails were on fire. My decoy was only 15 yards from me and somehow I got my bow drawn and hadn't spooked a bird! I anchor my pinsight right in the middle of his chest and just when I'm ready to let it rip I see that long ol' beard hanging there. I start to think that I might cut his beard off so I move my pin off to the right of the full strut tom and let it go! Immediatley I realize the error of my ways and that the physical dimensions of a turkeys body size are much smaller than it appears to be in full strut.

I picked up my two "Trophy Feathers" and went home a wiser man.

 

[dewclaw]

rackaddict, awesome story! I used to think turkey hunting was gay. Now I have a whole new outlook on those warry birds. I have strickly bowhunted whitetails for a dozen years or so and turkeys have now come to rival the feelings I get from whitetails. You know how everybody says, Oh you got "Buck Fever"? I now get that with turkey's. I still get that feeling when in a stand for deer, and when I no longer do, I know it's time to hang it up. But now I have another quarry that comes close to my first obsession. If they could smell as well as a deer or even close, they would be about the hardest game to hunt, especially with a stick and string. Good luck bud and talk at ya later.

 

[bowmaker]

Two years ago I talked a good friend into coming down and try turkey hunting for the first time. We hunted together for five mornings, and he hunted the rest of the days by him self. We had birds gobbling all arround us most mornings but just couldn't get them to come in, or get very close to them. His season and time ran out and the next morning after he left, two hens and a jake walked across our front yard within 20 feet of the house. I managed to video them with a comentary to Merle telling him what he had missed, and how timing is so critical in turkey hunting.