Swing and a miss this morning

Still not totally sure how I missed, LOL. Haven't missed one in many many years but I guess the streak had to end sometime.

Heard Zero gobbles this morning. With it raining last evening and lightly this morning I set up on the edge of a field. Set out my DSD decoy at about 25 yds. At 0635 I glance to my right and 3 hens enter the field 125 yds away. They could not see my decoy due to how the field rolls. 40 yds behind them strutter emerges. The hens feed a semi circle around me and when they reach a point where they could see my decoy they ran right down to it. The lead hen and another fan out and beging purring aggressively while pecking at the decoy. The gobbler charges right in when this goes on.

He's now standing 3 feet from my decoy, partially fanned out, taking all the action in.
The bad, my gun was down. They had me pinned the whole time. I have killed many gobblers by simply raising, mounting, and shooting..........not today.

I waited for the hens to clear the gobbler, raised, mounted, and fired which resulted in a clean miss. The bird did raise his head all the way up, and turn slightly left, when I raised. I'm figuring I shot to the right of his head / neck.

He ran straight off with one hen in tow. The other 2 hens ran to my right. I stood up and looked at my watch, 0700 hrs.

Had to come home to get the kiddo ready and take her to pre-school. Gonna head back out to another area while she is in school.

Thanks for listening and now I'm gonna go puke. That bird should have been what Bin Laden is......

Heard one gobble on the roost. Set up decoys in the same field I was at on saturday. Called in 4 jakes that came out into the field at 12 feet to my right. Not yards, FEET. passed on all of them as I am not wanting to shoot a jake. A little bit later a hen came in with another jake with her but never came to the field. A good morning even though it was a heavy mist the whole time.

Nice job!! Congrats

Had I not whacked him 2 days later I would certainly have been deserving of the award. Heck, I still may accept it. No way I should have missed him the first time.
 
Had number 2 in a tree 60 yds away this morning. Watched him last night for over an hour. Had a hen with him last night, still did this morning, ALL morning. Wish he'd get busy so he comes a lookin for me. Maybe Monday.
 
My kill hunt Wednesday was kinda cool. Set up on a large field, saw nothing. Only heard a few gobbles, nothing close. One bird gobbled one time across the road from the field where I missed Monday. The bird I missed ran that way after my blunder. I wondered if that could be him......
 
So, 0700 rolls around and I decide to head to another area. I slowly worked my way back to the field where my truck is parked. At 100 yds from the corner I slip my facemask on, just in case there are birds in the field. At 50 yds I get stopped in my tracks by a gobble, then another a few seconds later. It was close, I concluded it was in the field and on the edge I walk down to get back to my truck. I slowly turn around to look for a tree, then back to again look the field over. Holy crap batman, there are birds right at the corner 50 yds away. I hit the dirt slowly, crawled 10 feet, got my decoy out and stuck it on the path, then crawled 40 feet to a tree. As I slowly sit up I can see a hen in the field, then another, then they walk out of sight. I softly clucked and yelped and one answered right back. 15 seconds later, here they come, right at me. 15 seconds after that I see strutter enter the woods and on the path. He's zeroed in on my decoy. The hens walked to 20 yds off to my left, the strutter continued down the path. Fortunately, I was ready this time, gun up and locked on. He stepped behind a tree and when he emerged I delivered the blow at 30 yds. Suprisingly, he only had an 8 inch beard, but awesome hooks with black pointed tips. Both were 1.25 inches. It appears that he lost some beard length this winter, the end of the beard was brownish from freezing. It was a cool hunt that lasted like 10 minutes, maybe less. Like I said, right place, right time.

Never heard that. I had a PAGC biologist tell me that brown could indicate loss from being frozen then breaking off. Made sense to me since I have seen gobblers with ice the size of a golf ball on their beards in Winter when the snow was high.

Bird number 2 hit the dirt this morning at 0550 hrs, earliest bird I've ever killed. In a nutshell, he was roosted 50 yds away, flew down at 0545, and I killed him in full strut at my decoy, 15 yds, 5 minutes after fly down.
 
He gobbled at 0530 as I was slowly working my way to a hidden field, stopped me dead in my tracks. I had hens all around me and I basically got a little lucky in that I got between him and the hens. I could hear them softly clucking and I joined in. They were flying down after him and I could hear them walking in the leaves behind me. The gobbler got to me before them and I shot him at 15 yds when he strutted up to my decoy. Sometimes it pays to be a little lucky!
 
Large body bird, maybe 22-23 lbs, 9 inch beard, 3/4 spurs.
 
I'm tagged out....
 
Just reported both kills online, pretty easy deal to do and far less hassle than the old report card system.
 
Good luck to all still hunting!

I may not be the Pres but my hunting buddy is, not because of misses, because on all 3 hunts in which I had shot opportunities he was supposed to be the shooter. Upon waking up those 3 mornings I checked my phone to find text messages that he wasn't going to make it.
 
He's never killed one and at this rate he never will.
 
Hed, ya had me for a minute on the 3rd place being that my name had been temporarily in for the big suck club. Wasn't sure if I'd accept it! Then it hit me, you mean the Pymie tournament last week.........thanks and it was a cool day of fishing! Couple more culls and we would have been right there for the win.