The alarm went off at 4:30, but I think I was already up. Chris and his family had come up from Birmingham Alabama the night before for the youth hunt. I met Chris at Auburn and it was one of those instant friendships that you know will last a lifetime. Careers took us our separate ways at graduation, but we still tried to get together to hunt a few times each year. Smith, Chris' son had finally turned six and could hunt the Tennessee youth hunt. We had been planning the trip for a year with weekly discussions about shotguns, shells, and everything else.
As we pulled out of the drive, I put on a CD of Tom Kelly reading "First Time" from his book Dealers Choice. Looking back it might have been a little presumptuous of me, but I like my odds on the youth hunt. It seemed like the perfect way to start the morning, especially with the potential of Smith killing his first turkey. We started out at the zoo, and it was great to see Smith's face when all those gobblers started firing off. We popped the blind up where I had been seeing the birds fly down and of course they flew down the other direction. Later, the landowner told us "this is the least number of turkeys I have seen all year".......figures. We did see a lot of turkeys, they were just too far and had too many hens to be interested in us. We tried the moo cow and everything....no luck.
Then we hit the road checking other farms and it was slim pickins everywhere. I last stop by a small lease near the house on the way back for lunch to see the girls and there they are in the field. We looped around to get in front of them and set up to call. They answered back but wouldn't come. After about 45 min we decided to get a closer look and crawled up a low spot to peek over the hill. We got up between a fallen tree and could see the birds in a lower field.
There were 6-8 strutters and several hens and jakes, We tried calling again, but nothing doin. We did get to watch a Tom breed a hen...something I had never seen in the in the woods. They started to ease away and we decided to move again. Crawled back out, made a big loop to try to get in front...crawl a little closer....and a little more...and a little more. We finally got to within about 75 yards and they just wouldn't cooperate...so we thought. Then We see a White head pop up over the rise in the field about 35 yards. Kill em now is what I was thinking, but the urgency in "now" is not understood by 6 year olds and we had to let the moment pass.
At this point I had all I could stand. Jesse always said "if you ain't messin up you ain't tryin nothing", and we were about to make something happen, or mess up. I belly crawled to the crest of the hill and could see all the birds. Still 6-8 strutters and all the rest of the clan. We decided if we could get around on their level, and to the edge of the field we would be in range. We did get around them and almost to the edge when I heard "PUT...PUT....PUT!!! A turkey hunters worst nightmare. It was now or never and I told Smith to raise up and pick him one out and shoot him. It was a little brushy, I was helping him hold the gun, Chris was crawling up behind us whispering as loud as he could "what's going on...why ain't he pulling the trigger?" and poor ole Smith is trying to aim at a turkey. Through all the commotion he picks one out and pulls the trigger. When Chris and I saw one flopping we were ecstatic! All Chris could say was "that boy is 6 years old...I can't believe he killed that turkey". We had to go back and gather up vests, and calls, and other things that were lost in the pursuit. Smith wanted to stay with his bird and so we left him for a minute to get our things. When we rounded the corner and could see where he was, he was just sitting there looking at his trophy...he had never taken his eyes off of it. There is really no telling what was going through Smith's mind. As Colonel Tom said in his story this morning...6 year old boys aren't put here to understand, there put here to enjoy. After a lot of celebrating and picture taking, we headed back to the house. There is no doubt this hunt will go down as one of the best in a lifetime of hunts...I'm so glad I got to be a part of it.
Comments