| 2007
Triple Double Grand Slam Bowhunt
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BOWHUNT
IN MISSOURI (at IMB Outfitters)
Darrin
Bradley
|
IMB
Outfitters
Darrin
Bradley's IMB Outfitters hunts Illinois, Iowa, Missouri, Nebraska,
Kansas and has over 45,000 acres located in Pike County, Illinois, Southeastern
Iowa (Zone 5), Kansas, Nebraska and Northern Missouri. IMB Outfitters is
dedicated to maximizing the harvest opportunities of today's trophy
whitetail, and turkey hunter.
Darrin
provides quality portable treestands to hunt from, located in topographically
advantageous areas, such as rub lines, scrapes, funnels, food plots, and
bedding areas. IMB land tracts are privately owned and managed for trophy
buck production. With IMB a hunter may pursue trophy turkey of 3 species,
Merriam's, Eastern, and Rio or trophy whitetail deer across the Midwest.
For a free brochure visit www.imbmonsterbucks.com
or phone toll free at 866-855-7063 or Email imb@adams.net. |
Missouri Turkey Hunt:
Day 1 | Day
2 | Day 3 | Hunt Review
Third
Day - May Day !!!
Today's hunt was farther
away than before so I got up at 3:30 and Tony May picked me up at 4:00.
On the way out we drank coffee and Tony told me he had work his "Lucky
shirt" and "Lucky call." The shirt was one that he'd had for years and
it was getting a little raggedy but still brought good luck. Same thing
with the slate call he showed me.
Yesterday afternoon Tony
had set up my Double Bull blind and and we walked to it in the dark, dark.
Our hunt location was on a hill overlooking a small field. The woods around
us -- on every side -- had tall trees and medium undergrowth.
Tony waited until a couple
of gobblers had sounded off and Tony burnt the end of his wooden striker
and went to work on his "lucky" slate. The gobblers liked it. They had
us surrounded and there were a bunch of them out there, more than 20 identifiable
gobblers in the 360 degrees around us.
While the gobblers will still
hammering a hen flew into the field down hill from us at 6:16. Three more
joined the hen and even though the daylight was not real good my camera
managed a picture. Four more hens joined the group and they meandered out
of sight.
A gobbler with a hen was
next at 6:32. They were on the move.
A group of 4 jakes came
out of the woods at 6:56 and looked in our direction. We didn't give them
any encouragement and they couldn't see my jake decoy so when 5 hens came
into the field they rushed over to them. The hens were not interested and
they went back into the woods. The jakes followed them anyway.
Two more jakes entered the
field from the opposite direction at 7:26 and looked all around.
At the same time other Gobblers
were still sounding off from the woods around us and Tony worked them like
the master caller he is. Then a deep gobble about 200 yards down hill from
us sounded and two more deep gobbles kicked in on the tail end. "That's
what we're looking for," whispered Tony and he picked up his "lucky call"
and stood up in the blind. He held the call out at arm's length and gave
it to them.
The next gobbles were loud
and only 50 yards or so. Three different big gobblers were letting the
sound of Tony May's lucky call know they were on the way.
Four red heads took shape
in the woods near us and the lead gobbler stepped into the field 15 yards
to our left. It had it's eye on my Calley Morris jake and blew up into
full strut in stride and kept walking to the decoy. This was a monster
gobbler with a thick beard that hung down past his knees. And spurs that
were daggers. I drew my BowTech Guardian and put my pin on the gobbler's
vitals. My shot looked high but the monster tom jumped 6 feet into the
air and landed on my jake decoy, knocking it down. His wings continued
to flail wildly and loudly as he flopped around in front of us. I knocked
another arrow.
The 3 other gobblers were
monster class longbeards too and they stopped and watched. The flopping
gobbler hit the ground to the left of the blind, a place where I cold not
shoot, now that I was ready to do it. Its wings were spread out and it
was not moving. Tony and I were wide eyed. "You got him." Tony said.
And the gobbler suddenly
stood up and walked into the woods ... as if nothing had happened.
My Grim Reaper had a little
meat on one of the 3 blades. There was not a spec of blood anywhere on
the arrow. The gobbler was not to be found, and we looked hard and long
just to be sure. My guess is that the gobble thought the jake decoy attached
him and fueled by the fact that he landed on the decoy and then knocked
it over he must have thought he was in a fight. And the winner too.
Tony's lucky shirt and lucky
call did their job. A song goes "sometimes you're the bat, sometimes you're
the ball," and today, right when it looked like I was the bat, I got to
be the ball. Sure I'm disappointed in myself, but I wouldn't trade anything
for being there as Tony May worked those gobblers in to us.
Tony May loves turkey
hunting. He says his style of hunting and calling is "old school", meaning
getting out in the woods and figuring it out where it is happening. His
turkey calling is different than anyone I've ever hunted with, he relies
mostly on his exceptional slate work and his own style. He didn't learn
from other callers, he learned by listening to wild turkeys for hundreds
of hours. Somehow he singles out a gobbler's interest and makes that gobbler
know the calling is just for him.
That's me (Robert Hoague)
on the left and my new turkey hunting buddy Tony May (of IMB Outfitters)
on the right. |
