Washington 2015
Nitro, my dad, and myself all loaded up and headed west Thursday morning. Upon arrival we were greated with beautiful weather, cold beer, and sightings of over 100 deer, several turkeys, and some elk to boot. Right before darkness fell we roosted 3 gobblers and took it back to the hotel for some much needed shut eye.
Friday morning found my dad and I set up on 4 gobbling birds. It didn't take long for all of them to fly the other way with some hens and quickly end our hopes of an opening morning double. A quick drive to another location put us over looking a beautiful hillside that just looked like turkeys should be there. One quick yelp on my Buice trumpet and a bird fired off 150 away. We set up on the bend in the road and just minutes later a beautiful white tipped gobbler stepped out at 40 yards. He gobbled, dropped strut and ran up to 15 yards before going back into strut right in our face. Dad's barrel was going figure 8's as I watched the gobbler take his last steps right over dad's shoulder. I clucked, the bird gobbled, and dad crushed his first Merriam turkey mid gobble and 15 steps. It was a special moment I'll never forget.
Just minutes after Dad killed, I received a message on my phone from Andy that he too had killed a beautiful longbeard. Since I wasn't there I will let him tell the story, but I know shortly after daylight he had 3 strutters in range and crushed a fine gobbler.
Around 8:30 or so Dad and I got on another gobbler, shortly after that I missed him. That story sucks so I'm not going to focus on it. After the miss, we went back to the hotel, re-grouped, grabbed some food and struck out after more birds.
At roughly 1:00 Dad and I got a gobble from a group of birds not far off the road we were parked in. At 1:10 I pulled the trigger on my best merriam to date. He rolled up there with another gobbler and two other jakes and caught a face full at 20 yards.
10" beard,
1 1/4" spur, other broken in half
19lbs 4oz.
After killed my first bird we decided to keep on keepin on and get them while the gettin was good. At 2:00 we struck a bird at the bottom of a canyon. At 2:05 he was in full strut in front of dad's gun barrel at the long distance of 8 steps. He caught the business end of a nitro once he cleared a small tree that his head was behind. It looked like a pillow case had exploded. With that pull of the trigger dad was tagged out on day 1.
Not wanting to stop there, we kept going. The wind had really started to pick up and as we crested a hill in the truck we spotted a gobbler full strut in the road 40 yards from the truck. He was facing away from us and with the high winds I guess he never heard the truck. It was truly a blessing and we decided to take full advantage of it. I hopped out of the truck, made a big circle around him, and 10 minutes later he gobbled for the last time at 15 yards. It was a great way to finish the day and a hunt I will never forget.
Here is dad and I with our afternoon birds.
Andy ended up killing his second bird at 6:30 the second morning to finish his limit. By 10:00 we were taking group pictures and headed back to the hotel to pack. Washington is my favorite trip of the year, no questions asked. I'm blessed to get to spend that trip every year with a good friend. Taking my dad with us this year was truly icing on the cake. We finished the last eve with a fine steak dinner, and plenty of knobb creek on ice. I'm looking forward to next year.
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