Texas turkey season opened this past weekend April 4, 2009.  The Hunt Life team of Tommy Ellis, Bob Karel, Kyle Harding and I were back for another hunt with 5 Star Outfitters, Inc. in Christoval Texas.  This is our third year hunting with 5 Star and our eighth year hunting with Koby Howell owner of 5 Star.  We hunt the Rio subspecies and Texas is a target rich environment!  We arrived at the lodge on Friday afternoon and got settled in with our gear.  We enjoyed a great tenderloin steak dinner cooked on a mesquite fire and all the fixin’s prepared by our favorite cook Gerald Farris from Killeen, Texas.  Gerald has cooked for us seven of the past eight years and his cooking is over the top!  After a couple of adult beverages and stories of the recent turkey hunts we hit the sack with the anticipation of the upcoming hunt. 

We were out of the lodge on Saturday by 5:15 am.  Bob and I were hunting on the 5000 acre Middleton ranch about a twenty minute drive away.  Bob had arrived on Thursday as did Tommy, choosing the 20 hour drive versus a flight from Jacksonville for a little preseason scouting.  Bob and Koby had listened to several Turkeys gobble from their roost in the “valley” area of the ranch on Friday morning and already had a place to hunt picked out.  Tommy and Kyle were hunting the Harkey ranch where  the lodge is located.  Kyle was attempting to take a turkey with his bow while being filmed with cameraman from Dual Shot Outdoors, Chris Henry.

The weather was a warm 60° and the sky was crystal clear and the wind was blowing 15-20 mph when Koby dropped me in my favorite pasture on the ranch about thirty minutes before dawn.  I have had great success in this pasture and the anticipation of the roost gobbling was building.  Last year I heard no less than ten birds gobbling their brains our from the roost and on the ground to my calling.  I was primed and ready and so thankful to be back in Texas for another hunt.

I chose to not use a decoy because of the wind.  At dawn the wind did lay down and I was second guessing my decision.  I waited and waited and waited for that first gobble to wake up the Texas morning.  Not a sound was heard.  I called very softly then louder and louder but not a bird seemed to be in the same county with me.  I sent Koby a text of disbelief at 8:15 a.m. stating that I had not heard anything.  He told me there were several birds gobbling in the area he was scouting and said he was on the way to get me.

Koby picked me up and dropped me off on a road that ran through a cedar flat about a mile from were I was previously hunting.  The birds were gobbling in several different directions as I grabbed my gear and shotgun and headed into the flat.  I found an area that had a lot of turkey droppings and strut marks on a two rut gas line road and cut my way into the base of a cedar tree about thirty five yards off the road.  I set a hen decoy on the ground as if she was ready to breed.  The turkeys were still gobbling and they would answer my calls but would not come.  They obviously had female company.  I called pretty aggressively until 9:00 and then went to my every fifteen minute routine on the quarter hour.  I received a text message from Bob just before 10:00 stating he had not heard anything and he was bummed.  As I was going to respond to his text, I caught movement to my right.  Two longbeards were sneaking into the area silently.  They made their way down the road and were looking for the hen that had been calling to them fifteen minutes earlier.  The first gobbler stopped and I guessed he was about thirty five yards  out and fired my gun.  He dropped like a bad habit and the other bird ran down the road but stopped about sixty or seventy yards away.  I did not get up right away because I thought the other bird may come back to check out his dead compadre.  After a couple of minutes I reached for my phone to text Bob when the bird got to his feet and took off running after his buddy.  I dropped the phone and jumped up and ran after him.  He stopped at fifty or so yards and I tried to put him away but missed.  He ran into the cedars and I chased him for what seemed a couple of minutes until I found him trying to get under a tree and finished him off.  He was a three year old bird with one inch spurs and a nine inch beard.  The wacky, weird and windy hunt had begun.

Kyle just missed two birds with his bow on camera that morning.  He and Chris had some amazing film footage and a very fun hunt.

Bob and Tommy harvested good birds Saturday afternoon while Kyle and I did not score.  Sunday morning was 49° and very windy when we left the lodge.  Bob hunted a different area and I went back to the same spot that I shot the turkey the previous morning.  It was blowing 30 mph and cold when I sat down at 6:30am!  I could not use a decoy in this wind.  I did not heart a turkey at all that morning until 8:30 when a bearded hen walked up the road.  She was obviously going somewhere and I yelped softly to her after she passed by.  She was about fifty yards away and turned and walked directly to where she heard the yelp.  Right in my lap not three steps away looking for the source of the calls, ME!  She yelped and yelped, which I thought was great as she might call a big boy in.  I do not like them to get that close however for fear of getting busted.  I heard a gobble in the distance and she immediately picked up her head and headed off in the general direction of the gobble.  About fifteen minutes later I called again and I thought a jake gobbled back in front of me.  Next thing you know three birds are gobbling in front of me but I cannot see them because of a big cedar blocking my view.  They are getting closer and I still can’t see them.  A mature bird runs around the cedar and I whack him and jelly his head at 17 yards.  One bird flies off to my left and the other runs straight away from me to my right.  I swing the gun and shoot and miss two times as he heads down the road and out of range.  The tom was pretty much a twin of the bird I took yesterday.  Two birds, six shots, and I am as happy as I ever have been overcoming the most wacky and weird hunting conditions.

Kyle harvested two birds while being filmed that morning.  Bob shot two with one shot on Monday morning on film with Chris and Tommy left Sunday at noon to drive back to Jacksonville.  Thanks again to Koby and Robin Howell at 5 Star Outfitters, Inc.  for helping us “Livin the Hunt Life”

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