Finally Scored a Bird in LA

[Gasper Master]

I have been hunting them hard for the last three years and have been unable to score on a LA bird. My season started out great with lots of gobbling, calling one in for my boss, and a botched opportunity. The last two weeks have been terrible and zero gobbles. Crawl79 and I hunted all season together last year and before this weekend, were yet to hunt together. We joked that if we hunted together, we may have some luck, and yesterday we did.

The morning started out terrible. We went to my lease and went to two different spots where i have been on birds this season and heard no gobbles and there was no sign. Instead of trying to find something else there, we hit the road for Hunting Spot #2.

Got there a little after 8, and found some fresh sign. We knew the birds were in the area. Crawl79 and I decided to split up around 9 and set up for an hour. I was set up in some open pines that were burnt two weeks ago. I was calling on my Flextone Tramp Stamp slate call every 10 mins or so, throwing out some soft clucks and yelps. It was 9:45 and I was yet to hear or see anything. I was about try some aggressive calling to see if I could fire something up, but saw i still had 15 minutes left before our "1 hour hunt" was going to end, lol. I decided on the soft clucks and yelps again. I sent out a few calls with the slate, nothing. So,I decided to switch it up and threw in a Flextone Big Sexy Diaphragm right after, and threw some more clucks and purrs. I heard one gobble right away from about 200yds. It shocked the crap out of me. I knew it was game on. I turned toward him and got situated. I waited five minutes and threw some soft clucks and purrs at him. Silence. My heart dropped and my mind started racing. 30 seconds later, bam, he gobbled!!! Five minutes later i catch movement 100yds out. There he is making his way through the pines. He stops at about 70yds and goes into full strut!!! He is slowly making his way towards me. When he goes behind a big pine at 40yds, i move my gun and am on him. He makes his way into 25yds, and I let the 870 roar!!! He weighed in at 20.5lbs, had a 9.5" beard, and 1 1/16" spurs.

I am not only very thankful to have finally scored this season, but also thankful to have shared it with my bud Crawl79. Although we didn't get to hunt much together this season, we were always strategizing, bouncing ideas off of each other, and sharing stories.