Saturday, April 27, 2013:
I got the blind setup on the eastern edge of the freshly tilled bottom field and was setting out my DSD flock when a gobble sounded off in the woodlot behind the blind. “Finally setup in the right spot” I thought to myself as I finished setting out the Jake decoy and started up the GoPro “decoy view” camera. I hustled to throw everything into the blind and get my gear ready for the sun to rise. 
By this time the gobbler was sounding off every couple of minutes until about 7AM when he went completely silent. I knew he was on the ground and must have had a few hens with him.
Just before 8AM I looked out of the corner of my blind to the south and caught a glance of a bird working the field roughly 80 yards away. I pulled up my binoculars and noticed it was a lone hen. For the past 3 years now, I’ve seen this hen working the bottom field. She doesn’t make a sound, and hardly even acknowledges you even exist when you make a call. She fed alone for nearly an hour before disappearing around a bend in the field. Throughout the next hour, she would pop out into and out of view before finally leaving for a good hour or so.
I was starting to get a little bored, so I pulled out my phone to get in a few games of Angry Birds. After about another hour, I glanced out of the corner of the blind again and noticed the hen was back. This time a big strutter was right on her heels! I made a few yelps on my Roadblock glass call, but to no avail as they moved off behind the elbow in the field and out of sight one more time. He was with the lone hen I had seen earlier, and I knew he wouldn’t leave her so I waited them out.
I gave them about an hour before grabbing a Dead End Game Calls Shipwreck mouth diaphragm and giving out a few excited cuts and yelps. I hardly had time to take the call out of my mouth and set it on my cameras tripod before I see the gobbler turn the corner in the field and pop up in full strut looking my direction. He came out of strut 2-3 times, each time making it about 10 yards closer. 
I pulled on the decoy string of my DSD feeding hen decoy to give a little movement in my decoy spread and that sealed the deal.
He broke strut and ran the remaining 60 yards with a full head of steam right to the Jake decoy. After brushing against, and knocking the decoy down, he repeatedly pecked the Jake’s head as I came to full draw and settled the top pin of my Hunter Hoggit on the back of his neck.
The red Firenock lit arrow found its mark and folded the gobbler right in his tracks.
Just like that, bird number 2 for the year was on the ground! With 3 different SELFILMED angles, this hunt is one you surely aren’t going to want to miss.
Stay tuned to SELFILMED for the Hunt Vid to be shown soon!
I still have another Ohio tag to fill and will be heading out to Nebraska for our annual Merriam’s turkey hunt next week. Lord willing, I’ll be successful again and be putting more food on the table!
Brett’s Gear:
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