I had hunted this farm 3 times and every morning this Turkey would gobble across the road a few times, pitch down and walk out of my life. This morning was more of the same, when at 5 am he gobbled to start his day. I gave him until 5:10 and called to be sure that he heard me, and he roared back. We traded contact calls for a few minutes and suddenly he was on my side of the road and he brought a buddy as 2 birds gobbled to me. I let them find me and only called sparingly to contact them. They slowly made their way to me, and I could see they were 2 longbeards. When the lead bird strutted to my Jake decoy I was on his head. I hardly remember the gun going off but my aim was true, and he laid there in a heap. It was 5:45 am. The other tom ran over and thought about trying to beat him but I spooked him off because I self imposed a 2 bird limit, rather than follow the state's limit of 5 which is absurd. I was very happy, and my season was now done.
It was a perfect hunt on a wily old bird who just had to see what was on the other side of the road. Persistence, patience and luck killed this bird.