Staffers Chet Maxcy and Charlie Peck have been inviting me down to try for an Osceola turkey for a couple years now.  After my success last spring bowhunting for turkeys in MO and KS, I was ready this spring to take them up on it.  Winter has been hanging on here in MO, so the nice weather helped me make my mind up too!  Charlie worked to line up a few spots of private ground for me and offered to run the camera for me all week if need be.  Well…it took nearly a week, but things finally came together when 8 or 9 jakes came within a few yards of our ground blind.   They couldn’t help themselves but to check out our decoys and eventually I got a good shot at around 18 yards.  While not a longbeard, I was plenty excited to get any Osceola turkey with my bow.  A big thanks to Charlie for his effort behind the camera and also to his family for taking me in for the week!

Hunting in shorts an loving it!

As told by Chet:  After Charlie’s opening morning success, we spent the rest of that weekend and the entire second weekend trying to position ourselves on another good Osceola Gobbler.  We couldn’t catch a break the first couple days of working a particular bird.  After two days of bad luck, and watching this bird strut and gobble for his group of hens, always just out of range, we finally felt like we had him figured out.  We settled in for the afternoon hunt around 5:00pm., knowing the birds wouldn’t work back across the property line until an hour or so before dark.  At 5:30pm I did a couple lost yelps and loud clucks on the slate call to see if he could get a response.  About 10 minutes later we heard a couple gobbles from across the field, and after a few more minutes we saw the group of birds feeding under some oaks about 300 yards out.  We settled in for the wait, and hopefully an opportunity to finally get a shot at the big gobbler.   As we were watching the gobbler strut for his hens across the field, Charlie noticed movement to his left.  Out of nowhere another big tom came in silent about 40 yards out, heading straight to the group across the field.  I quickly repositioned and got ready, as Charlie got the camera in position.  Just that fast, the hunt was over.  He had a 10 inch beard, with 1 ¼ inch spurs, and weighed right at 19lbs.

Chet - Blue Headed Gobbler

As told by Chet Maxcy:  For the last year, Charlie Peck and I had been patterning birds at my hunting lease in Southern Highlands County Florida.  We built a ground blind that put us in position to intercept any birds on their way to or from the roost.  Opening morning found us setting up the decoys with a mature bird gobbling right where we hoped one would be.  20 minutes later the hunt was over, and Charlie had bagged the first bird of the 2011 Florida Spring Turkey season.  He had an 8 ¾ inch beard, with ¾ inch spurs, and weighed right at 18lbs.

Eric Gregory and I (Robin) hunted Northern MO for 6 straight days in early November.  Our hunt alternated from great to terrible seemingly every other day.  Many bucks were passed, including one that upon closer inspection of the video I regretted passing.  On our last morning before we both needed to get back to work, things changed in a hurry.  After shooting a doe that was just too close to pass up, a buck chased a doe by us and offered me a quick opportunity for a shot that I made good on.  As soon as I finished up my after shot interview, another buck was walking towards us and only 35 yards away.  Thankfully, Eric practices with my bow every trip so I stopped the buck by grunting while I traded my bow for the video camera.  Eric also made good on his chance and we had 3 deer down within a span of less than  10 minutes!