After missing the big tom at point blank range in the first week of May, little did I know that our trails would cross repeatedly during the remaining three weeks of the spring season and even in the fall season of 2008.  I also would come to realize the full impact on his turkey demeanor of that missed shot on the mature full bearded limping tom.  Several days passed at work before I had another chance to get out early on a Friday afternoon and get back into the turkey woods for another try.  I saw several hens that afternoon and two jakes in one flock that responded to my soft yelps and clucks about every 15 minutes as I sat on my acorn producing ridge.  No toms showed that afternoon and as shooting hours expired, I moved up the ridge towards my vehicle using crow calls attempting to find a roosting tom.  Not one tom answered according to my notes of that day’s hunt, and I returned home planning to hunt in the morning.

Dawn broke slowly as a cloudy day with rain was forecast.  I set up again on the acorn ridge as all the sign indicated that birds were feeding there for old acorns, and if it rained, the oak’s leaves would help me stay drier.  This time I put up my 3’ x 8’ blind around the base of a big oak and placed my shotgun on my shooting sticks and settled in to wait for a tom to come to feed or strut in this likely spot.  An hour passed as I called with yelps, clucks and purrs periodically to simulate a small flock as a light rain began to fall.  Thinking I heard a distance cluck, I scanned the woods around me daring not move my head which was the only part of me above the blind’s top.  Hearing a soft coarse yelp I figured I was in business and gave a purr on my Cody slate call.  Instantly, a juvenile jake gobbled in response followed by a second jake’s gobble triggered by his flock partner.  Spying movement finally at about 80 yards out front of me and on the west side of the ridge, I located the birds approaching.  Trying another purr on the slate call, the two jakes simultaneously both exploded in their immature high pitched gobbles and dashed forward out to about 60 yards in half struts.  Placing a diaphragm call slowly in my mouth for close in work, I waited the two birds out.  Both birds continued to mill about in their half strut, and I saw more movement behind them and could see several more birds approaching.  Waiting for what seemed a long couple of minutes, I reached to the side of me to deflect the sound of my calling behind me, and I gave a soft cluck.  The whole flock came alert attempting to locate the calling bird.  Both jakes moved forward again another 10 yards looking in my direction, still attempting to locate the calling hen.  Putting the slate call into my turkey vest, I waited as I still could not see any mature toms with the small flock of birds.  Feeding slowly in my direction, the hens located behind the two jakes caught up with them and continued towards my set up unaware of my presence.  Again seeing movement behind the flock, I identified two mature toms behind the flock bringing up the rear guard.

As the main flock moved into gun range feeding and scratching for last fall’s acorns, the two mature toms leisurely moved closer displaying handsomely for the hens in the main flock.  Daring not even to twitch or blink, I continued to sit frozen now with numerous eyes in front of me ever alert for danger as the flock fed within 15 yards of my set up.  Bit by bit the two toms’ eased into range as the rest of the flock fed slowly pass my ambush site. 

Catching movement along the ridge to my right I glimpsed another turkey’s head rise like a periscope just over the ridge top and lock on to my position at 30 yards.  Still frozen in place due to the two toms in front of me I considered my dilemma of being flanked by the third tom on the east side of my ridge.  I knew I would have to wait the third tom out who was still locked on to my position before attempting a shot at the bigger of the two toms.  Gradually, the third tom moved towards me keeping his head just above the ridge line in an uneven gait.  You guessed it; the big full bearded limping tom was back and still fixated on my blind and coming closer to investigate.  Now I was getting worried as I could see the two toms in front of me moving pass my blind on the left, and the third tom coming closer on my right flank still suspicious and not allowing me to turn for a shot.  I remember thinking how brilliantly the third tom had silently come in and pinned me down when he exploded in three alarm putts and took to the air flying behind me and past my blind before I could react.  Hearing the other two toms take flight, I started cussing that limping tom under my breath and then began to smile with some admiration realizing how easily he had beat me for the second time.

The last weekend of May of 2008, I again encountered my limping tom nemesis during a hunt on a warm but wet drizzling afternoon close to his roosting swamp cottonwood tree.  After being thwarted twice by the mature limping tom and being 0 for 2, I thought maybe the third time would be the lucky charm.  I gave it a lot of thought and decided to attempt an ambush close to his roosting tree, hoping he would come early and stage in the area before shooting time expired, thus giving me a shot at him.  I kept remembering that full beard and the way he pinned me earlier during the month, and wanted nothing better than to mount and display that fan and full beard in a special place of honor on my wall.  Debating how to set up on him and any other tom that approached the roost, I figured they would follow the edge line staying out of the wet and brushy area of the swamp.  Using my 3’ x 8’ blind again, I placed it around a group of three poplar trees growing close together about 30 yards off the swamp’s edge and about 40 yards away facing towards and from his favorite roosting tree.  Settling in a couple of hours before shooting time expired, I readied my shooting sticks and prepared to do battle with the old tom.  Thinking due to the warm drizzle he might come early, I stayed as alert as possible debating to myself the ethical issue of my ambush in the eyes of some purist turkey hunters.  Rationalizing that all is fair in love, war and killing big tom turkeys, I listened for turkey vocalizations and constantly searched with my eyes for any movement coming from either side of my blind.  Glancing at my cell phone I saw that I only had about 15 minutes of shooting time left in my hunting day and probably my season, as I had family obligations to attend on Memorial Day and wouldn’t be able to hunt.  Observing slight movement in the swamp brush at about 60 yards to my left, I slowly raised my ten powered binoculars and there he was limping quietly through the thick cover and water headed towards his roosting tree. Watching him with my binoculars, I saw him limp two or three steps with beard dragging in the water, and then stop to look about him and quietly stand for a minute or two before proceeding.  Talk about being cautious to the extreme, I assume this was probably due to the old tom having survived a ten yard 12 gauge shotgun blast earlier in the month while still being the favorite menu item for predators in the area.

Scrutinizing his surroundings the limping tom moved closer to his tree and shaking his feathers and fluffing himself up he took flight and flew up into the roost tree.  Foiled again and now 0 for 3, I monitored the tom as he paced back and forth on his limb and waited for darkness to fall to allow me to leave and not expose my hiding place to him.  My spring season ended without a tom harvested due to my infatuation with the limping tom and my missed shot at him at only ten yards.  I had learned quite a bit about his habits and patterns and knew that fall season would be here in October and I would hopefully get another crack at him then.

In September, I scouted him again as my obsession with this tom began to worry my wife with my frequent stories of how he had bested me the three prior times that I encountered him.  I had watched him Labor Day weekend fly down two mornings in a row from his roosting area only 20 yards away from a brush blind located in the three poplar trees I had built that June. I observed him once again, in late September in an afternoon scouting trip, arrive an hour early prior to roosting time by following the swamp edge closest to my poplar blind before flying up to roost.  I had paterned him now in regards to my property the best I could before the fall season started. Most of his day he seemed to spend on my neighbors large property feeding and following hens and young adults from this year’s hatch.  In my study of him I ascertained that he was at least a 3 year old bird with his heavy bushy beard and his long hooked spurs easily exceeding the other toms that I seen or taken previously.  One peculiar thing that I noticed after I first missed him in early spring was that he didn’t seem ever to get any closer than 30 yards to any other tom turkeys and seemed to avoid them on the ground unless roosting.  Later I assumed this was due to his leg injury that he had suffered earlier at some point in his life.

Finally, fall season opened that October of 2008, and I figured I was prepared to do battle with old “Limply” again.  Yes, I had named the bird by then, just another reason my wife was thinking of making a psychiatric appointment at the VA for me.  Opening day of the fall season found me again in my poplar blind awaiting daylight almost 90 minutes before sunrise was scheduled.  A few mosquitoes attempted to have me for their early morning buffet but my 40% Deet repellant helped keep most of them at bay, and I was glad I had packed my mosquito head net.  Retaining this information about mosquitoes from past years, I realized until a couple of hard frosts occurred that taking a head net was either a necessity or a quick hunt ender.  As the first images of the roost tree began to come into focus with the light rising in the east, I could make out several turkeys in the big cottonwood with my 10x50 Bushnell binoculars.  Studying their forms I could see 2 larger than the others scattered in the tree with one large bird higher than the others already awake and head bobbing on his branch studying the terrain below him.  I concluded that this was “Limply” dominant over his domain and the small flock roosting in his tree.  Several minutes passed and as the sky lightened in the east the birds began to cluck softly to each other and become more active in the tree stretching and pacing on their limbs.  “Limply” continued to study the ground below him cocking his head from side to side surveying for both danger and a landing zone, or so I assumed.  As one of the hens in the roost tree gave a soft tree yelp the other tom in the tree gobbled loudly only to be suddenly silenced with “Limply” giving a thunderous double gobble and then glaring at the other tom from his limb above.  Sufficiently cowed into silence, the first tom noiselessly glided from his limb to land on the ground about 15 yards from me. The subordinate tom turkey then readjusted his feathers and then his dignity from “Limply’s” ear splitting and thunderous brand of turkey discipline.  Now the hens with clucks and cackles glided down to land about 10 yards from the first tom on the ground, and I readied myself for my old opponent by aiming my shotgun just above the flock on the ground and waited for him to fly down. 

You guessed it big mistake again; I waited and waited for “Limply” to fly down and join the others on the ground out in front of my strategically placed blind that I had worked so hard to make natural and easy to enter, hide and shoot from.  As the flock with the other tom began to feed away to my left I watched “Limply” began to get more agitated and then fix his gaze directly at my blind.  Thinking he was going to fly down directly at me as he had in the past, I waited for what seemed an eternity as he tried to make up his bird brain mind.  Watching in disbelief, he turned on his limb and glided out in front of the flock and lit almost 70 yards away from my blind.  He then added additional insult by double gobbling again at the hens and other tom moving towards him.  Giving a soft cluck and purr, I hoped to bring him or the other tom back within range but to no avail as he turned and led the flock away from my blind.  Ok, now I was 0 and “Limply” was scoring a solid 4 on my scorecard of frustration.  Thinking maybe I was going to have to resort to claymores and land mines to bag this now legendary bird in my mind, I called from my blind for another two hours using clucks and kee kee calls with no luck hoping to bring the flock back or lure another tom into my natural blind set up. 

The fall season progressed and I quit turkey hunting even though the season didn’t close until November 14^th as the chase phase of the whitetail rut always rolled around the first week of November.  The first weekend afternoon of November found me perched about 20’ up in a large maple tree in a small saddle just below my acorn ridge waiting for a shooter buck to pass through the saddle.  My Matthew’s bow had a fixed two blade broad head resting in my whisker biscuit rest honed razor sharp by me waiting to deliver its payload through the chest cavity of a mature Michigan whitetail buck.  Catching a small motion from about 40 yards distance where I expected a buck to emerge from a thicket bedding area I froze in place. I had learned years ago by being busted by deer, to position myself behind the tree trunk for added cover with my tree stand and the place I expect the deer to materialize out to my front.  Viewing the area from whence the motion had come, I saw a large tom step out of the brush swaying from side to side as he walked.  It was “Limply” all by his lonesome about 200 yards from his roost tree out roaming and feeding along probably attempting to fatten up before winter came on.  Leisurely he came on moving a few steps at a time and pecking occasionally at some morsel on the ground which only his excellent turkey eyes could see.  As he closed the distance, I lifted my bow from its bow holder, clipped my release on the bow string, and prepared to turn ever so carefully in the direction he was traveling using the maple trunk to conceal my actions.  He passed my tree stand at 20 yards, and I let him pass unimpeded for another 10 yards to give me a slight quartering angle shot in an attempt to beat his sharp eyes as I drew my bow back.  Locking my anchor into place I slowly lowered my head to look through the peep sight and lined him up for the shot.  I swear to my maker to this day as I moved my index finger onto the release trigger he caught that minute motion and came to full alert.  Great I thought to myself a better target as I squeezed the release trigger and saw “Limpy” explode into the air as my broad head shaved feathers and skin from his back.  Roaring away in full flight I stared in disbelief as I watched him fly until he was out of sight dodging in and out of the woods missing tree branches.  Sagging against my tree stand harness and shaking my head in disbelief, I glanced back at my arrow impaled into the ground and watched several remaining feathers float to the ground.  0 and 5 and counting as he had won again in our duel between predator and prey, and lastly my grudging respect. 

Sadly, I never saw him again as he had to be going on four years of age that year and Michigan winters can be extremely hard on turkeys in this northern environment.  I hunted his cottonwood tree again the spring of 2009 hoping to see him but alas he wasn’t on the roost that spring.  I’m happy to report that I did take a mature tom from that roost the second weekend in May, and he was harvested textbook fashion and style. In lots of ways I miss that old tom and remember fondly the excitement of hunting him.  Watching him ease and limp through my woods and swamp, whipping me soundly each time on my hunting set ups for him.   But I quickly digress in my feelings, as I certainly don’t want a new generation of “Limpy’s” gene pool spreading to fast or aggressively in my turkey flocks.  

By Brad Gordon

Brad “Hawghunter65” Gordon began at the tender age of eight years old with a .22, rabbit and squirrel hunting with his father on their family farm.  He was lucky enough to add pheasants and finally deer to his list of quarries during his teenage years of life.  In his fifties, he also began turkey hunting after Michigan began a exchange program of Canadian geese for wild eastern turkeys from Alabama.   Brad’s passion in hunting is equally divided between trophy mature bucks and big boss gobblers that roam his current hunting grounds.  He is married with five grown children and 5 grandchildren.  His hobbies besides hunting are fishing for bluegills, growing food plots, and the game of golf.

Comments(2):

1. Very cool story. I bet that ol tom is still laughing at you from the ol rooting tree in the sky...

   Saturday, May 07, 2011 Robert

2. Awesome story Brad! You do learn a lot from those guys like that and in the end, you are greatful for them still! You can't get them all the time or every time otherwise there would be no sport if it! That's what i keep telling my self anyway! LOL

   Tuesday, May 10, 2011 Anthony