I did not fill my first season Illinois turkey permit but had a couple of toms some 100 yards behind me in a posted woods that would not come in. This happened two days in a row. Fast forward some four weeks later to the Illinois fifth and final season and I'm right back there with the same two turkeys. I could barely hear them at 5:30 a.m. but followed their gobbles until they were again only 100 yards in the posted woods behind me. That took until 7:30 this morning and I didn't hear from them until 9:50 and 200+ yards away, just 10 minutes before I'd set as my departure time. Being tired of playing turkey tag, I answered their periodic gobbles with my two pot calls (slate and aluminum), nail call, and box call, using excited yelps. Then they went silent only to gobble again from their spot in the posted woods behind me. I gave a few clucks and soft yelps, then went silent. A series of gobbles got no response from me. Then a gobble got closer and I peeked through one of the prop-up windows in my blind which greatly resembled a homemade privy. A gobbler exited the woods and started to enter the picked corn field where I'd set up my Pretty Boy strutter behind a hen in the breeding position along with a feeding hen about 25 yards away from me. At this point, he determined that he'd made a mistake and turned at the wood's edge and started sneaking toward me at a fast pace. At only 10 yards, I put the red dot on his head and sent a 3" load of #5 shot from a Winchester Long Beard his way which nearly took off his head! While toms in this part of Southern Illinois typically weigh 21+ pounds, he only weighed in at 18.5# but had a 10" beard and 1" spurs. Being the runt of the litter, he probably had his butt kicked enough to be very cautious when approaching hens that might be accompanied by those bigger than him. Not counting the two previous days working these birds but today's nearly 6 hours, this is the longest I've ever been involved in calling in a gobbler. Frustrating? Yeah, but I've still got one more tag to fill and I'm more enthusiastic about it than I was this morning.
