Bitter Sweet...

[Punisher]

This marks the thirtieth year of my turkey hunting career  in Kentucky, and the twenty-second year in a row that I have tagged out with two longbeards, but I am always a little sad. Especially this year. My nine year old killed his first longbeard last year (at eight years old), but we just couldn't make it happen this year after several close calls. I explained to him that is turkey hunting and he is fine, but I sure would have liked to see him kill one. Like I told him, "That is turkey hunting."

[guesswho]

He will kill his share. And hopefully you will get to witness a pile of them.   Let him know every day that goes by that he doesn't kill one, gets him one day closer to a day he does.   

[Greg Massey]

All i can tell you is keep him involved with hunting and the great outdoors and tell him , good luck next year...

[1iagobblergetter]

I started my son when he was 7. He has had his share of success along with some failure. I told him years ago that if we or everyone shot a turkey every time out hunting we wouldn't have many Turkey's left. I've also instilled in him its the challenge we are after and that if it was easy every time it wouldn't be much fun.He always tells me if he misses or doesn't get one that he isn't giving up and my simple reply back is me either this is why I love it so much..Also I tell him a bad day turkey hunting is better than a good day at work or school.(with his principals approval he misses a few days of school each spring and fall season)

[Ozarks Hillbilly]

This was a special season for me. My oldest son has always been a avid fisherman from a very young age. He  never really showed much interest in hunting of any kind. My father and myself took him turkey hunting around age 13 but he didn't take to it. Last fall he did a little bit of deer hunting. Sometime around the first of the year he said he would like to Turkey hunt this spring. Not having any interest in deer hunting myself but being passionate about Turkey hunting was great news to me. We were able to go the first Saturday of season and were able to get on a hard gobbling bird that read the play book the night before. If he gobbled twice he must have gobbled 100 times on the way in. The bird put on a long display as he worked into range. That was plenty of time for my son to get spun up. After a couple of gobbles in our face he worked into a position for my son to shoot. I had whispered to him to wait until he comes out of strut before he shoots. Clucks didn't get him to break strut so I cut and as the bird gobbled my son made a perfect shot on his out stretched neck. Much celebration followed along with the speech about how it seldom works out that way. We were able to go again the following Sunday and never heard a peep or cross paths with a single bird. After seeing both sides of the spectrum I believe he is still hooked. After he killed his first bird he wondered why he waited until he was 32 to start turkey hunting.

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