Your closest Shot?

[Tom007]

Would love to hear stories about your closest shot at a Gobbler. This one's real easy for me. It was around 1993, the last week, last day of the Jersey Season. I woke up to 25-30 mph winds, but warm and sunny. Set up in one of my favorite spots, started calling at day-break. The wind was whipping pretty good. After about an hour of loud calling on my Lynch box call, I noticed a hen coming up the ridge to my right about 75 yards out. She meandered up the hill past me. As I watched her walk off, I thought I heard drumming behind me through the wind gusts. It seemed to be behind me over my right shoulder. I honed in on the sound, heard it again along with the sound of something walking in leaves behind me. I did not move a muscle, gun was up on knee, ready. I am a lefty, thank god because all the sudden out of the corner of my eye; there he is. He is strutting along side of me no more than 10 feet away. I had a Remington S-P 10 at the time with 3 1/2 # 6's. He was looking towards where the hen was, in strut so I decided he's so close and not looking that I could swing on him and shoot. I made the move, put the bead on him as he popped out of strut and fired. He was so close, it blew him back a bit, he collapsed. When I was putting my tag on him, I noticed he had the white buffer from the shell all over his head and neck feathers. The shot was a little low. When I was home that day cleaning him, I noticed something under the feathers just above the side of his breast. I dug it out with my knife, it was the wad. Wow, I know for sure this was my closest shot ever! Be well....

[JeffC]

Hunting public, turkeys of course, were roosted and hung out on private. Sat down in woods as close as I could to field I knew they were spending time in. Did some light calling just so they knew I was there. After a few hours caught movement 70 yds up field edge as they started entering same woods I was in, but still on private. Tom is in and out of strut, hens not paying attention, he starts my way, I am behind a rose thicket, property boundary, I am postioned to take a shot when he goes to my left to go around the thicket, watching out of the corner of my eye he struts up to thicket, comes out of strut, puts hes head down and crawls under the thorn branches, I swing gun onto his head as he pops up,  we look into each others eyes, watch as all the color drains out of his head as he realizes hes made a mistake. Didnt see any birds behind him, squeeze trigger, his head is gone. Was 9 feet from end of barrel.   

[Tom007]

Hunting public, turkeys of course, were roosted and hung out on private. Sat down in woods as close as I could to field I knew they were spending time in. Did some light calling just so they knew I was there. After a few hours caught movement 70 yds up field edge as they started entering same woods I was in, but still on private. Tom is in and out of strut, hens not paying attention, he starts my way, I am behind a rose thicket, property boundary, I am postioned to take a shot when he goes to my left to go around the thicket, watching out of the corner of my eye he struts up to thicket, comes out of strut, puts hes head down and crawls under the thorn branches, I swing gun onto his head as he pops up,  we look into each others eyes, watch as all the color drains out of his head as he realizes hes made a mistake. Didnt see any birds behind him, squeeze trigger, his head is gone. Was 9 feet from end of barrel.

Love it, wow

[JeffC]

Spent my $4 on lottery, did you put in yet?

[Sir-diealot]

In the video attached to the story I counted 14 yards, in all actuality it was 14 paces not yards. http://oldgobbler.com/Forum/index.php/topic,91525.msg891235.html#msg891235

[ol bob]

Less than 3 steps, took his head completely off.

[BDeal]

About 5 years ago on the last day of the last season I shot one at about 8 yards with a 3.5 inch longbeard. Hit him a hair low. Almost looked like I hit him with a slug.

[ScottTaulbee]

2006. First turkey I ever killed. For 5 years in a row I had learned how to call and had called 2 or 3 up every spring and had called 2 up prior that spring. I had missed them all. My dad had no background in turkey hunting, he had hunted every game species KY had to offer at that time but we didn't have a state wide season for turkey until 96. I started in 01 at 6 years old. The second in my family behind my cousin who was 12 years older. My dad is a firm believer in "if you can see it, you can kill it" and was telling me to shoot at turkeys 50+ yards with maverick 88 12 gauge 3" #4 with a full choke. And I wasn't even getting close to hitting one. We had sat up in an old barn on a family friends farm, as we were getting out of the truck another guy that had permission came in and we told him we were hunting in the barn. The guy went down to our right and in front of us about 100 or 120 yards and sat up. At 12 o'clock my 11 year old patience had been exhausted and I walked back to the truck. Dad sat in the barn a couple more minutes smoking a cigarette before he was on the way. He came back to the truck in a hurry and said he saw a red head stick out of the woods across the field about 200 yards and tried to talk me in to coming back to the barn and trying it again. I reluctantly went back and started calling with my H.S. Strut mouth call and sure enough a Jake came out of the woods and I heard the other guy calling, I got really excited cutting and yelping and that Jake turned and headed right to me across the field. My dad told me shoot when he was about 40 yards and I said "no", same conversation at 30, 20, 15, yards. He got to 8 steps for a 11 year old and I rolled him. My dad said a couple things I won't put on here and said " boy, you about gave me a heart attack, I didn't think you were ever going to shoot!." I grinned and said, I wasn't missing this one. Since then I've killed a couple at around 10 yards, and last season killed one at 10 steps. But the first is still the closest.


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[Tail Feathers]

My closest shot was on my first longbeard.  I had killed a jake the previous season and was looking forward to my first longbeard on opening day of my second season.  I set up in a hole created by a blown over pine tree, beside and facing down an old logging road..  With the rootball and some brush hiding me, I felt good about my set up.  As the sun began to show, the gobbling heated up all around me.  I heard probably a dozen gobblers in all directions.  One, to my west was gobbling up a real storm and jumped on the few calls I let out. 
It wasn't long before he began coming and the gobbling seemed to double as he got closer.  It dawned on me that there were two gobblers approaching together.  In just a couple of minutes I was rewarded with the sight of two longbeard strutting towards me.  I had a couple of decoys set up, just five yards off my left shoulder.  The plan was to shoot as the birds came down the logging road.  My plan was working perfectly except the birds were too close together to take a shot.  The came at me head on, strutting with wings touching side by side.  The bother double gobbled at about 20 yards and nearly blew my hat off!
The walked right beside me towards the jake decoy.  Directly beside me, about 5 steps away, one bird got a step ahead of the other.  With my heart racing, I took my shot, taking his upper beak and the entire top of his head off. 
I've seen a lot of good turkey hunting videos but few, if any, have ever been as exciting as that hunt was for me.

[Greg Massey]

My closest shot, I was setup one morning before daylight in a heavy fog on a field road between 2 fields. As the fog grew thicker and still barely breaking daylight I hear a turkey gobbler off in the distances, you still couldn't see in the fog more than 5/10 yards if that, so i made a couple of small soft yelps and i didn't even hear them fly down as i was sitting waiting on the fog to clear. I hear something coming down the road and it was like a ghost walked out of the fog i was so shook up and had to wait for then to get pass me before i could take the shot and i rolled him at about 5 yards ... This is another one of these hunts i will never forget ... SO don't think for a minute, a gobbler want fly down in a heavy fog bank because they sure will... This was another one of these great hunting experiences that you never forget.

[Upfold99]

My closest was 6 steps. He pitched out of tree and was going to land just past me. He banked hard right and come in over my right shoulder. He touched the ground exactly in front of the barrel. I remember the breeze as he came by.

11 1/4" beard. Still my longest to date.

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[nativeks]

Severe storm coming and I was tracking the bird's progress as he gobbled at the thunder. He crests the rise and sees the decoy. Takes off at a dead sprint at my jake and trips over my foot. I shoot and miss at probably 5 ft. He gobbles and takes another step. I didnt miss.

I also blew a hole through a crippled bird my buddy had been chasing. He caught it and it spurred the crap out of him. He yelled at me to shoot it as it ran by. 3.5" hevishot at a few feet. It was a body shot and looked like something out of a cartoon.

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[stinkpickle]

I don't exactly remember how close he was, but I probably could have smacked him with the muzzle instead...

[Tom007]

Wow, great stories, keep em coming.....

[Tom007]

Spent my $4 on lottery, did you put in yet?

No Jeff, you got the winner