Our annual spring turkey hunting season came in this year on Saturday April 11, 2009 for the Central region of North Carolina and the weather was cooperating this year without being too cold or raining although it was touch and go according to the forecast the weather prophets issued a couple days earlier.  Friday night the rain came down pretty heavy and let up sometime in the early hours around 2AM so the opening morning hunt was still on. 

Web page updated by Bill aka Mickey Porter n 04-13-09.

TURKEY HUNTING 04-15-09 

I arrived at the hunt site sometime after 0615.  I had my usual stuff like a portable aluminum stool with fabric netting  which helps tremendously when having to sit a while which is the norm for me turkey hunting.  I had an extra box call to in my hunting vest to do a little experimenting with also.  I heard a long beard sound off.  It was getting close to daylight by now especially with the moon half full and we eased toward where we heard the gobble come from.  It sounded like he was close to the pasture fence line which was mostly planted pines but a good portion was void of any planted trees at this location.  A fantastic place to set-up and "guesstimated" the distance to the fence line at about 100 yards.  See pix below:

After quickly setting up the Jake and hen decoys,  I took a position at the base of a tower tree stand and had my back against one of the rear support utility poles of which I didn't stick out like a sore thumb and by now the long beard was hammering away.  I gave a soft tree yelp but he did not immediately respond, however he continued to gobble.  I gave a series of soft yelps but again he did not instantly gobble.  I put the call up and let him continue to gobble at his own pace and could tell he was seriously interested in those earlier yelps but I remained silent on the call.  Since he had a fix on the yelps, I decided to let him do his thing.  He was either coming our way or not!  After daybreak, I could make the outline of the long beard in a large sweet gum tree and he was positioned about three fourths the way up the tree which was a little ways back from the edge of the pasture fence and could see him stretching his neck looking around.   It didn't take him too long before he pitched down into the edge of the pasture clearing and  went into a full strut.  He did not gobble any more and was strutting at a very fast pace walking directly toward the decoys which was about 20 yards to my right.  When the long beard advanced within about  30 yards of my position,  the Remington 11-87 3 1/2 inch Super Magnum's Tru Glo sights were already fixed on his head and neck area and the long beard rolled at the mighty thunderous sound emitted from the Super Mag. and flopped around trying to get to his feet but unable to do so.  Normally, the Super Mag kicks like a briar eating mule but I didn't feel a thing and had missile lock on the long beard flopping around.  I ran to Mr. Long Beard and his head was pinned to the ground until the flopping ceased.  This was a classic text book example of Turkey Hunting How To 101 and it doesn't happen like this too often, or at least in my case.  Below is a self-portrait of myself and the long beard.  Naturally, I had to do a little promo for my Porter Dual Hens box call and don't think a comb has been through my hair in a few days as evidenced by this pix....grin if you must!

Pictured with the long beard and yours truly is the Porter Dual Hen's box called used which has a one piece Honduras Mahogany base and walnut lid with RB4 wood marquetry inlays.  This identical call is featured on my Sound Page which has a pix and sound file of this call.  The long beard had a 10.25 inch beard, 7/8 inch spur lengths and weighed 20 pounds.  He was harvested at 0645 hours at a distance stepped off of 35 yards.  I used Remington Hevi-Shot # 5 shot 1 3/4 oz. at 1300 fps velocity through the Remington 3 1/2 inch Super Magnum 11-87 general purpose shotgun with a Briley .675 diameter choke tube.  I plan to replace the choke tube in the very near future with a Black Diamond Strike choke tube since I am not totally pleased with the shot grouping at 40 yards with this set-up; hopefully the BDS choke tube will perform much better.  I would have switched over to the Hevi-13 shot but had 67 rounds of the #5 Remington Hevi-Shot in stock and a little too frugal at this time not to shoot them up.

Below pix showing where the long beard (far right in pix) fell and the large sweet gum tree can also be seen from this camera position where the turkey pitched down from.

I certainly do appreciate it when a plan comes together like this morning.  Below a few pixs taken filleting the breast meat from the wild turkey harvested.  I didn't take near enough pixs but will try and do a little better next time.

The long beard ready to give up the breast filets.

An incision is made along the center of the breast bone only skin deep to pull the skin away from the breast meat exposing the breast.

This pixs shows the entire skin pulled back exposing all the breast meat.  Using a thin bladed knife, make a cut at the top of the breast bone following the curvature of the skeleton and cut as close to the bone as you can not to waste any meat. 

This pix shows one half of the breast removed from the breast bone and skeleton.  Very little if any breast meat is left to go to waste.

Pix of the turkey breasts removed and ready to soak in salt water to remove as much blood as possible.  Each breast filet had a single pellet in it and the salt water solution will help remove any blood rendering beautimous breast filets ready to be vacuum sealed and frozen until ready to cook.  The antique Old Timer 4 inch length blade folding hunter has field dressed many, many deer and works equally well on Mr. Long Beard!

Wild Turkey breast filets after salt water soaking and paper towel dried ready to be vacuum sealed.

Food Saver vacuum sealing machine pulling the air from the bag and heat sealing!

Wild turkey breast filets ready for the freezer.  I will fix some wild turkey nuggets from these beautimous breast filets in the future.  View the hyperlink to my wild turkey nuggets recipe.

A most enjoyable hunt and I was back home by 0720. 

Bill aka Mickey Porter 04-15-09.   More to follow!

INDIAN CREEK BLACK DIAMOND STRIKE CHOKE TUBE

Yesterday afternoon,  I pattered my new Indian Creek Black Diamond Strike choke tube that has a .665 restriction (inside diameter) and very pleased with the performance at 40 yards shooting Hevi-Shot-13 # 6  1 3/4 oz. shot.  My Remington 11-87 shoots about 3 inches POI (point of impact)  to the right from POA (point of aim) even with the Tru-Glo rear sight adjusted about as far left in the track as it will go without hanging out of the track;  (note: I shoot left-handed), and it appears that I am not alone in some Remington guns especially the 870 Empress shooting a little to the right from the point of aim out at around 40 to 60 yards!  My Briley choke tubes shoots to the right of POA and peculiar to this gun/barrel combination.   I fired two rounds and adjusted after the first shot and there were enough pellets in the turkey target head/neck area at 40 yards not to be overly concerned about the point of impact being a little to the right of point of aim.  I will simply have to shoot a little Kentucky windage at the longer yardages unless I put some optics on the rig or opt for another shorter turkey barrel.  There was also a noticeable reduction in felt recoil using the new choke tube just as Indian Creek advertises and I looked up their patent number 5317825 and the patent describes in detail the construction and claims which was very interesting as well.  Below target fired at 40 yards and there are plenty of pellets in the darker area of the turkey neck that did not show up with the scan taken. I certainly did not fire enough rounds for any conclusive evidence but enough to get me more or less on paper with that particular load and choke tube and confident that it will perform well enough out to 40 plus yards to harvest turkeys. 

As always, "Two of the Greatest Ships that ever Sailed, Friendship and Fellowship."

Web page updated by Bill aka Mickey Porter on 05-10-09 and 10-18-18.

LEAVING ON A SPIRITUAL NOTE

If you do not know Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, please take this moment to accept him by Faith into your Life, whereby Salvation will be attained.   

Ephesians 2:8 - 2:9 8  For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: [it is] the gift of God: 9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.

Hebrews 11:1 “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”

Romans 10:17 “So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.”

Open this link about faith in the King James Bible.