One of the older gents in our group picked me up to try a new approach on the long beards we saw yesterday ...
I was hoping to get some photo's of Vern taking a shot on a nice gobbler ...
Long story short ... the Toms kept one step ahead of us !
1st set up .... no response and our hen decoy sat lonely ...
Moved to some heavy cover .... bumped into this Red Squirel who posed on a branch long enough for me to get a couple of quick frames ...
Worked our way into where we figured the Toms might be ... Vern did some calling ... 2 beauty Toms came in silently thru some heavy cover ... we should have known they were coming because the crows went into a frenzy ... 1 beauty Tom stuck his head up at approx 35 yards ... I couldn't get a focus on him and Vern couldn't get the gun on him clean ... The two of them ended up flushing when we tried to relocate .... the crows kept at them ... the biggest of the 2 landed in a tree and the crows kept dive bombing him ...
We don't shoot birds in the tree , so I moved into the bush to try to get a camera shot of the Tom in the tree with the crows at him ... I got within 20 yards and got 1 quick picture before he flushed ... Only it was in heavy pines and the picture didn't turn out ... he is the blurred subject behind the other branches ...
We watched the direction he flushed .... gave him some time to settle down and tried to get around him to set up for an evening hunt ...
But when we tried to go the long way around , we bumped into 3 hens ... 2 ran and 1 flew ... so we decided we had shook the area up enough , and started the long walk back to the truck ... One the way we saw the Tom running down the edge of the field ... I tried to get the camera on him again but NG ... only got track shots ...
It wasn't from lack of trying today ... Vern finds a spot to cross the creek and we head out ...
We get to the truck ... load up and drive home ... unbelieveably hot day ! I glance towards the field as we drive and see the Tom one last time in the distance... ( I swear I heard him laughing ! ) 
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" Remember , Trophies are measured by the time and energy expended to get them , not the size or quantity of the quarry "
See Ya. R.J.
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