[EddieF]

I don't live out in the wild like JB, but we're fairly rural here and I see my fair share of most common wildlife. And you hunters probably don't even notice such a common occurence but I thought this was cool...

Today I was driving behind someone else, and up ahead on the left shoulder I see a turkey. He's about to cross the road, but the car in front of him spooked him so he turned and started running up the shoulder.

By the time I got up to him, he had sped up to the same speed as I was going, so I got to watch him for some time. Running faster and faster, and I'm just watching him out my drivers side window. Then he took off and he's flying the same speed as me right at eye level! I watched him for a good thirty yards before he went higher and crossed the road over my car.

But I think I've never had such a good view of a bird in flight in my life!

 

[41 Magnum]

Beautiful Bird, aren't they ??
If old Ben Franklin </u> would have had His way, ..The Wild Turkey would have been Your "National Bird". And, I can't hardly see anything wrong with that !

 

[CodyBrown]

It sure is funny watching them fly isn's it?? Even better when they all come out of the trees in the morning from roosting the night before. Kinda like a gracefull fall or tumble.

 

[sheepdog]

Neat...cept'n if'n they'd been the national bird, they'd have been protected......and I can't feature roasted eagle for Thanksgiving...

 

[Johngoboom]

They're a ball to hunt...In Michigan we have great populations of the Eastern variety. In fact during gun season this year I had a flock of 13 that showed up every day to eat on the corn pile. One day I even watched two does, kick the crap out a turkey. The deer tried to run the turkeys off the corn and get some for them selves, and when one bird decided she would hop right between the two feeding deer, well they got a little upset. I laughed so hard I almost scared them all away. This spring, I am going to S. Carolina to hunt them with some friends of the family.

This is a picture of one my dad shot two years ago. He always guides for me during the first part of the season, and then after I get a bird, he starts hunting for himself. We had been hunting the first couple days of the season with no luck, and that night, I hurt my back working on the driveway. I called my dad and told him I couldn’t go in the morning. He went out and shot this one with my gun and my shells (I had left them in his truck the day before.) No one around here had ever seen a turkey beard like this one. He’s not a record (there are longer beards out there, and he had 1 ¼” spurs), but it is still a once in a lifetime kind of turkey!

 

[sheepdog]

Whattawattle!!!!

 

[Wizard]

We have a group of turkeys that more or less live in our 23 acres of pine trees. This year, the most I've seen at one time was 17. Two years ago, I counted 29 once....lot of turkeys at one time.....

 

[Snuffy]

cool story Eddie thanks for sharing.

 

[peace]

Yeah, that was a great thing to witness, when stuff like that happens kind of makes you feel blessed.

 

[deputy125]

Beautiful birds. Not many hunt them around here so we are covered up in them. So many high dollar deer leases that deer huntin' is all anyone thinks about.