Nebraskaland Magazine
This will be the last season my daughter can hunt the youth spring shotgun turkey season. I am going to savor every minute because I am going to miss it. In my opinion the youth hunting seasons have been one of the best ideas “we”, the Nebraska Game & Parks Commission, have ever had. This week of youth shotgun spring turkey season is some of my favorite hunting every year. It is so nice to be able to concentrate on getting my daughter her gobbler and not have as much competition from other hunters. There will be time for a lot more hunting later, even more hunting with my daughter, but this week is just for the “kids” (I gotta use parenthesis around “kids” there, because she is 15 and not really a “kid” anymore).
My son was born too early. If I remember right, he only got to participate in the spring youth shotgun turkey season one year. We always felt kind of cheated about that, but that hunt that spring was a doozy! On a foggy morning we spent a couple of hours calling and re-positioning on a big Tom before his hens finally left him, or he lost them in the fog, and he came gobbling through the fog, down the hill to us. From scouting I had a good idea where to set up, and eventually he came right down the trail to us, just like I told Daniel he would. At about 30 yards I told my son to shoot ’em in the face; he shot, the turkey jumped in the air and then charged us! Actually, the Tom was startled but did not know where the “thunder” had come from, so he ran right to us. Good thing Daniel was shooting my Browning automatic, so when the Tom stopped within about 5 steps of us, I told him to shoot again. Boom, the ole Browning spoke and the bird went down. Thank goodness we did not get flogged!
Since tomorrow is the “opener” for Nebraska’s spring, youth, shotgun turkey season, I have a song in honor of that event:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGjy3zXQJQc[/youtube]By the way, I have one of my granddad’s old 12 gauge pump in the gun cabinet, and the other granddad’s .270.
If you hunt turkeys in the spring, this week, find a kid and pass it on. DO IT! You can archery hunt some more later, or pull out your shotgun in a week. These next 7 days are for the kids (and for us lucky ones that get to go with them!).
EDITOR’S NOTE: Now begins my annual spring rush. In the next several weeks there will be more turkey hunting, fishing and mushroom picking than I have time for. I will be in the office only when I have to be. When I have time you can count on my blogging about it all, but, if you cannot contact me, well, I am gone fishing, gone hunting, or gone picking.
To quote Uncle Si from Duck Dynasty, “It’s on like bing-bong” (http://www.aetv.com/duck-dynasty/). I’m outta here, Jack.
