I got to take my daughter on her first ever hunt this past weekend - a turkey hunt! She told me last year that she wasn't quite ready to shoot a deer and that she wanted her first hunt to be a turkey hunt. She was really excited when we got the notice that she had been selected for a TYHP turkey hunt. I've taken both of her older brothers on multiple TYHP hunts and they have all been great experiences and this hunt was no exception.
We started out pretty eager early Saturday morning. We were in the pop-up blind just before sunrise with our decoys out and called and called but we didn't see or hear a single turkey for 3 hours. We were surprised and bit discouraged but still enjoyed the experience. For the mid-day hunt we were in another blind and we got a gobble back from our very first call which I had let her do on the box call. The turkey answered our calls each time getting closer and then it sounded like he was circling us but he never did come in. Later in that sit we saw a tom about 100 yards out but the calls didn't appear to phase him in the least. But we were making progress. I could tell she was getting a bit anxious before our Saturday evening hunt as it would be our next to last hunt. Much to our surprise the land owner had moved one of the pop-up blinds himself to a different location and told the huntmaster to put us in that blind. We started out calling again and got some gobbles back but they were way out there and they didn't seem like they wanted to come in to us. We had sat for about an hour and a half when we heard a gobble from somewhere way behind our blind. We called and he answered. We waited and while and called again and he answered again it sounded like he was closer. We kept up the game for a solid 20 minutes with him sounding like he was moving in before we ever saw him. When we finally did see him it was just his head and he was still a good 75 yds through the trees but my daughter's eyes were huge when she turned around and said, "DAD, I SEE HIM!!!" He finally came strutting into our decoys but wouldn't you know it, he stopped in a position where she didn't have a shot. So for the next 10 minutes we watched him no more than 15 yards from our blind, in full strut as he would approach our jake decoy and move about but still never in a clear shooting lane. That entire 10 minutes I was just convinced that something was going to spook him off, if nothing else the loud sound our our hearts about to beat out of our chests! Finally he came around the decoy and started to look at my two hen decoys. I told her if she had a good shot to take it and she did. She dropped him with one shot and the hilarious part was that it took about 5 seconds for her to realize that she had gotten him. There were some excited tears shed once she realized he was down. It was one of the most exciting hunts I've ever been on and I know we both will carry the memories from this hunt with us for the rest of our lives.
I really can't say enough good things about the Texas Youth Hunting Program. If you have kids and haven't signed up you're really missing out. On this hunt, we also got to meet a lot of great people and learn some neat history about our nation's military and meet some of our country's wounded warriors.
We started out pretty eager early Saturday morning. We were in the pop-up blind just before sunrise with our decoys out and called and called but we didn't see or hear a single turkey for 3 hours. We were surprised and bit discouraged but still enjoyed the experience. For the mid-day hunt we were in another blind and we got a gobble back from our very first call which I had let her do on the box call. The turkey answered our calls each time getting closer and then it sounded like he was circling us but he never did come in. Later in that sit we saw a tom about 100 yards out but the calls didn't appear to phase him in the least. But we were making progress. I could tell she was getting a bit anxious before our Saturday evening hunt as it would be our next to last hunt. Much to our surprise the land owner had moved one of the pop-up blinds himself to a different location and told the huntmaster to put us in that blind. We started out calling again and got some gobbles back but they were way out there and they didn't seem like they wanted to come in to us. We had sat for about an hour and a half when we heard a gobble from somewhere way behind our blind. We called and he answered. We waited and while and called again and he answered again it sounded like he was closer. We kept up the game for a solid 20 minutes with him sounding like he was moving in before we ever saw him. When we finally did see him it was just his head and he was still a good 75 yds through the trees but my daughter's eyes were huge when she turned around and said, "DAD, I SEE HIM!!!" He finally came strutting into our decoys but wouldn't you know it, he stopped in a position where she didn't have a shot. So for the next 10 minutes we watched him no more than 15 yards from our blind, in full strut as he would approach our jake decoy and move about but still never in a clear shooting lane. That entire 10 minutes I was just convinced that something was going to spook him off, if nothing else the loud sound our our hearts about to beat out of our chests! Finally he came around the decoy and started to look at my two hen decoys. I told her if she had a good shot to take it and she did. She dropped him with one shot and the hilarious part was that it took about 5 seconds for her to realize that she had gotten him. There were some excited tears shed once she realized he was down. It was one of the most exciting hunts I've ever been on and I know we both will carry the memories from this hunt with us for the rest of our lives.
I really can't say enough good things about the Texas Youth Hunting Program. If you have kids and haven't signed up you're really missing out. On this hunt, we also got to meet a lot of great people and learn some neat history about our nation's military and meet some of our country's wounded warriors.
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