Wisconsin Bird Dies Near Wheelchair

Well I put in a few days hunting in Wisconsin this weekend.  It paid off to stay in the blind as long as possible.  Yesterday I got in the blind at about 5:30 a.m. and did not come out until 7:50 p.m. or so.  Oh what a long day.  I saw lots of birds, they were gobblin’ till noon on Saturday and I think this bird and his buddy came in yesterday at about 11:00 a.m.  The shot was too long so I let them go.  Today (Sunday) I moved my blind up the hill into the food plot to get the best shot possible at any birds that might come to the plot.  The plot is mostly clover and chicory with some trefoil and other things deer and turkeys like.  Anyway, I was extremely tired and falling in and out of sleep about every half hour.  I would wake up look around and then drift back off to sleep.  At about 11:00 I contemplated calling my brother-in-law and asking him to come and get me but something told me to wait until noon.  I had seen birds pretty late in the morning yesterday. 

Big hint when hunting late in the morning, It seems like the birds like the shade.  Hey their black and its 75 degrees!  I woke again at 11:30 a.m. and lifted my head and looked out my window.  Being kind of groggy the image did not register at first and then my brain started processing the image. Whoa, that's a bird!  A nice bird!  Hey, there's two birds.  The bird in the back is a bigger bird.  He was in a semi-strutt just sitting there in the clover.  The other bird continued on toward my decoy slowing feeding along.  I went to grab my gun but forgot where it was.  I was looking around in the blind for my gun and shooting stick.  After a few moments of fumbling around I got the gun up and took aim.  Blam......Dead Bird!  I ranged the bird at 35 yards.  His buddy had to come back and check him out and try to wake him up.  Didn't work!  I took a bunch of pictures of the live bird trying to wake up his friend.  All in all it was a very good hunt.  I saw a variety of wildlife while out in the blind including a Badger.  It came within 5 feet of the blind.  Way cool!  Here's some pictures for you to look at.  The bird is a two year old, 7 1/2" beard with 1/2" spurs and probably about 20 lbs. 

Turkey season is officially over! 

Karl Anderson - MN