Double Bull co-owner Brooks Johnson backed up his turkey lessons with a Merriam longbeard.

In South Dakota you can hunt turkeys all day, and Dave said the hens usually start leaving the gobblers in late morning to go to nest. Once his hens have left him, the tom gets a whole lot easier to hunt. "If I could convince my hunters to do it, I'd tell them to sleep in, because the best hunting doesn't start until after 10 a.m.," Dave said. Dave's confidence was contagious, and I was almost too excited to sleep that night.

Well before daylight the next morning Bob Mussey and I were loading our gear into Chris' truck when I noticed a stuffed hen decoy sitting in back. Chris told me the local taxidermist makes them for Dave, and the results have been incredible.

A short while later we pulled onto a dirt road that led to a pasture. Chris told me there were several gobblers and a bunch of hens roosted on the other side of the pasture about 80 yards from where he was going to set up our Double Bull Matrix blind. He said the birds usually work their way across the pasture shortly after fly down, but he couldn't guarantee they would come within bow range because of the hens.

Inside the blind, Bob set up his camera equipment while I prepped my friction calls and worked my favorite diaphragm in my mouth until it felt just right. When it was just light enough for me to see the decoy in front of the blind, a rooster pheasant cackled to my right. The last gravelly note had just left the cockbird's beak when three gobbles boomed from my left. The pheasant cackled again and the birds -- three of them -- fired right back. I made a few soft calls, and the birds responded almost in unison. Then the hens started clucking and tree yelping, working the gobblers into a frenzy. I heard the birds fly down, and then all was quiet.

One quiet hour later it became painfully clear what had happened: the gobblers flew down, got with their hens, and were now content to just strut around without saying a word. When Chris pulled up, he told us the birds had hit the ground and traveled in the opposite direction. He had an idea where they might be headed, so we jumped in the truck and went looking for them.

It was almost noon and we were driving to meet Dave and the other guys for lunch when Chris spotted two lone gobblers crossing an open hilltop. We drove around the other side of the hill to get ahead of them and set up the blind and decoy. With Bob's camera and my bow at the ready, I let out some seductive yelps. Nothing.

Thirty minutes passed with no sign of the birds. I was thinking about lunch when I heard what sounded like a gobble way off in the distance behind us. "Bob, I think I just heard a bird gobble," I said. Bob removed his headset, and we both put our ears to the back windows of the blind. Minutes later we both heard a sound. It was very faint, but it was definitely a gobble.

"I think I see him," Bob said.

"Where?" I asked, as I glassed the terrain behind us.

"He's strutting by himself in that green patch two ridges over," Bob said.

Continued -- click on page link below.