Sumter youth doubles up on Youth Turkey Hunting Day gobblers

Daniel Reynolds of Sumter had big plans for Youth Turkey Hunting Day, but his results were almost too good to be true.

An alarm-clock malfunction almost ruined the morning, but it wound up helping provide Reynolds, 11, with an unbelievable 2-for-1 morning — taking two gobblers with one shot.

Reynolds, buddy Ronnie Mills and father Dan Reynolds were late getting to their hunting land near the Concord community in Sumter County because their alarm didn’t go off as planned, but the hour’s delay put them right in the path of some gobbling turkeys, and everything worked out better than it could have possibly been planned.

“We arrived at 6:45, and it was already starting to get light,” the elder Reynolds said. “Turkeys were gobbling in the trees when we got out of the truck.”
The trio set up on a dirt road about 200 yards from the roosted birds.

“Daniel got under a pine tree with low-hanging limbs on the edge of the road, I was directly behind him, and Ronnie was behind me. Every call I made was answered with gobbles,” said Dan Reynolds, who crawled up behind his son as the turkeys began to work their way in his direction.

The birds sounded closer with every gobble, but lying on his belly, but the elder Reynolds could not see them. When he asked his son if he could see them, Daniel whispered back, “I’m looking right at them.”

When Dan Reynolds finally got his eyes on the birds, a pair of gobblers wer drumming and strutting less than 20 yards away. He told his son to take the second bird, which appeared to be the bigger of the two.

Daniel Reynolds had other ideas. He kept his calm and waited until the heads of the two birds were in perfect alignment, then squeezed the trigger of his Charles Daly 20-gauge. The 3-inch Federal load of No. 4 shot did the job, with both bird dropping in a cloud of feathers and dust.

The bigger bird weighed 19 pounds, three ounces, sported a 10-inch beard, and 1-inch spurs. The second bird was 15 pounds, four ounces, with a 9¾-inch beard and ¾-inch spurs.
“Forty-five minutes after we arrived, the hunt was over, and by 7:30, text messages and photos were already on the way to friends and family,” Dan Reynolds said.