ESPN Hunting

Norman MacLean, the sage flyfishing scribe who penned "A River Runs Through It", wrote that he was haunted by rivers.

Not me, I'm haunted by turkey beards, especially those foot-long appendages that have swung merrily from the spring turkeys that have snubbed their beaks at me over the years.

For a bird that generally weighs less than 25-pounds, longbeards drive me nuts.

You see, for years, I've had a special place reserved in my study for a double-digit bearded tom, complete with sharp, nasty limb-hanging spurs. So far, that spot remains unoccupied.

It's not because I don't try hard.

I've had big gobblers slip in silently; go the other direction; get hung up and henned up; be intercepted by other hunters; completely ignore my calling; and give me ample reason to wonder how a grown man with a shotgun can miss a longbearded tom at less than 30 paces.

Name the excuse and, unfortunately, I'll have to confess that it's in my turkey-hunting log.

But I'll keep trying, including this spring.

Sooner or later, it's bound to happen, right?

Until then, my dreams at night will be tormented frequently by visions of these springtime longbeards who have somehow given me the slip — again.

In the meantime, anybody got a framed turkey hunting print I can borrow? You see, I've got a bare spot on the wall of my study and …

Here are the top-10 (well, 13, actually) turkey beards — all gracing birds in the Eastern subspecies — courtesy of the National Wild Turkey Federation:

Hunter		Length 	Date        Where	Hometown  
Robert Tremblay	18.125"	5/2/98	Va.	Rollins Fork, Va.
Michael Moore	17.625"	5/11/99	Pa.	Duncansville, Pa.
Steven Overton	17.625"	4/10/00	Ark.	Hardy, Ark.
Danny Register	17.5"	5/5/97	Ga.	Chester, Ga.
Robert Farris	17.25"	3/25/03	Ga.	Gray, Ga.
L. Wayne Carver	17.125"	3/23/01	Ala.	Fosters, Ala.
Robert Meier	17"	5/9/93	Wis.	Waupaca, Wis.
Edward Landreth	17"	5/4/01	Tenn.	Adamsville, Tenn.
Kirk Files	16.875"	3/23/85	Ala.	Brinkley, Ark.
Tom Jennings	16.625"	4/3/90	Ga.	Rochelle, Ga.
Lee White		16.625"	4/7/00	Ga.	Americus, Ga.
Donald Bridges	16.625"	5/2/01	Ky.	Cadiz, Ky.
Nick Schneider	16.625"	5/23/03	Minn.	Caledonia, Minn.

For a complete list of longbeards, including records for each subspecies,
click here for the NWTF "Longest Beards" Web page.

Material from the National Wild Turkey Federation.
Visit the web site at www.nwtf.org