I have never seen this before and quite frankly if I didnt see the photo, I wouldn't believe it. Friend of mine was hunting today and shot this gobbler. He went up to where he shot and the gobbler is standing there in the condition you see. An obvious head shot, but this was bizarre. The only thing I can think of is complete shock. Anyone ever hear of this?

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no , never saw or heard of it .must be positioned just right to be like that. neat picture though

That’s nuts! Never had that happen before.

A pellet probably hit a part of the brain or the spine that prevented the bird from moving and paralyzed it, alive but unable to move. I never saw that either but that is the only explanation I can think of.

That's just crazy. Did he poke it to see if it would fall over or take off running?

Never poke an unconscious turkey.

I watched my grandmother chop the heads off chickens as a kid and saw several of them walk with their heads chopped off, no blood as the chop must have pinched the vessels off. they tasted the same as the others.

I have heard of crows hanging upside down from a tree limb after being shot, but have never witnessed it myself

That's a really good turkey decoy that somebody just shot.

I had this happen once during spring gobbler.
37yd shot, no brush or other obstructions, I ran up and he was standing there like a statue, multiple bleeding hits in head/neck


This was the first gobbler after switching to the 20ga and Federal HVWT #7 shot, I had been a "hard sell" to change from lead #4 shot and wasn't impressed at all.

Called Federal, they had me send that box back to them, they replaced it with 2 boxes and never had a problem since then with any HVWT shells, it flat out stones them and I am sold on it and also TSS for killing turkeys.

weird stuff happens when you hunt