Team 1 "Dead RedHeads"

[IlliniWalli]

all right. wtg, hoyt. congrats

[Hoyt4]

Anyone on the team out this week. little bit of slience on here. Sorry I have not taken the pictures yet for my NE bird I will try and get them loaded this week. Remold and hunting just gets in the way .

I head out for SD Sunday morning hope we have some luck only two of us making the trip this year. Going to be a short quick hunt Sunday for the day and Monday have to be back on the road Tuesday afternoon.

[IlliniWalli]

just biding my time catching a few crappies, gardening, checking for early mushrooms and scouting close to home for my fourth season tag while waiting for third season to begin friday

have a good spot for the county i drew but its an hour drive to get there, so i havent scouted; just gonna trust that they are roosting in the same spots.

have shot a dozen nice toms off this farm the past 15 years so lookin forward to gettin back at em friday

[nbadger23]

Lost a couple of my spots to folks who leased the land so I'm scrambling a bit to find some places to hunt. There are birds around my subdivision and I'm hoping I can get a few of the neighbors to ok me hunting ... we'll see. I may be switching to my bow if that's what it takes to get their permission. Only 8 more days!

[Fins-n-feathers]

Hey guys, sorry I haven't been checking this too often. Just thought I would give an update. I hunted Friday and last weekend, and once the snow really started to go, the birds got more active. We watched a tom and a few hens for hours in an adjacent field, but they were on private land. On Monday there were people in our spots, so we only got to hunt very little before we had to head home. Since I am still considered a youth, my tag is good for all seasons, and we will be back in a few weeks to try again. Hopefully next time the hens will have nests and the toms will be a little more callable.

+1 for Dead RedHeads

[IlliniWalli]

keep at em fins. later in the season means less hunters, too

i see another vote for Dead RedHeads. bad luck not to have a name so lets go with that unless there are objections.

[Hoyt4]

I'm good wit it.

[Hoyt4]

Once I'm done with this remoldel work at home I can get to the freezer. I have my NE bird still together was thinking of mounting not sure yet but leaning to doing it more and more. I will get pics of the beard and spurs and form filled out.

I cannot wait till Sunday morning and hope to hear some more gobbles. Been a few days since I've been in the woods going nuts.

[IlliniWalli]

filled my second tag yesterday

another off the roost hunt. walked in in the pouring rain, finally quit when i got to my tree tight to the roost

nary a gobble, but i could see beards in the trees swaying in the breeze.

close to sunrise, it was still pretty dark but 2 finally pitched down about 60 yards away.

it was kinda foggy but i could make out a couple beards, so i gave a soft yelp on the diaphragm, one gobbled and they came up the hill right to me

picked out the one with the longest beard, which went 9.5 with 1 1/16 sharp spurs but he weighed only 20. still a nice 3 year old

[DonBo]

WTG Walli, keep putin' em down. Looks just as soggy there as here.

[Borch]

Nice bird Walli!

[Hoyt4]

Just got back off Noah's ark from SD. It was a tough hunt but we did get two birds could not fill the other two. Got there to our spot about 10AM on Sunday. On our walk in the rain stopped for about 4 hours or to a mist. That just gave me a enough time walking into a flock that started to talk about bit on our way into the woods. We followed with them for about 2 hrs. Called in a few hens out of the group and then they would mill around for a bit then go back to the rest of the flock. Each time they would go feed out of site we would make another move up a few more trees. Finally the hens broke and came our way but angled out a bit which was not good. Lucky two of the gobblers came in around 50 yards. I did not like that distance but they were going to follow the rest and angle away from us. I always let my buddy shoot first but these birds were going to be gone with the weather we had to take what we could. I dropped him right were he stood. One bird down in a few hours. We put the birds to bed that night they didn't even spook too bad after the shot. The 2nd bird was too far after the shot.

We came back in the next morning and I called on in right off the roost. AGain lucky the rain poured but stopped right around fly down time. This bird almost landed on us. He came in no decoys strutted and looked for the bird that was suppose to be there. My buddy shot him at 20 yards. Two birds down in less then a day of hunting. Now the raing got even worse we hunted and checked out many places not getting too many to respond or even seeing out in the fields or in the coolies. We put on a lot of miles and had thousands of acres to our selves no one was out hunting because of the weather. Most years we will see a couple people but no one this year.

Monday morning we hunted same area we shot the two but the birds had different plans came down by us just out of range and went on to private land we could not hunt. This was the most birds we were seeing out of all the places we hunted. Think the birds are down just a bit but was still a fun hunt even know we almost drowned. Sorry do not have too many pictures and the ones we have are bad with the rain we just didn't take any good ones.

My bird was 21lbs 1 1/4 spurs 8.5 beard. My friends 20LB 9inch beard 3/4 spurs.

[Hoyt4]

Congrats Walli

[DonBo]

Hoyt, good job getting after them in the rain, no fun I know, but WTG! It does make for ugly pictures though...

[sticknstring]

Those hero pics are great! haha Congrats on the SD birds!

[totally_addicted]

Alright, it's time to get on my own birds. I do not have a lot of time this weekend, but I do plan to go tomorrow morning. Next weekend looks to be a lot more time in the woods for me.

I made it out last night to scout. Went to a different property than the one I took my cousin to. I hadn't been there yet this year, but my hunch was right. I did some walking and eventually just say down and watched a big meadow that leads to a known roosting area. Saw a big tom and couple hens make their way across the field and to bed. After they were out of sight I snuck down there and set up a blind. They were totally quiet the whole time. The tom strutted the whole way across that field.

It will be interesting with all the rain we have had. A lot of flooding down there leaving the birds with only one dry spot to cross on my side of the train tracks. So I set up my blind right near that land bridge. Hoping to ambush that tom even if he is quiet and responsive.

Can't Wait!!!!

[Hoyt4]

good luck

Get us another on the board for us.

[Fins-n-feathers]

Well guys, what a weekend!! Saturday morning, we went out and sat on a known high-traffic neck down spot that leads to a cornfield. We sat and called for a while, but saw or heard nothing. We decided to walk down the trail a bit and check a few other patches of field before we headed for home. We were walking down the trail adjacent to a field when we noticed a big tom strutting for two hens on the opposite side of the field. We froze in place, because they hadn't seen us yet. There was no cover anywhere close and we were afraid to move for quite a while. I think the two hens noticed us and headed into the strip of woods opposite us and over a little rise out of sight. I know they were still close to the field because about 15 yds inside the woods is a big drainage ditch and the tom was staying out in the field strutting for them. We waited until the tom was facing directly away from us and his head was hidden behind his fan. We crouched down and there was just enough of a rise in the field to hide us as we crawled to cover, leaving our decoy in the middle of the road. We set up and were in good shape because the hens soon forgot about us and came back into the field. There was only two directions they would have taken to get out of that field, one was right by us, and the other was another neck down spot where we could have easily went around, got ahead of them and set up. We had been watching them for about 15 minutes when two other hunters walked across the middle of the field. They had to almost walk past our decoy and one of them turned around and waved to me. They spooked the turkeys and proceeded to go over to that side of the field and set up a ground blind. Now, we were on public land, so they did nothing illegal. However, such blatant disregard of common respect and hunter ethics is sickening. That is one of the hardest parts of hunting public land- most hunters will respect each other, but then there are those few idiots everywhere who will completely disregard everyone else. We picked up and headed for home.

Sunday morning we got out late and we went to a different spot. We were kind of poking around and calling to see if we could get any gobbles. I was working my way down the edge of a field and stopped to call and got a gobble that wasn't too far off. We dropped the decoy and set up on the edge. The turkey was a jake that came right to us but was hanging up about 50 yards away in the field. I had picked the tree I was sitting against in a hurry, and I didn't have a lot of cover. The jake looked really cautious and I think he saw my face or my gun glowing in the sun. He didn't look like he was going to come any closer, so I waited until I had a perfectly clear shot and pulled the trigger. I do believe the past 4 years of no-luck turkey hunting affected this decision heavily. At any rate, I got two more shots off before he flew away. We spent about an hour looking for him but we never found him. We walked up on little bear who jumped up in a tree for awhile.

The turkey looked pretty healthy as he flew off, so I think he will be fine. It was a roller coaster of a weekend for me. I'm trying to do my part guys!! I might be able to get out one more weekend before the season ends. I also have an opportunity to hunt over in WI this year. Hopefully at least one of these trips will pay off.

[Hoyt4]

I only have one more hunt left unless I get a tag for the last WI season. I'm starting to get a little said. All year long wait for this time of year and get all pumped up just to now have to put away the turkey gear in a few weeks.

How are we looking I think we have 3 birds on the board? I know I still have to get my spurs and beard lengths for Borch turned in. Just cannot get to the freezer yet I will have to move a some stuff to get this done next week I hope. Good luck if we have anyone hunting tomorrow is a new season.

[nbadger23]

I will finally hit the woods sometimes in the next week or so. I moved out of the D MN season and into the G season because of some conflicts. I've got a WI tag that starts on Wednesday (hope to hunt Friday - Monday) so I'll finally be able to give it a go!

[mws4dux]

Good Luck nbadger and fins...... WTG Walli and Hoyt! I have been out once saw a couple toms and six jakes nothing close enough.

[IlliniWalli]

good luck, guys.

[Hoyt4]

The birds just keep going down. I know of 10 birds shot this weekend . My dad and friend just shot a bird this morning. They are just coming in running to the calls right now.It's hot and heavy hope nezxt week is the same way for WI.

[brittman]

Well guys, what a weekend!! Saturday morning, we went out and sat on a known high-traffic neck down spot that leads to a cornfield.

Sunday morning we got out late and we went to a different spot. The turkey looked pretty healthy as he flew off, so I think he will be fine. It was a roller coaster of a weekend for me. I'm trying to do my part guys!! think he saw my face or my gun glowing in the sun. He didn't look like he was going to come any closer, so I waited until I had a perfectly clear shot and pulled the trigger

I might be able to get out one more weekend before the season ends. I also have an opportunity to hunt over in WI this year. Hopefully at least one of these trips will pay off.

If you are gun hunting in Minnesota - you get 5 days. It appears you hunted Season D - so you are done. Only archery tags are good for multiple seasons. Good luck in WI.

Or are you under 18 ?

[Borch]

[quote=brittman

If you are gun hunting in Minnesota - you get 5 days. It appears you hunted Season D - so you are done. Only archery tags are good for multiple seasons. Good luck in WI.

Or are you under 18 ?

Yes F-N-F is a youth.