Gobbler down 05/17/14

[1eyeReD]

Well, we did it. To our surprise, the huntin Gods shined their light over our setup Saturday morning. Here's our story..

My friend and I set out on a run & gun adventure to the SE on some state land we usually bowhunt for deer in the fall in hopes for some dialogue with a gobbler and even a bonus kill if possible. With time constraints and tons of excuses, we haven't even scouted this property. In fact, we haven't even been back since a late season bowhunt for deer in December that didn't produce much but frozen buggers and some closure to our 2013 archery season on that piece of property.

Our game plan was simple. We were going to just walk and call along the bottom of a ridge from a non-motorized DNR forestry trail and hopefully get an answer to work with. To our our west was the ridge. On top of the ridge are some huge fields that had corn last season. To the east of our route along the trail for most of its length of about a mile and a half until it goes up into the hills was all riverbottom. Flat land with some tall grass, patches of woods, patches of shubs, brush, wetlands and some large patches of shorter grass was the terrain where we would do most of our hunt this morning. Here I'm thinking "strutting terrain?" Haha what do I know.

My friend and I agreed that he would carry a shotgun and be licensed for this week's gun season while I would carry my compound bow since I opted for the archery tag a couple weeks back. If a legal bird would commit hard to within bow range without a hangup, I would be up to bat. And if the bird hangs up but still within shotgun range, my buddy would take the shot. This would ensure we don't come home empty handed as a group right? And again, that's if we even get close to a bird. We both understood and accepted that it was a slim chance, not knowing how they use the land. We were also concerned about safety too so didn't want to venture far off the trail.

I knew there were some turkeys around because I've seen them on a few occasions last fall and seasons before, and even have some trail cam pictures. But I really had no clue where to even begin our hunt. We just knew to check around or near all sections of the property that we were familiar with and this particular section of state land was huge with all but two accesses miles and miles apart so you could cover A LOT of ground.

We arrive at 4:30am to an empty parking lot which is usually the case here with the exception of the first two weeks of small game during the fall. When you look at this place, it doesn't look like primary deer habitat and doesn't look great for much small game either. And is far from the usual stuff you see for turkeys. Maybe waterfowl, but even for that, guys choose to go elsewhere because the sloughs are pretty dead for much of the waterfowl season except for some waves of wood ducks early on.

I closed my eyes for a 15 minute power nap and about 4:50am we set out from the parking lot to our first spot where I guessed turkeys might roost nearby. I had originally planned to set up my blind at the corner of a field that had sorghum last year and just do the waiting game for the first half hour or so of legal shooting time. Instead, we just stood there and yelped a few times under the low light and as expected, heard silence. We sat around for about 15 to 20 minutes just listening to the silence with the exception of a few bird chirps and goose clucks in the distance. We then started back the way we came and headed down the opposite direction on the trail, walking past my lonesome SUV in the parking lot.

It got lighter out and we were yelping about every 200 yds or so and nothing. By now we were well past half a mile from the lot and hadn't heard a thing besides geese and robins. The feeling of the oncoming "skunk" set in as it was such a quiet morning and based on the echos, if there were turkeys around they would've heard us even at a distance and if they talked, we would've heard them. The sheer amount of deer tracks kept our minds off of the lack of gobbling and so we continued on being distracted by deer tracks, squirrels, geese, ducks and everything else besides the sound of turkeys. We did see a few turkey tracks, but they didn't look all too fresh either.

By 6:20 or so we approached a slight bend in the trail where we would usually rest on the way back from our stands after a morning hunt during the heat of early fall (this is one of those public spots where you'd hafta hunt 1.5 miles out to get away from others in the earlier part of archery deer season). As my friend and I were quietly talking and both giggling amongst ourselves about not knowing what the heck we were doing (trying to stay in a positive mind), I spotted a dark blob in the middle of the trail up ahead about 100 yds milling around with some subtle movement. I did a double-take to confirm it wasn't a decoy or any other critter, and grabbed my bud by the shoulder and whispered "turkey turkey turkey!". Our walk came to a halt and we hopped right off of the trail and into the taller grass. In a frantic scramble to get set up, I took the blind off my back, found an opening the grass to set the blind with a clear lane to the trail, and we managed to unpack & pop up the blind without catching the bird's attention and got our gear in. While my buddy set up the chairs and put the finishing touches on positioning the blind, I army crawled back out to the middle of the trail making sure I remained behind the bend and below the taller grass to stake my Avian X feeding hen and the Funky chicken looking over the hen. I then crawled the 12 yards back and into the blind, nocked an arrow and let out a few soft yelps while still trying to catch my breath. From the moment we hopped off the trail to being set up, we wasted about 5 minutes (haha not bad!). Man I was for sure we got busted and they would be long gone by now. Luckily that wasn't the case.

Bout 10 seconds after the yelp, I let out a purr that I learned to make on a mouth call the night before thanks to Youtube videos which sounded more like a kazoo (kazoo credits go to me and only me) followed by some clucks that would probably alert farm raised chickens.

About 10 seconds after the calling sequence, my buddy whispered "Oh dude, here they come!"

Watching through the mesh on my left window, there were now two blobs heading our way down the trail towards us at a fast pace. As they closed the distance, the front blob looked like a hen at 30 yds. Small blue head, small body and kind of skinny. It got to about 20 yards and almost into my lane and stopped to feed and that's when I noticed a long slender beard about 6 to 8 inches, a jake!? Oh wait, a bearded hen?! I dunno, it has a beard and it's a turkey!

"I'm killin it if it gives me a shot." I whispered. My friend acknowledged.

The second bird caught up to about 30 yards and what do ya know. A fan opened up and he lets out a thunderous gobble with neck fully extended. My eyes nearly popped out of my skull and my heart rate accelerated instantaneously. He closed to about 25 yards while my heart nearly meeting him halfway and then he stops. He strutted around and puffed out his feathers so hard, it looked like he was going to pop like one of those party balloons with confetti inside. By now I had lost track of the first bird and I didn't care about that one anymore. I wanted that big ol gobbler down whether it was me or my bud who gets the job done. I just wanted that gobbler down and to know that the decoys, the calls, the hours of reading and learning about experiences of others and Google searching turkey hunting, looking at maps, formulating plans in my head etc. all came together in text book fashion. It was our first hunt, one bird between the two of us would be huge experience for next season!

Now back to the turkey..

The body language of the tom suddenly changed and I think he either noticed the blind or was trying to see movement in the decoys. Or perhaps saw movement in the blind. He suddenly became cautious for some reason. He took one step at a time with long pauses and seemed to be on pins and needles. I've seen deer do this and it aint a good. The more nervous the gobbler got, the more I did too. I thought to myself, "take him at 25 yds" but there was a clump of grass he'd have to clear. Dangit!!

Still keeping tabs on the jake (or bearded hen), my buddy whispers "the jake is right behind the blind", but I couldn't bring myself to even swiveling my head to look, I was locked on the tom. And then to my crush my hopes, he turns around and slowly starts strutting away and disappears between the windows of the blind. As he makes it into the next window, his fan closes while bobbing his head looking back at the decoys. He takes a step the other way and now is behind a few straws of grass and picking up pace.

I quickly whisper "Just take him before he goes."

My friend being the kind dude he is, replies: "You sure?"

"Hurry!" I whispered back.

Buddy shifts his body, sticks the Remington 870 12 gauge equipped with glow-sight and a fancy turkey choke out the blind window and shoulders the gun. Before I could blink, the sound of the shot exploded out of our blind followed by a distinct ring in my left ear and echoes up and down the bottoms. All I could see now is a few feathers floating back down to the ground and a gobbler flapping on the ground just like on TV. My buddy turns back and looks at me in disbelief. A short pause with wide eyes and jaws dropped on the both of us then we both just burst into giggles and started cracking up like two nine year old boys laughing over the sound of bodily gas.

We looked around for that jake and said, "let's wait to see if there are any other birds."

30 seconds later...

"Eff it, lets get our hands on him!"

We walked up to the gobbler and he looked a lot bigger when we were standing a few feet from him. We picked him up and holy cow, this was a first for the both of us. We've never had our hands on a wild turkey before. His neck was almost the size of my wrist and he was very warm to the touch. We examined the perfectly placed shot to the head and neck and checked out frost covered 10.5" beard and .5" spurs. More laughs, victory hollars, about a hundred air punches and high fives later, we gathered ourselves, and my friend tagged his bird.

We went back to the car to put away the now tagged out hunter's shotgun and field-dreseed the bird before putting it in the cooler and continued looking for my bird for the rest of the morning into the afternoon. We worked another very loudmouthed gobbler later that morning for about half an hour on top of the ridge next to a field, but he was led in the other direction onto private land by two hens. This one got close enough for gun range too, but was a out of my comfort zone at about 45 yds for no more than a couple minutes. My bud and I finished the day with some scouting afterwards and a nap then headed home. Both satisfied about our first successful turkey hunt which was, haha - his first and last turkey hunt of the season. His girlfriend was quite happy about that.

Hopefully I get out next weekend to try and get an arrow through one.

We were kinda bummed we didn't get to weigh it in the field because my fishing scale took a dump on me and he forgot his, but dressed, it weighted 18.5lbs when we got back to his place. And again, 10.5" beard with .5" spurs.

The funky chicken with Avian X hen works!! LOL!

[DonBo]

Congrats on a hugely successful first hunt! A lot of planning and a little luck go a long ways. Great story, thanks for the write-up.

[monstermoose78]

Way to go 1eyered! Congrats!!

[Borch]

Congrats to you. Good Luck with the rest of your season.

[x1957x]

Awsome bird 1eyeReD!!!

[paceman]

Awesome Hunt! Congrats!

[Scoot]

Adda way! Congrats!!!

[sticknstring]

Congrats on the late-season bird! I bet you guys had a smile on your face the whole drive home. Getting them w/ archery tackle is awesome, but they sure don't come easy.

[leech~~]

Nice way to go! I knew that the funky chicken was a winner even though people laughed at it last year!

[1eyeReD]

Yes, we were smiling ear to ear on the way back home. The ladies probably got tired of us re-telling the story that night over the fire pit at my house.

[1eyeReD]

Nice way to go! I knew that the funky chicken was a winner even though people laughed at it last year!

LOL!! My 5 year old still asks me if he can play with it. He seriously thinks I got it from Toys R Us for him to use in a battle sequence with his Godzilla action figure.

[rkhinrichs]

great work!

[brittman]

One of the few birds reported killed on this site after May 10th. Glad for your success.

[1eyeReD]

Thanks guys.

On the drive back, we both discussed how it will probably never come this easy ever again (haha especially for him, his season lasted all but less than 2 hrs with no prep other than going to the store and buying a license and some ammo). Talk about lucky. One thing for sure, we are both hooked.

I'm going to try and get out again with the bow. To me, it's all about time in the woods and tagging a bird would be a bonus. I am hopeful to bag a bird, but if anything, just getting to interact and learn about em is what I need to better prepare for next season. This first season of trial/error/learning has been productive!

[korupt21]

1eyeReD,

question.

When you say you are hunting again this coming weekend, how is that possible?

I am assuming you had a lisence for season G (May 16-22) since you were carrying a bow and your buddy a shotgun. But that season closes on the 22nd (Thursday).

Are there special rules for a bow where you can hunt multiple seasons. I'm assuming your older then 17 considering you have a 5 year old so the youth lisence wouldn't apply.

just curious if I was missing a one season exemption in the regulations?

[sticknstring]

Are there special rules for a bow where you can hunt multiple seasons.

just curious if I was missing a one season exemption in the regulations?

The archery license is good from May 1 - May 29th across all zones.

[korupt21]

OK, didn't know that or see that in regs.

thanks

[1eyeReD]

Yea what Stick said.

One of the reasons why I choose to hunt with a bow for deer and turkey. You just get more time in the woods (haha with a bow, you'll need it) and it kinda forces you to learn more about your quarry since you've gotta get so dang close to stick one.

My friend hunted with a G season shotgun tag. Though he's had his shotgun and a turkey choke for some time now, I think this was his first real outing with calls and decoys. He only had the weekend to hunt so we were going to camp and hit other tracts of land in the area if we didn't tag at least one bird. Luckily we didn't have to.

Now it's fishin time!!