Swing... and a MISS!

[MOGC]

I took a new turkey hunter out this morning. He is the same guy I took out for his first coyote hunt this past winter. We were lucky that I called and he killed his first coyote ever on our first stand ever. Well...

We went turkey hunting this morning. Parked the truck and a gobbler sounded off as soon as we got out of the truck. Only problem was he was dang near over the truck! The bird was on a steep bluff overlooking our parking spot and about 80 yards from us. He shut up as soon as daylight cracked and I'm pretty sure he made us out immediately. We started up a creek bottom and heard another gobbler sounding off. Problem with this bird was he was moving at a quick clip away from us. Hummm...

We made a couple of set-ups and did a little quiet calling for about 45 minutes each with nothing to show for it. Other than the first two birds we heard early nothing else was talking and it was heating up fast. We were standing beside the creek in a little field with another much larger field on the other side when I noticed something. Everything my friend had on was crisp and new. His camo, turkey vest, boots, everything brand new. Made my ragged old gear seem kinda tired - but very comfortable. I felt kinda bad doing all the calling then and realized he probably had several new calls tucked into that new vest. I asked him if he wanted to try some of his calls out and he quickly said, "Sure... but I don't really know what I'm doing."

I had given him an old Cody glass call of mine a couple of weeks ago and he pulled it out. He wasn't able to get the knack for the little oblong circles to make turkey talk so he asked for a lesson. We spent about five minutes messing with the call and I showed him several times how to make the call talk. He tried and tried and wasn't making much headway. He handed me the call and said, "Go ahead and call, I want to watch your hands work the striker." I did some slow yelps with a couple of cutts and then slowly increased the calling into some fired up cackling and cutting - "Gobbblllrrrr!!!" right behind us across the creek - and CLOSE! Three longbeards were strutting about 70 yards away across the creek and working their way toward us! Oh crap... we are out of position, no facemask on, standing up, everything wrong.

I slowly sank to the ground and went prone. My friend still stood there looking at the gobblers, his jaw slightly agape, wide eyed. It took an urgently whispered "Psst... ease down!" to get him moving. He made it down prone and we belly crawled to the creek bank. The gobblers were about 60 yards and sorta looking around for the hen they had heard. I did have a mouth diaphram in my mouth and fired them right up, they were hot and man did they put on a show. When they hit the 40 yard mark I nearly climbed the tree I was snuggled against when my buddy's .12 gauge boomed. He shot and the birds all jumped and semi-took wing for the woods across the field. I looked at my friend and guys the look on his face was priceless, eyes wide, mouth open, breathing ragged, good stuff.

[Altjaeger]

Great story!

[LampLighter]

That was an excellent story. Yep. That feeling of fun just is not the same with deer. I love the stragety and all the sneaking. I was in that position once- the new guy. My guide, a boy much younger than me, got us up on a field edge with some turkeys. I was supposed to make the kill, but I got spotted by a hen, who began sounding the alarm putt. He was in position so he took out a gobbler. He gave it to me. That boy died of cancer at 29 years. He had a pet gobbler at home and I swear, I once saw it on the sofa with him watching TV. No lie.

[MOGC]

Got that new guy out on Saturday and worked a bird off a ridge and across a field and into the creek bottom with us and almost close enough... and a danged hen ran in between us and hustled the gobbler off. I couldn't fire her up and bring her back to us and it was at the end of shooting time so we didn't have time to try to cut them off. But it was a lot of fun!

I had the wife out this morning for her first crack at a gobbler and the dang wind nearly blew us off the map. I told her to load her pockets with rocks so she wouldn't blow away. The 30+ mph wind is really getting on my nerves. I took vacation to hunt next week and the weather gremlins got hold of that info and have planned a nasty week for my hunt. That sucks, but I'm gonna have fun and make the best of it. Lemons outta Lemonade ya know! :)

[LampLighter]

I had wind opening week on March 28th. You need to go to a place where the turkeys can see because they will go there due to everything in the woods moving. They know there sight sense is diminished- everything is moving. So they go to right-of-ways, powerlines, roads, pipelines, and fields. That is where you need to go. Observe, observe, observe with good binoculars. Learn what they do, where they do it, when they do it. Set up ambush and kill. And don't think they can't see you at long distance. I had the one I killed see me at 400 yards the day b/4 I got him. On a right-of-way. And I was head to toe in M.O> Obsession including headnet. I had belly crawled out in the middle of the right-of-way, and was glassing him. I got tired of holding my head up so I scooted my knees under my chest. He saw that movement at 400 yards, and took off running down the right-of-way and into the woods. That quick movement is what does it. Had I s l o w l y eased my knees under my chest, he would not have seen me. Lesson learned and will always remember. All future movements will be at slow motion speed. Ease those binocs up slow. Definitely, switch to my tactics above on the windy days. It works.

[Sidekick]

The wind was blowing like heck all weekend here (35 mph gusts) and I called up 9 toms Saturday and Sunday. They came in the open and in the woods. The wind didn't seem to make any difference. Just made them harder to hear.