South Dakota was good to me this year! 3 nice longbeards on 2 trips out there. First bird was taken on public ground in south central SD and the next 2 where up in north central SD. One on private and one on tribal lands. The first bird from public I first spotted when out scouting some new stuff I had never been on before and he crossed the road with 2 hens and another tom. I got in front of them and set up and maybe 15 minutes later I had my first tom down as he came in on a string once I started calling.
My second bird was on private lands I have hunted on for years now. This one was a flash hunt! This tom along with 2 hens was roosted not 150 yards from our campsite. I didn't know he was even there until after I had left camp and was a good 1/4 mile up the property listening for the first gobbles of the day when he sounded off right back by camp! I hauled butt back that way and spotted him in his roost tree and got set up maybe 100 yards from him. I only called to him twice to get his attention and when he hit the ground he marched right in. I was done at 5:25 am.
My 3rd bird was the next day on tribal lands. I had found these birds the afternoon before. It was real windy that morning but I kind of new where they would be roosted and as it got light enough to see I could see some of them in the trees. They flew down but hung in this open bottom for hours and I couldn't get down to them with out being busted. I repositioned on these birds 5 different timed and a couple of times I could draw one of the toms within 60 yards or so but then he would go back to the group. The group consisted of 4 toms, 6 jakes and a couple dozen hens. Finally sometime around 10:30 the wind died way down and the birds started to drift out of that open bottom into an area where I could get set up on them unseen and after about 15 minutes of calling I got the the main strutter to close the distance to 40 yards and I took him. I first spotted these birds at 5:15 and finally got my shot at 10:50.
I love hunting these Merriams!
