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SD was good to me!

Started by paintbrush, April 27, 2021, 10:16:14 PM

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paintbrush

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!   

FullChoke

Huge congratulations on 3 fine gobblers! Where are you off to next?

Cheers  ;D

FC


Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog, it's too dark to read.

xarcher

Wow. Action all around. That last one had to be very satisfying with all the work you put into him.

Guns don't kill people.  Guns kill food.

paintbrush

Minnesota is on the board for next weekend.

turkeyhunter91

Awesome, congratulations on 3 birds. I had a trip planned for sd this year but my wife changed jobs and some stuff came up so we decided to put it off till hopefully next spring.