Massachusetts 2018

[Rapscallion Vermilion]

Every year for five years now I have flown out to Massachusetts from New Mexico to hunt turkeys on my old stomping grounds with a buddy of 40 years plus. We originally met in hunter safety class and discovered our moms were nurses in the same hospital. In the days I was growing up there we didn't have a turkey season but did some fine grouse, woodcock, and duck hunting.  The gobbling was off and on this year, but mostly off.  Places I know there are a few gobblers were completely quiet most days.  I was lucky to time my hunt last week to a stretch of a few very nice high pressure days and the toms did fire up a bit.  On my second morning I managed to find a gobbler on the roost that liked what I was saying with my Hudson hen box.  After an hour long battle it was clear he was hung up hard at about a hundred yards.  I switched to my brand-new-to-me Shannon Kelly push pin for some quiet clucks and soft quavery yelps.  (Thanks again Andy)  That did the trick and I could see him start working his way in from a long way off. 







As much as I love hunting our high mountain New Mexico forests for Merriam's, those New England hardwood forests, rock walls, and small creeks are in my DNA.  A couple of other highlights from the trip were finding a bear skull in the woods complete with nice big teeth and an enormous patch of ramps ready for picking which we sauteed with some fiddlehead ferns and mushrooms.

[Marc]

Nice bird and great photos!

[SteelerFan]

Congrats on a nice trip and bird!

[Sir-diealot]

Congratulations to you and thanks for teaching me something new, I had to look up fiddleheads.

[zelmo1]

Great hunt bro, congrats

[Meatseeker]

Very nice season.  Merriam's in NM followed by Easterns in the Northeast.  Good stuff.

I killed two nice toms in MA my self this year (home state).  I'd love to get to New Mexico some time to hunt Merriams!

[1iagobblergetter]

Congrats...Those tight beaked birds sound like the ones I'm hunting. Weird year compared to years past..

[Happy]

Congrats

[renegade19]

Beautiful bird.  Nice work!

[WiLL B]

Congrats on a good Homecoming trip!!

[Gooserbat]

Congratulations on a great trip.

[Yoder409]

Gorgeous bird !!!!

CONGRATS on a job well done !!

[tomstopper]

Very great looking Tom. Congrats

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[vt35mag]

Great job!
One of these days I need to head down and give western MA a go.