I doubt I keep this up to date, but I try and add something every few days. Maybe I'll do better then I think.
Let's start this off with my first hunt (for myself) of the year, the Kentucky opener. Kentucky used to be a virtual Eden for me with many trips being a blessing. That seems to have turned into a exercise of frustration. I have not killed a spring bird in Kentucky in at least 3 years and only have one miss to my scorecard. Birds have become more scarce but I have still been around gobblers.
April 13, 2024 We arrive at the perfect time and walk out a ridge to a listening point and wait....silence. We hear an occasional gobble far off. I decide to drive down the road to another farm, more of the same. I go to a spot that always has a gobbler and make a few calls. A boss hen fires up and we begin cussing each other out. I am sure this will elicit a gobble, but nope. Finally she comes to me and she's alone. At 7:30 my buddy text me and has heard nothing. I pick him up and we head to a new farm we just acquired. As we pull into the field we see a guy at a truck and pull up. This is deflating to find another turkey hunter and we assume that we won't be hunting this property now. As we talk to him we find out he is local but does not have permission. He mainly is just using the parking spot to access his buddy's property, next door. Of course he still hunts this farm, but he's a neighbor, so we assume it's ok. Out of the blue he offers to show us around the property if he can tag along and maybe learn something from us. We agree and he even text his buddy and gets us permission in that farm, another100 acres or so. He turns out to be very nice and friendly. We hunt all morning with him and learn the property. IN the end we set up on two birds and neither would come, just answer off and on. We did walk up on one other in a field, but it appears to be a good farm to hunt. The down side is it appears the locals treat it just like public ground and several people hunt it. Our new friend says most of those are just weekenders and not serious, only him and his brother are serious. Disappointing but there's around 400 acres of prime turkey ground so its worth hunting. I am not hunting Sunday and might go down after sunup MOnday as I have an early morning appointment. Tuesday is out. So Ky will be an off and on thing until next week. My buddy is going down with his son Sunday. Oh well, it was still fun
Best of luck to you.....
Glad you're were able to get out there and at least hear birds. Keep after them you will get them. Have a safe and successful hunt.
Well it's a start and you had contact and a new place, things are looking up. :fud:
I might add I think this is my 39th year hunting Kentucky, they locked us out for covid in 2020 or it would be 40. I hunted it when you would hear one or two old mountain birds in a few day season. If someone killed a bird they were a celebrity. By the 2000s all those same areas were saturated with birds and it was turkey nirvana, but like many other areas the birds have declined and now are just staying at a lower carrying capacity. This is some rugged country and I don't get after them as aggressively as the past, but I still love hunting it as a bonus. If I never bag another I have already brought more than my share back to Ohio. Every trip is a blessing and new memory in a stage of life I am realizing my days of doing this are becoming a much lower number. I know many of us on here are seeing our turkey hunting sun approach the horizon of our turkey hunting careers. Soon our hunts will be more reminiscing then actual experience, but hopefully that's still a few years away. If not I give thanks to a gracious God for the many blessings this sport has brought me.
Good luck! Hope you have a safe and successful hunt!
This was an interesting day. Woke up at 2:00 and took the boss to the airport ( 3 hr round trip) to fly out to our daughters who is having surgery tomorrow. Got home at 6:00 AM and my buddy was waiting on me to drive the 1.5 hrs to our hunting spot in Ky. Arrived there just about an hour after gobble time. Saw a couple hens in fields. Heard one very distant gobble. We worked our way around the ridge and came back to a spot that had an active bird yesterday. I hit one series of clucks and up tempo yelps and Gobbblllleeee he came back on the call and was only about 75 -80 yards away. Hastily set up and wondered if we'd been busted. After about three minutes I purred and instantly heard walking and drumming. Then I saw his head and him picking his way in. He stopped behind some briars at about 60 and I adjusted my gun. He turned slightly towards me and came walking in When he stopped to look for the cutey he heard, at 35 yards, I lowered the boom and put his beak in the dirt. Soon as I lifted him I knew he was heavy. You can see the stats on our kill thread. One more tag left in Ky. Maybe Wednesday Thursday I will get back down there. If not I'll meet another Goat in Ky next week.
1st off, prayers and best wishes to your daughter. Congrats on the Tom ES!! Things change fast!!
Congrats on a nice gobbler, good job
Thats a full morning right there
Nicely done, sir. Figured you were up for a good hunt.
Good-looking and Platinum level member of the Elitist club
April 18, 2024
Well felt brave and went back today and talked to the landowner we always hunt on and I think things are going to change. Anyway there was only one hunter on the property and he had permission. We stayed on our old ground and we had birds working all morning but hens were all over us and them. Every time we got a bird going a hen would lead him away. We saw gobblers and nearly sealed the deal a couple times, but no clear close shots. The funny part was I stopped on the farm road and heard a bird down the road and decided to drive closer to get a location. As I rounded the bend to the gate we see this big gobbler strutting right in the road. He doesn't budge, but keeps right on his way down the road following a hen. Mind you this is 40 yards at most from the truck. He is so lucky it was not one of the local idiots or he would have been dead. Instead we let him get around the bend then circle and set up. Yelp Yelp cluck cluck, purrr the boss hen cusses us out and we watch her lead old Tom down over the hill. We played this same cat and mouse game for 4.5 hrs solid with three different gobblers. We'll give them a few days and go back. This is mostly behind locked gates, so shouldn't be any idiots.
Congratulations, nice bird! Sounds like game rich property, good you spoke with the landowner.
Good stuff, Dana. Congratulations on your success. Hope to see more... :icon_thumright:
Opener here was a dud of a day, I never even set up on a bird. Sunday I didn't hunt, but Sunday evening two gobblers roosted just above my house by about 400 yards. So today I was set up at daylight. Sure enough right on schedule they gobble. A little soft tree talk and they were making quite a ruckus. They fly down and end up about 150 yards above and to my right. That works as I have a good view 50 yards and in. Then silence and I think, "Oh boy". The next gobble is 200 yards and every subsequent gobble is further up the hill. Finally silence ensues and I assume they have hens. I have heard 4 other birds and none gobbled more then 3 times. MY buddy text he has one down at his farm. I text back to meet me in town and we'll head to my cousin's farm. Two hours of hitting all the hot spots and not one gobble. So I head home and with an hour left decide to give the birds across the road a yank. After hitting a couple spots I get an answer and I look and I have 45 minutes to seal the deal. I set up and he is answering every call. Then silence, yup this is becoming a theme. I think maybe he's sneaking in and hold my ground then I see something that doesn't look right and yup it's an side by side ATV with mushroom hunters aboard. Of course they drove right into the gobbler. I can't say anything because it's the neighbor's property and they let all the locals mushroom hunt. So I waddle home tired and humbled.
Well my turkey hunting turned into a circus Thursday. I worked on birds for 2 hrs and couldn't get them to finish. I finally baled on them after they started going quiet. Came home and heard a bird gobble off the in-laws. Headed that way and got an immediate response at the ridge top. The next gobble was closer and I frantically looked for a set up but I just couldn't find a good choice with a hard coming gobbler. I settled for a bulldoze pile with a side view of the road he was on. Finally I was set and the gobbler would appear at 30 yards. A gobble bellowed from just around that corner and I shouldered the gun and turned off the safety, he was mine. Suddenly a gobble explodes right beside me and gobbler spit hit me in the face (I know not a real thing, but gets the point across). I panic, how did he get from the bend to just on the opposite side of my dozer pile 10-20 feet away. What do I do if he comes around that pile I would be better off clubbing him then trying to shoot him. Since he's in a farm field I get the brilliant idea to slowly raise up just enough to make him move away and try and get a shot as he leaves. Yeah, of course that was a lame idea as I raised up to see not one set of gobbler eyeballs but two and one was literally in spitting distance. Of course they ran and I tried my exit shot only to blow up part of the dirt pile. Then I turn in time to see the original bird is where I expected him all along (crap there was three different birds). So I pull down on the now dumbfounded original gobbler and bead on his neck I squeeze the trigger and nothing happens. I don't know if my gun short cycled a shell or I instinctively had reset my safety, anyway he didn't wait around. However, this jerk flys up in a tree and sits there looking pretty...aaarrrrrggggg! No I did not try to shoot him out of the tree. It was probably 75 yards and I'd never get close enough even if I wanted to, which I didn't. So I just stood there and admired him and told him he was free to go. He sat there about 2-3 minutes and pitched down and walked off. I saluted and sulked my way home, embarrassed and mad at myself. This is what happens when you get old, fat and senile.
Friday I only heard a few gobbles and then they went silent. Saturday I went fishing....
Awesome story, excitement and frustration, just makes it all that more special when it all comes together!
Quote from: eggshell on April 27, 2024, 07:54:46 PM...I saluted and sulked my way home, embarrassed and mad at myself. This is what happens when you get old, fat and senile.
This comment reminds me of somebody else. Let me think who it might be... Uhh, oh yeah...ME! :angel9: :toothy9:
My hunting has been like my reporting, sporadic. I haven't spent a lot of time hunting as our birds are just not very actively gobbling. I can not pull myself to deer-stand hunt turkeys. My buddies have tagged out and done it by sitting on fields or travel lanes in blinds, that's deer hunting not turkey hunting to me. I actually got in a heated debate with my best friend the other evening. We can now hunt all day in Ohio and he wanted to go with me for an evening hunt. We slipped up to a filed to see if any birds were in it and he plops down and states, "we need to just sit here for the next couple hours", I sat for about 30 minutes and said lets go I am not doing this. His reply was you better do it or you may not kill a bird and I sniped back, fine I'll eat my tag before I deer hunt a gobbler. I know I am probably rubbing someone wrong with these comments, but I am not judging just sharing how I choose to hunt. I hunt turkeys to engage with them and call back and forth, that is the intrigue of this sport to me.
I have only set up on two gobblers in the last 4 days and didn't hunt two of those days. Both gobblers answered a couple times off the roost and then went silent and disappeared. I have actively worked two birds all season. I have heard as many as 10-12 on a given morning but they will not work. I set up one morning and ended up 75 yards from a gobbler. He flew down right out and front of me and would not answer a single call, just took off like a jet in the opposite direction gobbling all the way. I guess I must be sounding like and old hag hen and not a sweet young babe. Back to Ky today, so far those boys have been more willing to dance. Sooner or later I hope to find a lonely old gobbler that will play. It seems like old times when many mornings were met with silence. Back then it was because there weren't many birds, now they are just being a pain in the Butt. I guess I have been spoiled over the last few years with a bounty. This is the first time in many many years I still have a tag open in the second week of my home state season.
Hunt the way YOU want! Props to you sir!! :agreed:
ok this is how my season has been going. I only had about an hour to hour and half to hunt today. I went to my cousins farm and an old bird I call Rufus sounded off. I got to him with a good set up point and at the first call he was right back at me. Steadily the gobbles got closer and closer and I pre-positioned the gun at the last gobble as he was about to step in sight. Then silence and I am looking for movement and then the next gobble is going away, the next is further. There's a filed below me and I head there to get ahead of him. Then he gobbles on around the ridge and is barely audible. That makes him close to my cousins house. As I work my way down the hill the gobbles grow fainter and so I go to the truck and think I will drive up the road and try another approach. As I drive by my cousin's house I see a hen in the driveway and my gobbler strutting in her yard. I just laugh and go home
Back to Ky today for our final try of spring 2024 in Ky. A very quiet day. Got on one gobbling bird early and set my buddy up ahead of me as he had not filled a Ky tag yet. The bird spent probably 15-20 minutes in range and he could never see a shot. We left northern Ky and headed south only to find more silence, but of course we seen multiple strutters in fields on private farms. We met up for a chat with a certain good looking G.O.A.T.S. team member then headed home. Now to fill my Ohio tag.
Monday MAy 6th. Heard 3-4 birds on the roost then silence. None would answer a single call. Went to another spot and heard a crappy gobble and set up. Called in a gobbling hen, yup a gobbling hen. She stood right in front of us and gobbled 15 steps away....yup that's my 2024 season. This is truly uncanny, as I heard 25 gobblers on these two areas preseason and only 1 has been killed. Now it's like they are all gone and the ones left are too lazy to breed. I think they are all just like old drunks, wake up and go sit at the turkey bar all day. I am getting tired and behind on work at home, and I am going to start cutting my mornings down to a first two hr hunt and go home. Tag soup for Ohio may be on the menu. I am really indifferent as I have been very blessed with success in the past. I think it's probably been 30 years since I eat tag soup at home. In my old age and physical abilities I just don't go after them like I used to, but I still have fun for the most part. I got 10 days to find a stupid one.
Keep at it ES, do it for the FUN and enjoyment of being out there in Gods beautiful creation!! Thanks for keeping us up to date.
Quote from: eggshell on May 07, 2024, 05:51:10 AMIn my old age and physical abilities I just don't go after them like I used to, but I still have fun for the most part.
Having the same thoughts the last couple of years. As much as I love spring gobbler hunting, I just don't have the same drive I had up until just a couple of years ago. ...Still enjoy the time I am out there to the fullest, but it's just not as important to keep pushing myself to the limit...both physically and mentally...as it used to be to fill those tags.
last night was severe storms and hard rain the last two days. A non hunting day. I made a token effort and listened but no gobbles so I came home and hooked up the brush hog on the tractor and serviced all the drive train and ready to mows some fields when it dries up. Was able to mow all the yards. Got some gardening to do as well. Rain forecast tonight and all day tomorrow, so I may sit out tomorrow. I am losing interest fast as work is piling up behind me. I appreciate the encouragement from everyone, but the drive just isn't there like it used to be. I have not even stayed out past 10 but one or two mornings. I do find it frustrating when I can't get birds to at least work and duel with me, but I am a long way from desperate or disappointed. If I end up eating my tag I am ok with that. I have had a lot of good exercise and fun. I actually could most likely fill my tag tomorrow if I wanted. MY buddy has a long beard on his game camera every day for the last week at the same times in the morning and evening. He has a blind set up right at the spot and he offered me the chance to go and sit in it and probably get a shot at that bird. There were two and he let his Grandson shoot one. I told him I would eat my tag before I done that. That is not my game.
Well sometimes when everything stupid thing you can imagine goes wrong something stupid right balances the scales. I thought this morning would be a good morning and I never heard a gobbler. I saw 3 hens and a jake in a field and they were just milling around. I was home and doing chores by 8:30 am and contemplating whether I would be hanging an empty tag for Ohio 2024 spring. Something that had not happened for probably 30 years.
About 3:00 PM my daughter calls from South Dakota and she's trying to learn how to play the trumpet I gave her from my NWTF elite raffle win. She is not getting much sound from it and is not sure what to expect. I have the Bent CReek wingbone call in my truck and I tell her to hold on and I'd go play it for her to hear. I am not good on it, but been practicing. So I do my best string of yelps and I think I hear a gobble. I make another call and this time it's clear as a bell a bird answers from my back woods. I tell her a turkey just answered and I got to go kill it. I rush in and grab my gun and put on my vest and as I go out the door a gobble rings from the woods and this one is a lot closer. I rush up the the bench above the house, as that is their normal travel lane. I barely make the 250-300 yards before he is coming around the bench. I make one call on the wingbone and he cuts me off, but he's below me and I fear I won't get a good shooting lane. So I turn my head and throw a call up hill with my mouth call and he cuts that off and he's 75 - 80 yards dead in front of me. I hear him drumming then I see him working across in front of me to where I threw the call. As he clears a big poplar tree he stops and I cut loose a load of #5s and he is down. These birds have give me fits all spring and then bingo, a gift. That what's great about living right in the turkey woods. This is the third time I have killed a later season gobbler in the valley around the house here after I had given up other areas. I typically leave these birds alone, but keep them as a final trump card. Myself and my wife's cousin are the only ones that will get to hunt them. He was 20 pounds 5ounces, 1 1/8 and 1" spurs and 10 1/8" beard. A point less than my Ky bird, so no team upgrade, but a nice bird.
Congrats, Dana. Those last-minute gobblers sure go a long way towards making a guy feel better about all the things that have gone wrong all season long! :icon_thumright:
Awesome story ES, Congrats on a fine Tom! Hope your daughter is successful.