Indiana 4/24/24 - 4/25/25
All I've heard for years is Indiana this Indiana that it's a one bird state so yeah it should live up to the hype. I make the drive from North Carolina to my spot in Indiana in time to try to roost a bird but had no luck. Opening morning, I'm on the highest noll around and the silence is deafening. I get two phone calls from friends excited to hear how it's going for me and they were in awe when I told them that I had not heard a bird all morning. I make a couple big loops in hopes of finding something but no luck, a lot of sign but that was it.
I get back to my truck and decide to go try a few other places but when I drive off the public on the private every field had strutters in it. I couldn't believe it. I turned around because there was a group of 3 working their way closer to the public. I make my around to get below the field they are in to where the public joins the private and I back off around 80yds and set up in hopes of them actually working across the line. I called to them with a trumpet made by my friend Matt Fulkerson and they immediately answered, I called again and they answered. I sat patiently waiting to see if they would ever brake when I hear a crow call and it was for sure another hunter. It gets closer and closer and the birds never gobbled at it. Soon I see the hunter sneaking towards the field so I whistle, he keeps creeping, I whistle again louder but he keeps creeping. Finally, when he's at 10yds I yell at him and he finally stops, turns his head and see's me and I motion for him to come over. He said he didn't know anyone was around and I told him it happens all the time but we could move to ta bigger tree and possibly double. He said he was good and took back off towards his truck. All he had was his gun a crow call and tennis shoes. Pretty sure I know what he was about to do.
I gave them about an hour and they never would move closer so I left and went and check a few other places. I hear a bird from my truck across opposite of the 3 birds I left in the field. I mark him on the map and take off. I get close to where I think he should be and make a call and he hammers. I melt next to a big pine tree and we swap call for an hour. He's in a real good spot for him and not for me but he finally drifts off so I make my move. I make a big loop and end up running into some fresh survey markers. I walk the line to where I should be above the last place I heard him at. I sit down next to a tree and make a soft call and he hammers just over the noll. 10seconds later I'm looking at a huge gobbler at 25yds, my only issue is he's 20yds across the line. I just can't do it. I let him walk and the game was over for that day with him but I knew where I wanted to be the next morning.
I leave that area and I get to a place some friends told me about a half hour north that had a private field on the north end and public joining it. As I'm walking in I find a spent hull on the ground, it was fresh. I text my buddy a pic and told him I figure one got poached. The only place someone could have shot in that spot was out in that private field. I put the hull on a sapling and kept walking. I made it ways and saw a gobbler in the private field but he was spooks as heck. I made a couple loops through the public land with no luck so I came back to the edge of the field to watch the gobbler and see if I had a chance at him. After an hour of this 2 game warden trucks pull up to the house and I text my buddy and tell him that I'm pretty sure I'm about to meet the game wardens. They talk to the home owner and they are pointing out in the field. They end up running the bid off farther onto the private then leave and park by my truck. Great. I figure I may as well go meet them vs them coming in after me or worse them leaving a ticket or note on my truck. They were waiting on me. Ended up being a federal warden and a local guy, both were pretty cool. I told them about the shell and showed them the photo and text I sent which helped out my time line and I also showed them the spot where I let the bird walk earlier and told them I didn't drive that far to poach. They were appreciative and me and the federal warder talked about some other places to try out for birds. They were going to investigate it some more and went to where I left het shell. I told them I was headed to a different area with less commotion.
No luck roosting anything Wednesday evening but I was on that ridge where he had been the day before well before daylight. I'm sitting 30yds off the line facing the line because it's a nice flat in the hardwoods and where I believe he had been strutting all day the prior day. As the woods start to wake up I hear two birds off my right shoulder on the next ridge then a bird blows my hat off. He's maybe 60yds to my left and he's facing me. They rip it for about 30min, I hear gravel popping and some turns around at my truck and leaves then a little while later I hear another vehicle do the same. I thought to myself that that's nice they left, then I hear the most gosh awful yelp ever come from right behind me. The turkeys and woods go silent and the call just keeps going down the ridge behind me out of hearing thank goodness. Then I hear someone else go by. Both trucks dropped someone off at my truck. The birds didn't gobble for over 10min. then flew down straight away from me. They ended up meeting up right in front of me and stayed there just across the line till 9am gobbling and strutting. It was pretty neat but nerve racking I could have shot any of the 3,4 different times had I wanted to shoot across the line. But I didn't. Once they worked off farther onto the private I made a loop and ended up going back to the truck.
I went and checked a few other places with no luck and came back to find a vehicle parked where I had been, I left and came back after lunch and saw the 3 birds out in the same field as the day before. The guy at his truck this time so I pulled up and talked with him. He had just left and saw the birds and was going in to try his luck on them. I told him where I had set up the day before and wished him luck, I asked him where he had roamed and that I would probably eat a bite and then maybe ease off in the woods in the area he didn't walk over. He left and I grabbed a sandwich then my gear and hit the woods.
I had made it down the huge ridge that fell off into a creek bottom where I had set up that morning when I noticed a hen at the creek. She was working her way to where I needed to be so I put a tree between me and her and took off in the opposite direction until I fell off the other ridge side. I dropped down the ridge and went as fast as I could without running down the creek crossed another ridge and creek then came up the creek bed to where I was directly below the tree I was on just a few hours prior. I'm standing next to the limbs of a beech tree with the leaves on them looking at the water fall when all of a sudden a hen pops out on the water fall, then another hen. I had beat the hens there by mere seconds. I looked behind them up the creek and couldn't see any other birds. They fed literally 20' above me over by the tree I had been sitting on that morning. As I'm listing to them scratch around I'm thinking the gobblers have to be close because I haven't seen any hens without gobblers but it would be about right if these didn't have any. About 5 min goes by and I'm trying to figure out how I need to get up to the straight up 20' ridge to in case the gobblers show up. I've got the water fall 15yds away, the wind is blowing and the hens are scratching when I hear a wooooommmmppp! My mind goes nuts now wondering if that was a drum or just some noise. Then the scratching gets louder and louder and I catch movement ahead of me up a small cut where water runs off the ridge. That's at 12 o'clock and the hens are at 2 o'clock oh dang that another bird and it looks like a gobbler. Then the second walks into view and yep it's a gobbler then the third and he is for sure a gobbler with his black body and red and white glowing head. Things get hectic in the following 15 seconds. I look at the tree they are by and I'm sure they are on my side of the line, so I raise my gun settle my dot and that's all I remember the gun goes off. I claw and climb my way up to the top only to be looking at 2 gobblers at 10yds when I top the ridge, I raise my gun while scanning the area and I see a fan just below them. I lower my gun knowing I had connected with the one I shot at. I walk up to him and he's a brute, and he's lying motionless 1 foot on my side of the line. Talk about cutting it close. The Good Lord really blessed me with patients on this one. So much had gone wrong for so much to have gone right in the end. Was a really cool hunt and a heck of a way to end my week.
Was able to make a short road trip and meet up with Matt for a celebratory meal with him and his family.
21 lbs
12 1/8" beard
1 ΒΌ' spurs
