Weekend reports

[mason3toes]

Hunted till 11 this morning and heard a bunch but just couldn't get it done. My uncle had called and I didn't answer due to being in the woods so I called him back when I got out. He told me a big strutter was out in mamas pasture all alone about 7 this morning. I felt like i knew where he would roost so I set up a strutter with a breeding hen at 3 o'clock. At 5:30 he sounds off 200 yds through the bottoms and I answer back with a series of soft clucks and he hammers. I immediately respond with some excited yelping and he hammers again 50yds closer. I put the call down and within seconds he is running across the pasture to pick a fight. Bang flop tss style!

[harleytom]

Congrats on a nice bird! Nice planning, nothing like a late afternoon kill.

[surehuntsalot]

good deal

[cramerhunts]

Awesome job! Congratulations.

[3bailey3]

I got a invite to go to a buddy's land today. He had never killed before and only hunted them a few times, heard a bunch of birds and called on two to 10 steps and they saw him moved game over right, no another started gobbling close and he killed him at the same 10 steps the other two popped up at. A great bird for a first 18.4 pounds 9 1/5 beard and Spurs one was broke but right under a inch the other was 1 3/4 and was cracked and about to break off.

[Full strut]

Arkansas opened yesterday. able to get out this afternoon and bumped 3 birds in one afternoon.... guess i know where to go back to in a few days!

[Sand Man]

Man what a week. I left Sunday headed to Arkansas to hunt the opener. Got it done on the first sit Monday morning with a great bird I post in "The Limb" above.  Still working on pics. Never could get another one on the ground, but had a lot of close experiences. Birds were gobbling good, but still had plenty of hens with them.  If you've never hunted the Ozark Mountains, got dang if it ain't a beautiful hunt. Headed out Tuesday night to hunt West Tennessee with a couple of friends. Wednesday was no good, but did see/hear some birds. Thursday morning found me in a river bottom by boat of some of the best hard wood timber I've seen in a while. Nice change of pace as I grew up cutting my teeth hunting Easterns like this compared to these West Texas/Oklahoma Rios in mesquite flats. Long story short had a bird come within 15 yards of me but I never could see him for a big cypress tree.  He gobbled and about blew my hat off.  I knew he was close, but just could never see him.  My buddy could and wouldn't shoot him thinking I'd have a shot. Bird ended up walking off and circling around us. We got him fired up double and triple gobbling. I saw him at about 40-50 yards coming in. Thought its a done deal again about the time the State of Tennessee decides to run an airboat up the river to get in a special track hoe they have on pontoons to clean the river out and start working. Never hear or saw the bird again.  Struck another one at 11 o'clock, but he must had had hens with him as he walked off gobbling and one of the hens came in.

I left that afternoon headed back to Texas since my wife had Good Friday off to spend time with the family. Had a good friend from Alabama in town that wanted to hunt Saturday and Sunday. Finally got the Rio monkey off my back. We killed 5 on Saturday.  All of them were 2 year olds.  9-10" bears with around 1" spurs.  Crazy story. We were hunting a 300 acre wheat field around noon. Had just called in 9 jakes to 10 yards. After they left the field we decided to go get some lunch. We head out across the middle of the field and spot 3 longbeards headed at us. The field has a pretty good rise or hill we were about to walk over. We hit the deck where the birds can't see us. My buddy convinces me that we should put the decoy out, back up 30 yards, and lay sniper prone style in the field as we don't have enough time to make it to the mesquite line. I reluctantly agree. We ended up doubling at about 20 yards. How in the heck those birds didn't see two, 300 pound ex-college football offensive linemen laying in 12" high wheat I'll never know, but chalk up another crazy tactic that worked on turkeys. 

About an hour before we killed those birds I had my first ever encounter with a snake turkey hunting. One more step and I'd been on top of a 4-5 foot ratter. Found out a fat boy still has moves, but man that shook me up for a while! Dudes head looked as big as my fist.

[harleytom]

Sounds like a great week! Congrats on the birds, nothing like a good hunt with great friends.

Sent from my XT1650 using Tapatalk

[FullChoke]

I love doing the Ninjee Chop on 'em like that. Good job at being sneaky!

FC

[cramerhunts]

Sounds like a lot of fun! Dang I hate snakes though. Congratulations.