A discussion about public land mountain birds

[POk3s]

Basically I'm just thinking out loud and curious as to what other's experiences have been with these hard headed birds! I just got back from a 4 day trip in Utah hunting national forest around 8000 feet. More on that after the video uploads! Regardless I spent 4 days chasing what seemed like 2 birds in the entire area. Now surely that's not the case but what gives!!?? The Utah general season opens April 30 and goes the whole month of may I believe. The Utah website also shows that these are supposed to be rios, but upon further digging (after shooting a white tipped bird) it appears that these birds were transplants from Nebraska....so who knows what they are.

The few birds we did find only came to us 20 yards or so, or remained stationary waiting for that "hen" to show, and then were quickly walking off and gobbling as they went. By the end of my weekend I would get one to gobble and he was already on the move.

I just saw JMalin's post about New Mexico birds and it sounds very similar, so I had a few questions from those that know.

Is this an attribute of being call shy? Are the birds that want to be with hens, with them and quiet?

Is it just a quiet time for rios and merriams overall?

What calling tactics work for you? I tried slow playing and it seemed like if you didn't stay on the calls, that bird was still walking off but not letting you know his location and I'd lose them easier.

I saw a handful of solo hens I assume would be nesting. Also, all the toms I saw were alone. I did see 4 hens and a jake running together and the jake never made a peep.

Anyway, like I said, I'm just thinking out loud and trying to understand the lack of focalization and weird behavior.

[GobbleNut]

I'm headed up to UT to hunt next week myself,...hope we don't experience the same problems.

Of course it's hard to say what was going on where you were hunting.  Merriam's are generally good "gobblers", at least on the roost, so the first question I would pose is "were you trying to locate birds on the roost?"  If you were,...and were not finding many birds,...then I would suspect there just were not many around.

The "on the ground" behavior you describe is pretty typical of hard-hunted Merriam's gobblers here in NM.  They can just reach a point where they are not going to approach an unseen turkey calling to them in the distance.

When gobblers reach that point, from my experience, there are two ways to kill them (involving turkey calling).  The first focuses on the idea that pretty much anywhere you hunt, there are a few birds around that, for whatever reason, are willing to play.  It is just a matter of covering enough territory to finally bump into one of them. 

The other way to kill one is to use good roosting tactics, locate a bird on the roost, and get in as tight as you can to him in the dark in the morning.  With a bit of luck, he will either fly down close and/or will be fooled by tactics he is not used to at close range right when he flies down.

Personally, one thing I will never do is keep chasing the same birds over and over for days that have demonstrated that they are not going to respond to calling.  They got that way for a reason, have adapted to hunting pressure, and have learned how to stay alive.  Again, covering ground and using good locating tactics will find you other birds to hunt,...and hopefully, they will be more cooperative. 

[SD_smith]

My experience with the birds around the Black Hills is that the main element is pressure. Had one on Sunday gobbling at 100 yards on the opposite side of a small gulch and wouldn't come any closer. I think in scenarios where they can see your general location they stop and wait for the hen to come to them. I've just learned you have to get on the ridge/mountain with them and really close the distance when you strike up a gobble. Also, I have had tons of success finding lonely birds around noon time! Its hard out west to do that because the days are so long, but man most of my best merriams hunts have happened late-morning to early afternoon. I just get up as high as possible and go from gully to gully calling down them and eventually one will answer somewhere. Essentially that is just run-n-gun tactics, but I've found higher success near the middle of the days. Early morning mountain merriams can be tricky if you aren't right underneath them at fly down. Got two on Saturday like that, was about 100 yards away from the roost and they both flew down and went with a couple of hens right away. Took me only 30 minutes to realize that was fruitless so we jumped up and made a big loop that took a few hours looking for random birds. Came back around 10:30 a.m. and as we got close I yelped real loud with my mouth call and they fired off right where we left them. Couple minutes later they were down for the count.

[POk3s]

Gobblenut, I did try roosting every night wth no luck but I was covering country on roads and stopping on high points just trying to have more plans. I tried it traveling to my spots in the early morning too. I found our "main bird" Sunday morning and he did gobble good on the roost. You guys will have to watch the video hahahaha. I set up on the hill above him with the thought of "he strutted up here yesterday morning so I'll just got in his way." I was about 75 yards away from his tree. I tried 2 different short series of tree yelps. In hind site maybe I shouldn't have because it didn't work...but it may not have mattered.

The woods were relatively open but we were trying to close the distance the best we could. It was just weird that these birds would go away so quickly! I did nothing but try and strike birds Sunday walking all day long with almost no breaks and found TWO. I bet it was a 20 mile day...no joke. I had never been more beat after killing my bird on Monday after such a hard day of hunting Sunday and a hard morning Monday.

SD_smith it sounds similar but I never saw anybody in the woods. Plenty of people parked I have space to though. Maybe they had heard it all already and were just flat out call shy... hard to tell.

[JMalin]

In my experience, you've got to be within 200 yards to have any shot at bringing them in.  It is also essential to be where they want to be or on their path of travel.  Locate them with a loud box call, figure out where the bird is going, get out in front, and bring them in the rest of the way with some soft calling on a pot.  I also like to stay high.  It's a lot easier to drop down to a birds level than it is to hike up the face of a mountain from the bottom of the canyon.  I'm also a fan of taking a hen decoy with you, even if it's a little extra weight.  The bird I killed earlier today went into full strut when he saw my hen decoy.

I think earlier in the season you're more likely to birds gobbling on the roost in the evening than later on.  I couldn't buy a gobble last night, but did hear a couple this morning.  I also look for isolated sources of water when it comes to locating birds.  Not sure if there was water where you were hunting.  Lots of fresh tracks/sign is good too, and will keep me scouting in an area longer, even if I'm unable to get a bird to gobble.  I would have been pretty discouraged to have hiked 20 miles and only heard gobbles from two different birds.  Was there good sign where you were hunting?

[POk3s]

Well I'm glad to hear I was doing everything "right!" Just tough hunting! I had a hen decoy in my vest that I carried with me everywhere but rarely felt like I was close enough to deploy it. Also did the same as you guys mentioned with being high up with loud friction calls. I'm just trying to figure out what in the world was going on!? Probably never know I guess.

There was water. But in the mountains there's springs and puddles everywhere. I was walking creek drainages while trying to strike birds. So yes I was around water. Where our "A bird" was, the closest water source was a small pond that doesn't show up on the map. So you're right again...an isolated water source. But there was a real deep, steep drainage  not far away. But I just don't think they wanted to scale cliffs to get water there. But I could be wrong!

Video is up! It's a half hour long but I think fairly entertaining and funny. But I may be biased.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aW0wvNeCrgQ

[GobbleNut]

Enjoyed the video and your commentary about things during the hunt, Trent.  Good stuff! 

One thing I find interesting about Utah is how they went from very restrictive, draw-only seasons (as I recall) to some pretty liberal regulations nowadays.  Seems like they went from one extreme to the other.  How long is their season now,...something like six weeks?  ...And the month of May being over the counter tags?  That length of season alone,...with any amount of hunting pressure,...will make gobblers paranoid ghosts. 

...But, on the other hand, like many Merriam's gobblers, some of them are still pretty much willing to gobble at a hen call.   

[POk3s]

Thanks GobbleNut!

Yea you're right. They opened up a general statewide season for basically the whole month of May. You can also put in for the draw and if you do draw you get to hunt from mid April all the way through the end of may. Sometimes it really felt like they couldn't help but gobble. Gobble while running off...but at least I knew they were in the area I guess.

[DTGobble]

My brother and I had similar situations last year on our trip to the Black Hills.  It was our first hunt there, and other than talking to a few people and studying on line, we didn't have a clue.  All I read was if you could find the birds, they would be very responsive to calling.  Almost easy.  I guess you could call them "responsive", but they didn't act like everything I had read. My main concern from that information was locating turkeys.   Finding gobblers wasn't any trouble at all.  We were on turkeys from day one, they would gobble a lot, and work our way and then just stop coming.  Either stay in one place and gobble, or go the other way gobbling the whole time.  Getting in front of them was kinda difficult considering we had never seen these places before, and didn't know the terrain.  Also, those birds move a lot and fast!  I finally tagged my bird on the next to last day, and my brother tagged his on the day we left.  Absolutely beautiful country, beautiful birds, and plenty of land to hunt.  We're planning a trip back already.

You're not alone, and it sounds like we were hunting the same birds.  I've been thinking a lot about what to do different since we left.  Who knows.  LOL

[POk3s]

Yea it sounds about right. I don't know if they just expect these hens to quickly show themselves, if it's a call shy thing, or what???

[High plains drifter]

Those mountain birds will wear you out!! Stick to the foothills.