How Long Did It Take You To Kill Your 1st Spring Turkey Without A Mentor?

[quavers59]

    There were no Turkeys on my area of New York State when, I  started to hunt in 1974. I saw my 1st set of Turkey Tracks at age 29 while out hunting Pheasants.  Next year ,I took up Spring Turkey Hunting.
   No Mentor of course and ,I was on my own from the start. The School Of Hard Knocks was rough on me. I made 1001  mistakes and then for good measure,  I  made them all again.
    Finally- near the very end of my 5th Spring ,I  Killed my 1st Spring Turkey. I figure ,I  hunted at least 25 days each May. Took me 125+ Hunting days to Kill my 1st Spring Turkey.  Then as now it was Public Lands. I used to have access to Crowded Gun Club Lands when ,I  was a member
   After that Long + poor start ,I  started to knock them down left + right. Up to 121 Turkeys today which is probably  low compared  to many members here.
   So-- How Long did it take you to Kill your 1st Spring Turkey without a Mentor at your side?

[Gobble!]

Killed jakes my first two seasons. First long beard I called in myself came in year three, 2007.

[tracker vi]

Bout 15min. Killed the first turkey I ever heard gobble in the woods . It got more difficult after that .

[Greg Massey]

I remember my first turkey kill, it was just amazing hunting and i was still in the learning stage. I guess you could say i'm still learning. LOL I cared that Jake around in the back of my truck all day showing people. In those day's we were lucky to hear couple gobblers all season. It was my second spring season.

[fmf]

i finally connected my 4th season, spring if 1990, I was 15 and drove 4 hours to meridian ms by myself to go hunt some land I was invited to hunt.  I had asked a couple known turkey hunters in my hometown, who my mom worked with, if they would take me on a hunt to show me the ropes and they turned me down so I had to learn on my own.  heck, the day that I killed my first was the first time one had ever even responded to my calling lol

[Which Gun]

My fourth year trying before I got my first one.

[Tom007]

Nice thread. Never really had a mentor. Nobody wanted to turkey hunt in 1981. I started in PA by myself. First season, they answered me. The last weekend of my first season, I had one coming. The problem was that I answered him every time he called. Next thing I knew was he passed behind me silently, and walked away gobbling. Did lots of reading that off season, and learned it's better to call less, get them curious, let them come. They know exactly where you are. The next season on opening day of PA, I called twice after a bird hit the ground, 5 minutes later I got my first bird. A nice 22 pound Tom with a 9 inch beard. I will never forget that moment. The rest is history, but nothing replaces that memory of that bird strutting over the ridge to 25 yards. I thought my heart was going to pound out of my chest. That's why we all do it. Thx for listening. This thread brought that great memory back as if it was yesterday.....

[guesswho]

45 minutes to an hour.  Public land in Florida.  That was a long time ago, late 60's.   

[Gobbler428]

My first one was a Jake in 1982. Had no mentor and hunted for three years and made a thousand mistakes until I finally got one. I'm still making mistakes but just not as many and as often as I used to  Still learning, lol.

[GunRunner]

 
It was just my young son and I.
It took me to mid season of my 4th year.  10 inch beard with 1-1/8 " spurs.
My thirteen year old out gunned me though. He killed his first bird in our 3rd year....a nice Jake. Needless to say the guys in our club ragged me unmercifully.

GunRunner

[GobbleNut]

Mentor?...What's that?   When I started spring gobbler hunting as a teenager in the mid-1960's, you could probably have counted the number of people who had ever hunted spring gobblers in this entire state on one hand,...and since the spring hunt here had just started, any spring hunting they had done had been somewhere else. 

I knew nothing,...and nobody else I knew that hunted knew anything about spring gobbler hunting.  We all started with a totally blank slate,...except for the occasional article seen in one of the "big three" outdoor magazines at that time. 

I didn't kill my first "called in" gobbler until 1975, although in terms of total number of days hunted from when I started in the 60's, it was probably only around 20.  Our seasons were very short back then, I had limited time to hunt, and I recall a couple of our seasons in those early years getting cancelled altogether due to fire danger in our forests.  And quite honestly, I hadn't caught the "bug" for spring gobbler hunting that came a few years later.

Honestly, I wouldn't give up those futile, "learning curve" years for anything.  We figured it out on our own, and even more importantly, it made us appreciate all the more the successes we have had over the years since those lean, early struggles. 

[fallhnt]

My 1st year on an out of state hunt. My state didn't have a open season in my area. Self taught for those reasons. Fall is how I learned to hunt turkeys.

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[Happy]

I spent a couple years hunting where there weren't any turkeys. That didn't stop me from trying though. Once i started hunting where there were turkeys it took about 3 hours. I am still waiting to kill my first turkey with a mentor but I have an add out so fingers crossed.....

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[PalmettoRon]

First started in KY in 1983. I laugh thinking how little I knew then. Called up a long beard in '85 after I had moved to Mississippi. I was so excited that while I didn't miss that bird, I unfortunately hit him. He flew and I heard him splash down probably 75 yds away in a swamp up to my waist. I searched and searched to no avail. I was truly sick over the whole deal as I knew that bird sank.!987 finally got it done by myself and alone. I literally cried. I had taken a couple of birds with the help of a mentor earlier. It never gets old being in the turkey woods!

That's the long story.

Short story is 5 Springs.

[B Rogers]

Guess I'd have to say the 4th season. The first year was a learning year. The next few, my hunts were limited and hunting locations were not great. Then I finally talked a friend into trying it at some spots they had access to. It worked out great. I called 3 of the 4, that we took, in last year.