2021 Strut Stopper Story Thread

[Dmason3]

Been a weird year for me this year. Haven't been able to go out but a handful of times and being limited on those times due to having young kids and having to leave the field early for various reasons. Finally found this guy one evening and due to where he was I knew where he was roosting.
There must have been a nest nearby because the next morning there was a hen in the field before it was even very light out. Sure enough the tom flew down and came out in our field. He was acting funny, not really strutting much but gobbling his head off.
  Finally got him worked up a bit and heading my way and sure enough that other hen cut him off and lead him away then went back towards her nest. For the next 2 hours he was within 100 yards in my shooting lane just half strutting, gobbling, and watching. I ended up sliding down to lay down because my back and my butt were going numb from leaning against a small tree.
  I could get him worked up and he would cut me off with gobbles but he never would break and come into my hen. He finally inched in closer to just around 40 yards and I talked myself into crawling to the edge of the woods and shooting him. As soon as I got halfway to the big tree blocking his view from me he decided to break and come into my hen.
He walked past me at about 10 feet while he was strutting and spitting while I was on my hands and knees with the gun beside me and on safe. I had to wait for him to circle the decoy and for his fan to be blocking his view before I could raise up and shoot him. Was a fun hunt, I really need to start recording my hunts. Not my biggest but with season winding down I'll take it!


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[aclawrence]

Congrats!  That sounds exciting!  I pulled something similar a week ago. I left my gun propped against the tree and when it started getting light I had a gobbler roosted in a tree 40yds in front of me. It took me forever to inch my gun into place. I could have shot him eight off the limb. Of course when he pitched down he flew around the corner where I couldn't see.


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[Kygobblergetter]

Awesome hunt. Congrats on the bird! I'm afraid my season is starting to wind down. It looks like my out west trip has been screwed up due to the wife's vacation not getting approved but I might run north somewhere. I can't stand not hunting when there's somewhere I could go


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[turkey harvester]

Wow!! sounds like it got wild for a minute. We have 1 more week. Season goes out sunday. I have found a couple of birds that haven't been swarmed by a gaggle of people but getting time off from school is almost impossible at this point. Maybe the last weekend will produce.

[Huckleberry91]

The hunting has been hard and gobbling scarce here in the Ozark mountains. Opening morn I had a stare down 2 different times with a 2-3 yr old bird, he put the slip on me. I hunted him the rest of opening week until I got over ran by OOS. We're roughly 4,000 birds short of our worst season in 20 years. Almost everyday in the woods I've seen atleast one to two coyotes. Predation is out of control. I've got 2 days left to get it done, let's hope I can scratch one out.

[Kygobblergetter]

I'm headed back to Ohio to hunting Monday morning. Then it'll be wv for the last weekend of season and that will probably be it for me. Hopefully I can get on another bird


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[aclawrence]

I making a run to Tennessee tomorrow to hunt some private land. I'd love to knock out a couple more gobblers before the season ends. 


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[dzsmith]

im done for the year.came back to work on the 3rd. Had a good season. tough birds , but a good season. It does appear that many folks have had good seasons but I promise you....from what ive seen. harvest numbers are down in many states, at least from last season. I knew it was gonna be a tough year. and at first...it didn't seem like the woods were too overrun....but its like as the season progressed the amount of people anywhere I went kept compounding. This actually scares me for next year.....at least in OOS hunts. Good luck to the few who are still going. Looks like im saving my vacation for deer season, or maybe ill finally draw a moose tag that ive been putting in for a decade......oh and congrats DMASON. kids make it tough to get away...im just now getting to experience that......

[aclawrence]

im done for the year.came back to work on the 3rd. Had a good season. tough birds , but a good season. It does appear that many folks have had good seasons but I promise you....from what ive seen. harvest numbers are down in many states, at least from last season. I knew it was gonna be a tough year. and at first...it didn't seem like the woods were too overrun....but its like as the season progressed the amount of people anywhere I went kept compounding. This actually scares me for next year.....at least in OOS hunts. Good luck to the few who are still going. Looks like im saving my vacation for deer season, or maybe ill finally draw a moose tag that ive been putting in for a decade......oh and congrats DMASON. kids make it tough to get away...im just now getting to experience that......

Your experience was a little bit the opposite of mine in North Alabama. The first two weeks the pressure was terrible!  After that I don't know what happened but all of a sudden there were empty gates and birds were gobbling. The last half of the last week I started seeing a good bit of truck traffic again. Starting out we had a lot of hunters from Mississippi and Arkansas.


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[turkey harvester]

Well Huck and myself are officially done. Worst numbers in Mo in 20 years. We got close Saturday between the storms but ended up bumping 9 deer that ruined that for us. Last day... well 50 mph winds and thunderstorms all morning. Not a peep. With very few birds and tremendous hunting pressure I'm not surprised. Good luck to all that's still after em. 

[wvhoyt19]

Congrats everyone on the harvests!! Been a tough year for me. I hunted WV early and faced henned up gobblers. My focus was on Nebraska though as I've been planning that trip for some time. Well, I got back last Friday and the turkey population was a huge disappointment! We seen very lil birds and put on a lot of miles on public ground. The number of hunters far weighed out the number of birds. My 1st experience was a bad experience. We roosted a bird the first evening and was setup on him before daybreak. He hammered on the limb and flew down with a hen about 100 yds away. Every time we called he would cut us off. Then, a few other hunters started calling 40 yds behind us slightly over a rise. We got the hen to come to 42 yds and I had him at 65 but waited for him to clear to where she was at. Unfortunately the guys behind us got busted and the birds went back near the roost tree. Another hunter had worked his way up there and shot him. Right after he pulled the trigger, pellets rained down on the pine we were sitting at! Too close for this ol WV boy who hunts primarily private land!! I soon figured out that public land was not for me. Very few people were successful and most everyone we talked to seen/heard very few birds.

2 weeks left in WV so I'm going keep after em. Good luck ever!


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[turkey harvester]

Seems to be problem all over. Too many hunters and not enough birds. Our MDC needs to pull their head out of their butts and start focusing on our turkey population instead of the stupid elk and bear hunts they've been planning on for a few years. When this years harvest is at a 24 year low its time to do something. We need to follow other states and drop out season to 2 weeks and 1 bird, close fall season, and people need to start killing predators again. They are trying to say that there wasnt as many tags sold this year as opposed to last year but I'm calling BS on that. I seen more hunters in my neck of the woods than I did last year!!

[Turkeyman]

turkey harvester...I'm thinking in many areas nationwide it's time to institute trap and transfer again. If we wait for Mother Nature to take her course with natural propagation Lord knows how many years that may take. That could be incorporated with minimal, or no, fall seasons until the resource recoups.

[dzsmith]

Seems to be problem all over. Too many hunters and not enough birds. Our MDC needs to pull their head out of their butts and start focusing on our turkey population instead of the stupid elk and bear hunts they've been planning on for a few years. When this years harvest is at a 24 year low its time to do something. We need to follow other states and drop out season to 2 weeks and 1 bird, close fall season, and people need to start killing predators again. They are trying to say that there wasnt as many tags sold this year as opposed to last year but I'm calling BS on that. I seen more hunters in my neck of the woods than I did last year!!

my biggest question period to any state in the nation is "why  do we still have fall seasons....why....In my state it has virtually zero participation and its kind of a difficult process to even apply and hunt the fall....so why not just do away with it. the states that do have fall seasons...do people actually "fall hunt" flush a flock, set up ...call them back and shoot one, because I imagine most are just simply shot while deer hunting

[Kygobblergetter]

I'd say here in Kentucky probably 90% or better of the fall harvest is killed while deer hunting. Which sucks. I'd really like to see them get rid of the fall season or at least make it gobbler only


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