2022 Strut Stopper Story Thread

[wvhoyt19]

Awesome job team! DZ I didn't get caught with my pants down this morning lol but I had an awesome hunt!

I roosted these birds a few times this season. I roosted them last night and they were higher on the ridge. I still decided to stay below them on the field edge and set out my DSD upright hen. At 5:44, I heard my first gobble and they continued to hammer on the limb until 6:21. Then they all flew down 1 by 1 30 yds behind my decoy. A soft call and they soon headed my way. I felt that the bird I was calling Buzz Cut (due to his fan missing 3 feathers at the top half) was the more dominant and bigger bird. He strutted the whole time and his head was as white as snow. I let him strut, spit and drum for a lil while then decided to pull the trigger on what turned out to be my birthday bird!!

48 has been good to me. Woke up to a God that loves me so much that He sent His son to die on a cross for my sins!! A family that loves me unconditionally and supports me in every way possible. I hope and pray I'm still chasing them at 88!




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[turkey harvester]

Awesome story and happy birthday!!

[dzsmith]

Awesome job team! DZ I didn't get caught with my pants down this morning lol but I had an awesome hunt!

I roosted these birds a few times this season. I roosted them last night and they were higher on the ridge. I still decided to stay below them on the field edge and set out my DSD upright hen. At 5:44, I heard my first gobble and they continued to hammer on the limb until 6:21. Then they all flew down 1 by 1 30 yds behind my decoy. A soft call and they soon headed my way. I felt that the bird I was calling Buzz Cut (due to his fan missing 3 feathers at the top half) was the more dominant and bigger bird. He strutted the whole time and his head was as white as snow. I let him strut, spit and drum for a lil while then decided to pull the trigger on what turned out to be my birthday bird!!

48 has been good to me. Woke up to a God that loves me so much that He sent His son to die on a cross for my sins!! A family that loves me unconditionally and supports me in every way possible. I hope and pray I'm still chasing them at 88!




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" somebody loves me, answers my prayers. I love somebody , I know he cares. Somebody tells me not to repine. That somebody is Jesus , and I know he's mine." W.f. Crumley. Your post randomly made me think of this old hymn....congrats on good bird .

[wvhoyt19]

Thanks for sharing! That's a good one for sure


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[JeffC]

Congrats on "Buzz Cut", and Happy Birthday.

[wvhoyt19]

Congrats on "Buzz Cut", and Happy Birthday.

Thanks!


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[birdman67]

Congratulations and happy birthday! Great bird and story

[bornagain64]

Congrats guys on all the birds,  and happy Birthday WVHoyt.
I have never killed a bird half naked before, we should probably make you take the team picture the way you pulled the trigger. ( lol, just joking)

[aclawrence]

Well guys my season is done here in Alabama. Tomorrow is the official last day but yesterday was my last trip to the woods. I had a decent season. I killed one bird on a new to me public area. Unfortunately I squeezed the trigger three times this year and only killed one bird. I'm pretty sure one was a complete miss and another turkey I hit but it flew away. I still feel disgusted by this. I misjudged the yardage on this one. He was out in the open. I ranged my tree from the feathers I knocked off and it was 65 yards. I had a good rest and felt like I made a good shot. I would never shoot that far intentionally and I wouldn't be surprised if I killed that gobbler.  I looked for him but couldn't find anything. I went back two other mornings and never heard him again. I had ranged a tree that was fifty and didn't realize he was past the tree in the heat of the moment.  It would have been nice to have three turkeys in the freezer.  I may make a run up to Tennessee for a couple hunts up there. I did shoot a hog on the way back to the truck yesterday so at meat I got a couple tenderloins on my last trip haha. Good luck to the rest of y'all.


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[aclawrence]

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[turkey harvester]

Well it seems the older I get the less I care about beard size and such. Its been a very tough season in Mo this year. 25 year low on numbers doesn't help either. But Saturday, Huck and I went to a private farm that normally produces good gobbling. Never heard a bird gobble. Do we decided to just start walking and looking in some fields we can hunt. Things were not looking good as we didnt see or hear crap. We were actually fixing to head to a different farm when my brother spots 2 white heads in the tall grass in a field. I broke out the full strutter and showed it to them and wow!! These birds came charging in on us rather quickly. They hit a dip in front of us and I couldn't seem em until they were right on top of us. Big red head, wanting to act like a big boy, so he'll die like a big boy. That hunt once again went from zero to 100 in a matter of minutes. My nephew who killed his first bird youth season got to watch the whole show. It was great!! Turns out he's an almost 18lb jake with a 5" beard and I'm just as happy with him if he would have been 25lbs!! My wife was sick so that was my last day to hunt too. Ended good and he ate well!!

[wvhoyt19]

Congrats!!


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[Turkeyman]

Congrats turkey harvester.

[aclawrence]

I made a last minute run to Tennessee and was able to connect on a nice ole gobbler up there. I went up to my brothers place and did a quick hunt Friday afternoon and didn't hear or see anything. I camped out and hunted the next morning and all was quiet on the farm. There was one bird gobbling but he was across a highway.  My brother text me to go try another farm that his father in law owns so I made a run over to that place. I walked all over the place over there and couldn't turn up anything. I went back to my brothers place and hung out with him for a minute before they had to leave to go somewhere.  He told me to stop at one last place on the way home and gave me a key to the gate. This particular place is loaded with turkeys and is where I had originally planned to go, but the other family member backed out last minute so that's why I had hunted the other places. With a gate key in hand I took off with a renewed sense of expectation and hope. I had thought my season was over but I now had a chance.  I've killed a few turkeys on this land and took off walking towards the back of the property to where I killed a gobbler last year.  This land has two huge ridges/hills that run parallel to each other and a road they keep mowed in the bottom in between the hills. I walk a little over a half mile down the road and veer off into the woods. I end up walking over to the exact tree I killed my turkey at last year.  I had been calling along the way and sat down for about 20 minutes or so. This was probably in the 11:00 time frame. Nothing was talking and I had just packed up my calls when a owl hooted and a bird gobbled 80-100yds away. I was totally caught of guard. I called to him and sat there another little while but he never made another sound. I'm wondering if he had snuck in to my calling and seen me and left and gobbled at the owl on the way out. Anyway I make a huge loop through some big woods and back down through a big grown up hillside and finally back to the road in the bottom. I slipped my vest off to take a break and I saw some movement in the road. I ducked down and grabbed my binos and saw a gobbler in the road that I had walked in on. There is tall grass on both sides of the road but there was some shrubby stuff across the road so I got down and crawled across to the shrubs. There was a bend in the road there so the gobbler couldn't see me. Once I got behind the shrubs I stood up and glassed down the road and saw that there was two gobblers. A strutter and his sidekick. I waited to see if they were moving my way. I figured I'd have the least chance of screwing it up if I just sat there and waited on them but they were drifting the other way. They were actually camped out in a shady spot but they eventually started moving away from me. I got out in the road and crawled for what seemed like a long ways and eventually was able to get off the road and close the distance when I got some terrain between me and the birds.  I crawled right up to where they had been hanging out and I could see they had moved about 100yds down to the next shaded area. I tried calling and nothing worked until I finally did a Jake yelp. He gobbled at that one time. I called some more and he wasn't really in the mood. He finally gobbled on his own and I cut and yelped right back to him. This flipped the switch and they started my way. I eased forward to where my shotgun was laying in the road and just part of my head was poking out of the grass into the road. It would be dicey but I thought by the time they might see me it would be too late. I had been throwing my calls back behind me into the ditch and unfortunately the birds left the road in that direction before they were close enough to shoot. I was only catching glimpses of bits and pieces in the road so I'm not sure how close they came. I thought I was hearing drumming off to my side in the ditch and a bird gobbled. He was still out in front of me but fairly close. Maybe 50 or 60 yds. He gobbled again and it sounded like he was moving away again. I got out in the road and did a bent over jog to where the thick stuff came to an end and it opened back up. I peeked out and was looking for the turkey. He saw me first and jumped into flight. I didn't even think about what happened next. I just through up and put my red dot on his head and squeezed the trigger. I probably shouldn't have taken that shot but it felt good in the moment and I had a good sight picture. Feathers went everywhere and he flew about 100yds and it looked like he was going to land around the corner in thicket around a stream. The pile of feathers was about 30yds from where I was standing. I followed along where he had went and almost stepped on him while I was scanning ahead into the brush. He was stone dead. It turned out it was a pretty good shot and he just glided down to his finally resting spot. He had one nice sharp spur and the other was just a 1/4-3/8 nub like a Jake. The sharp spur almost looks like it had a double spur wanting to grow or had been injured. The birds on this farm are heavy and this one said 23 lbs on my old scale. I couldn't find my digital scale anywhere but this one says 20 on the dot for my 20 lb weight. Most of the turkeys we have taken here are 21-23lbs or so. I've gotten to squeeze the trigger on four turkeys this year. The first three were all Alabama public land and I only got to bring one home. I was thankful to get to run up to Tennessee and get in one more hunt on some private land. Here's a late season tip. I was expecting the birds to be in the timber in the shade and not out in the road where the birds were. When I was laying in the grass I was baking in the sun but when I moved into the shade where the birds had been standing it must have been 20 degrees cooler. I couldn't believe the difference. So the turkeys might still be in an open road or out in a field somewhere. Make sure you glass into the dark shady places really well. I shot this turkey at 2:00.






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[turkey harvester]

Awesome job!! Congrats