My buddy Andy and I got drawn to hunt a WMA in Louisiana for their opening weekend so we were pretty excited, well as excited as we could be about going to one of toughest states to kill a turkey in. With very little intel to go off of we both reached out to a few folks to try to get an idea of what to expect. The info was promising and its always fun to see new ground anyway.
With my work schedule, Andy living in Alabama and gas being crazy high there wasn't any on boots on the ground scouting that could be done so we were going blind. A lot of onX scouting done by both of us. Our hunt was for Saturday and Sunday, Andy was able to get there around 3pm Friday afternoon and ride around some of the WMA just to get his eyes on some of the spots that he had seen on onX. He called me and told me he had made it and that it wasn't looking good. He had not found any burns, open pine woods or hardwood creek bottoms like we had been told about. Instead he found Crazy thick pine plantation, thick cutovers, thinned pine plantation that had grown up with so much trash it was impossible to see 15yds and the SMZ creek bottoms had only holly bushes scrub oaks and gum trees in them and it was a literal wall of vegetation once you got to them. He said its the thickest stuff he's ever tried to hunt and that there was people everywhere on every road or access road he traveled down. Not the phone call I was expecting and I honestly thought he was joking with me, he wasn't.
I work all night and finally got to leave around 3:15 or so and I'm already an hour behind when I wanted to leave. Andy had sent me some pins and as I was looking at them, the first one he sent me overlapped a pin I had placed on a spot that looked promising so I decided that I would start there. I was late and didn't get to the access until 7am and to my surprise there wasn't anyone on this access road. There wasn't even any tire tracks past the half way point. I parked my truck at the end of the road and got out of my truck. I was standing listening to the wind howl and every now and then some rain would start up but the skies were clear for the most part.
In the distance I hear what I think is a faint gobble. I couldn't believe it I was happy that I heard a gobble then I hear another but both are so far away its hard to tell the direction. I just got a pair of Tetra hearing aids to try out so I figured what the heck, lets see if I can hear them with these in. I had put all my stuff on and then turned the Tetra's on and I hear a bird gobble way off my right shoulder but I couldn't tell the distance so I pulled the Tetra's out to see what he sounded like without them and when he gobbled the next time he was about 150yds, I freaked out. I broke and ran about 40yds into the woods still in sight of my truck but it was so thick I couldn't go any farther without making a ton of noise and he was closing the distance fast. He gobbles again at about 60yds and is down a select cut row that's all grown up, I call and he cuts me off, I call and he cuts me off. This goes on for a few minutes, he's just on the other side of a thicket and he's ripping it. I crawl up to another tree in hopes that I can see him but I can't see anything but briars and privet hedge. He's still gobbling but has now drifted away to about 80yds so I make the decision to try to get in front of him. I crawl back a ways and get up and run straight away from him, then used the rolling ridges to get below and start my way around him. It so loud and there are tops and chunks of trees and just crap everywhere, I hit a big bunching ground that i had to navigate through. I finally get around all that and see a clump of dirt up next to the dirt trail I came in on and I figure I'm about 200yds from where he last was so I ease up to the mound and stand up beside a pine tree that has some holly bushes and privet hedge around it and across the trail I can see a 12ft lane where they brought logs out of the pines. I told myself that if I beat him here then I could kill him in that lane. How crazy for me to be that confident and naïve. But it did happen just about how I envisioned it in my head, emphasis on the just about part.
I catch a little movement 30yds away in the edge of the path and in the time it took my brain to tell my hands, arms and trigger finger that it was a gobbler that sucker was across the path and gone in a literal blur, I was in disbelief of what just happened. I was scanning the bushes in hopes of seeing him and I hear a gobble below me about 150yds, so I spin around and move to a tree to see what happens, I make a soft call and he gobbles again at about 800yds then again almost out of hearing. I just laugh and say dang runner right there he'd give Usain Bolt a run for his money. I walk over to see if the gobbler had seen me but it was so thick there was no way, he just ran past me and then crossed the path and kept going below me. It was nuts.
I walk back to my truck and I can still ever so slightly hear him gobbling and moving. I looked at my map and picked a pine row on the same elevation that he was traveling down and thought it I could get over there I may have shot. Well after crawling and fighting my way a mile deep in that mess he was not getting any closer so I crawled and fought my way back to my truck. I hear him again and I had him marked on my map so I called Andy to see how his morning had gone, He had not heard anything so I told him to ride over to me and that we could go try to find this bird since he would gobble every so often.
He finally gets to where I am and I tell him that I'm Happy Mad lol and told him about my brief encounter. Then we decided to leave my truck where it was and take his to another access road and see if we could find that running rascal. We park and walk into the woods and call, nothing. We walk and look and call and nothing. After an hour or so I said why don't we just work our way back to my truck and maybe we will strike one on the way. Andy agreed and we started the journey. When we get about 300yds from my truck off in this creek bottom jungle we hear a faint gobble, we looked at each other then another gobble, we point in 180deg different direction on where we thought it came from. I just started laughing and said that we had a 50\50 shot at getting closer. He gobbles again and we agree in the direction that time and he's back by Andy's truck. So we go back through the mess we just came through. He gobbles again and we cut about 500yds and make a call and he gobbles 500yds off, we cut about 250yds off and call and he's 500yds off in a different direction, we cut that in half and call and he's now 800yds off in another direction. Andy now looks at me with this look on his face and I just laughed and said I told you he was a runner. I looked at my map and figured he was now on the edge of a private field up by the truck and hoped he would hang around there long enough for us to get close, so we took off in that direction.
Now as we're closing the distance we are using a crow call and he will gobble at it. We cut the distance in half and call on the crow call and he gobbles but this time it sounds funny, it sounds like 2 birds. So we cut the distance to about 400yds and crow call, they both gobble again and they are in the same place. We decide to use the rows of trees and thickets to block our approach and ease down one cut row. Andy crow calls and they gobble not 100yds away now, up over a slight ridge. It takes us 5min or so to find a tree and figure out which path we think they will take. We get set up but Andy cant see so I tell him to get beside me on the tree I was on.
We are on the edge of a cut lane thick with privet and just junk, the bottom of the slight ridge is 40yds away and it is thick with pine trees and privet, but I can see one small opening at 60yds. It's not ideal but it's all we've got.
Andy asks me if I'm ready and he gives a soft series of calls with his two sided pot and the turkey gobble but now they are 300yds away. We now are faced with what do we do and I said lets let them gobble one more time then that will make the decision for us. He calls again and they gobble now 150yds out. It worked, Andy set his call down and got his gun up on the other side of the tree. About 5min goes by and he says there they are, at your 10o'clock easing down the hill. Its so thick it took me a little while to finally see one then the other. One stop and just looks around the other keeps coming but he's moving from thick clump to thick clump and just stops and stares. He's at 45yds but I'd have to push through the privet that I'm setting behind and using for some cover so its a no go for me and Andy can't see him from his angle. He steps behind the thick brush and out of sight, now I cant see either bird and they are both less that 60yds. This rocks on for a while 5 maybe 10min maybe more, but long enough that I'm in a bind with the way I'm holding my gun and Andy said he was in a real bind too. Then Andy says they are moving back up the hill and in both our minds we thought that if they clear that ridge were moving up on the hill, a few more painful minutes pass because were both scared to move I Finally hear Andy whisper here they come, they changed their minds. Then he says can you see him he's 45yds away right behind the double tree. I can't see anything, finally I see the top bird easing down the hill so I fixate on him. He's moving ever so slowly and just looking as he passes my 40yd mark and steps in the bottom I loose him and the path he was taking will put him in the last openish hole I can see. As he walks though it I settle my red dot on his head and give a slight yelp and he turns to walk our way(maybe). I don't remember touching that little 20 off but that gobbler cut a back flip and never even quivered. At the shot I look at the hill and the other gobbler steps out from behind the thicket and just stands there looking. I said Kill'em Andy Kill'em then boooommm and that gobbler flips. That was it for me I couldn't take much more I just laid back on the ground and tried to hold it together as best I could which wasn't to good, lol.
Andy jumps up and runs out to his bird, I finally get my up and hobble over to check out my bird. We were both in total disbelieve and awe of what all had just transpired. From the low lows to the head scratching on what to do next to the highest of highs. We had just doubled in arguably the hardest State to find a bird in. We high fived and said a prayer to the Good Lord above because without a doubt that was some answered prayers that saved that hunt.
I roughly figured it up just off of the gobbles and locations, the bird I got on at daylight traveled a minimum of 2.5miles before meeting up with the other bird at 11am and we put our hands on them at 12:04pm. I don't know how far we walked but it was a looooong way. There was a road less than 100yds on the other side of the ridge and there was 4 vehicles that drove down it while we were set up on those birds. Thankfully no one stopped to listen around there.
We got back to the campsite and had a few folks come congratulate us and then ask how long we had been hunting Louisiana and when we told them it was both our first mornings they laughed and said we better go buy lottery tickets because that isn't normal at all. I told them that if I heard a bird I was going home with a win. It was crazy thick and tough but persistence payed off
Two fine Cajun country gobblers.
A sample of what we were hunting.
More of the mess were were in.
Celebratory local meal.
