The Old Days are gone, at least for now….

[arkrem870]

Turkeys are still turkeys and they will always have similar habits and quirks. They are being hunted differently now with technology and the current public land craze. Seasons are changing, start dates are changing. Bag limits are changing.  But turkeys are still turkeys.

[Brillo]

Reminds me of elk hunting in Colorado a couple of years ago.  My first elk hunt and DIY.  It was a week long parade of hunters waaay up in the mountains.  Some old timers I ran into said..." You should have been here in the old days before You Tube and beetle kill." The elk hunting may never be the same just because of beetle kill.  If the current downward spiral of the turkey is biological, turkey hunting may never be the same.  Both are mournful for the old timers and I feel ya bro.  Very sad, but not completely devastating.  The old timers in Co. still knew how to get it done on elk and they had a blast trying. A few of the guys I met there had fun trying to help me and also had their own success.  Never met a better bunch of men.  Tom, you would fit right in.   You can cry in your beer a bit but then you need to get your calls and your gun and get after it while  the glass is still half full. 

[Greg Massey]

I can remember around our area of the farm, we had people who had cows and farm the land with row cropping. Most all of this has gone by the way side.. Most of these hard working farmers are no longer around. Fields are all grown up with vegetation, timber has been cut and the habitat has all changed.  Do any of you realize how much it cost to just put in food plots on your hunting ground? Several dollars which include tractor / equipment, fuel, seed and fertilizer. So all of this has changed the overall turkey population alone with habitat and predators.  Some are more fortunate than others because habitat hasn't suffered as drastic of a hit from non-farming practice.  No one traps or hunts predators to speak of and so the life cycle of the plentiful days of lots of turkeys are no more in my area. I do feel we will always have some to hunt, but again i always have HOPE this will continue on our farm because of maintaining the farm and planting food plots..

[sswv]

good read.   I know I've mentioned it on here before...my first spring gobbler hunt was in the 70's and DANG have things changed since. I'd like to say for the better but things were so much simpler back then. I think the fewer choices you have the better off you are. Now there's hundreds of shotgun options, hundreds of ammo options, thousands of call options not to mention decoys and all the fancy camo. If the old guys I hunted with when I was a kid could see things now the would laugh till they were blue in the face.

[Tom007]

Reminds me of elk hunting in Colorado a couple of years ago.  My first elk hunt and DIY.  It was a week long parade of hunters waaay up in the mountains.  Some old timers I ran into said..." You should have been here in the old days before You Tube and beetle kill." The elk hunting may never be the same just because of beetle kill.  If the current downward spiral of the turkey is biological, turkey hunting may never be the same.  Both are mournful for the old timers and I feel ya bro.  Very sad, but not completely devastating.  The old timers in Co. still knew how to get it done on elk and they had a blast trying. A few of the guys I met there had fun trying to help me and also had their own success.  Never met a better bunch of men.  Tom, you would fit right in.   You can cry in your beer a bit but then you need to get your calls and your gun and get after it while  the glass is still half full.

The same is happening with Elk in Colorado. I saw it first hand. Colorado is addressing Elk license/permit availability by adjusting same. How ironic  are the similarities to Elk and Turkey hunting. We can all just do what we can to help out. Take an ethical approach with everything you do in the woods, support the right organizations that will further our causes, and hope nature does their part. It is a lot to ask, but realize we are protecting more than a lot here.....thank you all for the great input!

[guesswho]

I started in the mid 60's as a kid of two hard core turkey hunters.   I tell you what I miss most of all.  Sitting around an open campfire with my parents and usually another die hard turkey hunter as gator tail, swamp cabbage and usually grits were being prepared.   And more times than not the local WMA game warden Glenn Ivey would stop by and hang out.   They even named a trail after him after his passing.  I'd sit around for hours playing in the fire and listening to those old stories (probably enhanced versions).   All while listening to the airboats in the distance on Kissimmee.   I'd give anything to go back to one of those weekends of the 60's and 70's.   I'd gladly leave my gun and modern equipment in 2023 just to get a chance to relive of few days of that era again. 

[Paulmyr]

In 50yrs these will be the good old days and old men, like some of  us here, will yearn for them.

[Mallard1897]

Hat's off to all of those doing this since pretty much the beginning of the restoration or hunted the truly wild birds. I've only been at this for a few decades so I haven't seen the waves of change you all know so well. Just in the time since I started there has been an unfortunate downturn. Hope we turn it around so someday I can show my kids the good old days and not just tell them stories about days gone.

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[mikejd]

Funny because the places I hunt and have for the last 30 years have substantially less turkey hunters.
If I did not read on here how many new hunters there are I would never believe it. There are equally less Turkeys
I can go a week without even hearing a bird now.I have my beliefs as to why but thats not the point.

[Tail Feathers]

It's changed, no doubts about that.  But we still go, hoping for those precious few magic turkey mornings where it all comes together.  For some lucky guys, it happens more than others, but we all have to go.

[Tom007]

It's changed, no doubts about that.  But we still go, hoping for those precious few magic turkey mornings where it all comes together.  For some lucky guys, it happens more than others, but we all have to go.

Amen to all for this!

[WV Flopper]

 To the OP:

Don't know why, but I just seen this "Not the first time" it struck me as funny, this time.

Our days gone bye, be it the 70's, 80's, or 90's was never seen by a lot of these guys. So today is their best memory of what it could be. Hopefully, it gets better for them.

[SDK]

New to Turkey but have been hunting and fishing since the 1970's. I've always tried to keep a "young mind" but have a few good memories of the old days, and knowing they are never coming back does get depressing sometimes.

I grew up on Eastern Long Island, back when it was largely a sleepy suburb and farming community. We used to grab some beers and head out to Montauk or other jetties and fish for Striped Bass all night. The Stripers were plentiful and the shore largely empty. We knew all the night shift cops, and because we were clean and respectful, they either left us alone or sometimes hung out with us. Now anywhere you go out there is either private property or shoulder to shoulder internet warriors with $2,000 rod reel combos and GoPros. Police are all over. Loudness and fights are common, and you literally could not pay me to go out there anymore.

Same with deer hunting. We would hop in my buddy's truck and just drive half the night into rural upstate NY. Then find a dirt road to drive down, pitch a tent and hunt. Again, always respectful of Posted areas, and clean and respectful of any property.

You just can't do that anymore. It seems like everything is a landmine of property rights, and I need to have my nose in OnX Hunt to make sure I don't step out of line.

I actually became a more successful deer hunter as I got older, but I sure remember it being a lot more fun back in the day.....

[Meleagris gallopavo]

I don't have a frame of reference for how things were as we didn't have turkeys where I grew up.  I didn't start turkey hunting until later in life once the turkeys were reintroduced.  I'm lucky to have access to a lot of private land to hunt that holds plenty of turkeys.  Typically I latch on quickly to new hunting equipment, some of it helps me and some of it doesn't.  My style of hunting changes from year to year and from situation to situation.  Some of the old timers I talk to around here say the turkeys have changed behaviors since they were reintroduced.  So the more experienced hunters have had to change tactics. 


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[MNGobbler]

Great thread and I appreciate all of you sharing your view points with the rest of us! I am always interested to hear it from so many different perspectives. Just another reason a place like this is such a great one to be a part of!