Mexico?

[TrackeySauresRex]

Scary schtuff right there in that story! :0

[capecodmike]

Tough enough to win the home games.

[Dtrkyman]

It was on his uncharted show a while ago.

[Bottomland OG]

It was on his uncharted show a while ago.

I want to say this episode was on tv a couple years ago I watched and he was telling the story and had a little footage to go along with it.

[captpete]

Lots of places in this world that are MUCH safer that I would rather visit/hunt.

[2flyfish4]

Seems this topic is mostly about goulds in northern mexico.

What about ocellated in the Yucatan? Still not a good place?

[PalmettoRon]

I've not hunted in Campeche state in Mexico which is where almost all of the Mexican Ocellated trips are.

I do have friends who have been and said it was fine.

If you google Campeche and the city of Merida which is where most fly into, it is considered safe.

Lots of Americans go to Merida and the crime rate is low. I suspect that is even more true out in the country side.

I hunted in Guatemala with Lovett Williams for Ocellated, years ago and had a good time and no issues although there were more risks in that area. Actually called the birds up using a Doug Camp owl hooter and an electronic caller to mimic the sound of the male bird.

[YoungGobbler]

The police pulled them over at 3:45 in the morning and then let them go. The police then followed them and pulled them over again once they got a mile or so down a dirt road. The cop never got out of the car and stayed there until a pickup with 3 guys with Ak's showed up.

The police comment reminded me of the first time I/we went down there on our initial DIY hunt back in 2006. We had heard the stories about the police pulling people over...especially "foreigners"...and basically extorting money out of them before letting them go. 

We had hunted several days without issue, were driving back, and were almost to the U.S. Port of Entry when I noticed a police car coming up behind us on the rural highway we were on.  I nervously watched in my rear view mirror as the car followed along behind us for a while, and as expected, the lights came on and we were pulled over. I said to my buddy,..."Oh no, here we go", fully expecting to be harassed for a while and then having to pay some sort of "ransom" to get out of it.

We got out of my truck as two policemen got out of their patrol car and walked up to us.  We knew almost zero Spanish, but they knew just enough English to ask us what we were up to. With enough gesturing, pointing, and "pigeon-English" thrown in, we finally made them understand we had been "guajolote" hunting.

Their initial stern attitude gradually changed and, before long, they seemed genuinely interested and curious about our hunt.  We showed them the gobblers we had harvested, how we had used turkey calls to call them to us, and even pulled out our calls and demonstrated some turkey calling for them. All the while, I was still expecting them to demand some sort of bribe to let us go on.

However, after a few minutes, they just smiled and told us to go ahead, never demanding a thing from us. We jumped in the truck and headed on up the road towards the Port as quickly as we could...making sure to obey all speed limits and traffic rules...of course.   

I know a lot of Mexicans who live 'up here' and they are all very impressed and interested when I tell them I hunt 'Pavos y venados'... They would all want to come with me!

[ChiefBubba]

42 posts and the bad far out weighs the good. No way I'm going do there. I don't need one of them ugly sobs. Goulds well hopefully by the time I can't hunt anymore they'll be enough in the SW USA to hunt. Bubba

[BBR12]

Seems this topic is mostly about goulds in northern mexico.

What about ocellated in the Yucatan? Still not a good place?

I had a friend (that went with a very reputable outfitter) that their camp in the jungle was taken hostage and held all day while the rest of the bad dudes went further into the jungle to rob another camp. The bad guys took everything they could load up. Left two vehicles but disabled them and told them if they left camp before the next day they would be killed. They got one vehicle running and waited till the next day to go into town. Cops would only take the report of "lost" passports. They didn't want to hear about them being robbed.
The outfitter said it was probably Guatemalan's that were running security for the cartels. They had never had an issue before that day.

[Yoder409]

Guess I'm glad I went twice and survived both times.

Luckily I got a pair of Gould's, a pair of Ocellateds, and I'm too poor to go do either hunt again.   

[GobbleNut]

Guess I'm glad I went twice and survived both times.

Luckily I got a pair of Gould's, a pair of Ocellateds, and I'm too poor to go do either hunt again. 

I hear ya' buddy!  A couple of decades ago, I was fortunate enough to be able to go down there several times when it was relatively cheap. Back then, we could kill two gobblers for half the price of killing a single bird now. Times have changed, for sure. Even if I was willing to risk it, I am just not willing to pay the current price to kill another one.

As for the safety issue, I'm not sure we were any safer back then than it seems to be now, but we never had a problem. Looking back, I cringe a little bit thinking about what could have happened based on the stories we hear about recently. Perhaps things were safer back then...but perhaps we were just lucky...

Having said that, for those considering going down there through a reputable outfitter, I think the odds of having a good, safe hunt are pretty high. We don't hear about all the hunts that take place without incident...just the few that do which admittedly are pretty scary...and make a guy think twice about going.