This story goes back almost 40 years. That's when I first started turkey hunting. I grew up on the north side of Cincinnati, Ohio. At the time I started, the nearest county offering turkey hunting in Ohio was 3 hours' drive from town. Little by little, the turkeys kept marching east, and by 1990 you could hunt them in Clermont County, only one country over from me. I was deer hunting there at the time, but I never saw a bird. They were in SW Indiana as well, but I never saw them east of the Great Miami River until a few years ago.
Over the years, I've marked the progress of the birds. 25 years ago, I got a house on the north side that was close one of the county parks, and I figured I'd at least try to call every year and see. About 5 years ago, I heard they'd showed up in a small park about a mile from the house. In 2016, I got my 4 yr. old granddaughter out and managed to call up a gobbler together in that park.
Last year, I opened up my back door and did the ceremonial annual call with my loudest box call, and got the faintest hint of a response. Last summer, my sons saw a gobbler standing in the middle of the road on the road behind the house, so I know they're in the adjoining woods. I'm waiting for a warm morning here in a few weeks to give it another try.
Meanwhile, I know they're closing in from the south. Cincinnati has them in an abandoned golf course and city park a mile or so south of me.
