Mark Twain NF planning help

[RiverRoost]

My brother and I are looking into making a trip from Ms up to Mark Twain next season and this will be my first public ground out of state hunt. I feel like going next season will give me time to do my research and have a good plan instead of striking out this year. Any tips on the hunt, pm locations to start or info you can share with me will be greatly appreciated and kept top secret. Thanks for the direction and looking forward to the trip.

[Rzrbac]

Mark Twain is big, it's several counties. I can tell you a few spots in one county. You should know this, in my area there is a lot of timber cutting so it may not be what you think. I will also say in my area we haven't had a good hatch in 3 years. I'm not trying to sound discouraging, I'll be happy to give you a couple of locations in the areas I hunt but it's not what it used to be.

[Greg Massey]

We hunting out of Alton Ms ... but that's been years ago... it pretty tuff hunting terrain ... one of the problems we always had was the locals riding and calling from the roads ... We always camped off the 11 point River and hunted the Irish Wilderness ....

[Rzrbac]

Beautiful country around Alton. I used to have 665 acres leased just west of there. Deer hunting was great but in the spring the birds just didn't use that farm much, they were always on adjoining properties.

I'm not sure how the population is over in Oregon county but in Wayne it's down.

Mark Twain has some beautiful country for sure. Hope our birds get a good hatch and bounce back.

[James gang]

Not the same since they have been cutting the timber been hunting mark twain for over 30 yrs less birds now than ive ever seen not the big pretty woods it was looks like a bomb went off they are not leaving anything cut all the oak and hickory and gonna replant pine guess the deer and turkey are gonna eat pine cones

[Ozarks Hillbilly]

Not the same since they have been cutting the timber been hunting mark twain for over 30 yrs less birds now than ive ever seen not the big pretty woods it was looks like a bomb went off they are not leaving anything cut all the oak and hickory and gonna replant pine guess the deer and turkey are gonna eat pine cones

X2
It's a shame the way the National Forest Service has decimated area's of the Mark Twain in South Central Missouri. Between that and the bad hatch's have bird numbers down again this year for sure.

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[turkey harvester]

They have slaughtered the woods around the Irish Wilderness!! Hunter numbers are incredible too. I live 3 miles from irish between the camo army, lack of birds, and terrible looking woods, bout time the MDC took their head out their ars and quit worrying about the stupid elk, bears, and any other critters that don't make their money. They've done such a fine job with all their hog trapping...NOT.

[Jstocks]

I hate to hear all this. I started my out of state hunting sometime back around 1999 on J Highway. We always camped just north of the fox pen and I'd ride over there at night and talk to the old hunters around their fire and listen to the dogs run for awhile. The Irish Wilderness and the Handy Church Road always had some birds. Each year was different and some would be better than others, but we always had fun.

I hunted Mark Twain last week. I actually killed one on Tuesday. I'll say I have never seen the numbers as low as they are now, nor have I ever encountered so many hunters. I literally was parking at 3:30 am and walking back 2 miles down a walk in area. At 4:30 one morning a fella come down there, and we talked, and he respectfully went back towards the truck. At 5:30, here come a guy walking up and he acted like he was wanting to go down the trail (the birds were roosted 300 yards from us. I finally had to tell him that he knew he parked next more than one vehicle, and that he had to have passed. The other hunter coming in there, and that we were there to hunt the turkeys between us and the edge of the peninsula we were on. He respectfully turned and went back towards the truck somewhere. Dang I just never seen such. When we come out there were 6 trucks parked on one road less than a mile long.