Woke up this morning (and bought myself a gun)
It’s raining graupel this morning. It’s above freezing; the little ice balls are hitting the roof and making such a racket that it woke me up. This is not the sort of day for thinking about turkey hunting, but there it is. The switch inside my head has but two settings. One setting is for deer. The other is where it is now. I have already been to the basement once this morning to check on supplies of ammunition. I have enough 3-inch #4’s to last for a few more seasons. My calls are still all packed up. However, I’ll … More . . .
Turkey Season 2016 Post-Mortem
The shotguns are back on the rack. The ammo and calls are put away. For all their work, Angus and SuperCore are eating tag soup. However, we all walked away with actionable intelligence. This was a good year overall for us. Everyone had shooting opportunities. First off, let me talk about the weather and how it affected the turkeys. Coming off a mild winter, this was the most pleasant turkey seasons we’ve had in 15 years at the farm. We had fairly warm mornings in the low-to-mid fifties and highs frequently going into the low 80’s. I think this accelerated … More . . .
Afternoon Tactics– What Blythe Taught me
Mark Hay on T&TH was asking about how I call gobblers in the afternoon, and I thought I’d start a new topic rather than go deeper in the Hunting Pressure thread. This is a description of what I do on my property when I want to entice a gobbler in the afternoon. I save this tactic for a sunny windy day when. I probably would not be seeing gobblers other ways. I wait until about 2 PM and then go to one of several spots where I have seen gobblers strutting in the afternoon and mimic a hen that is … More . . .
A Momentous Occasion
When I started turkey hunting, Ronald Reagan was still in his first term. Ohio had a spring season, but you had to apply for a tag months before to get into a lottery. The closest place I could hunt a spring gobbler was 5 counties over. It took a 3 hour drive to get there. It was in Hocking County, one county over from Vinton where the last remaining flocks had been netted for breeding stock. By 1995, Ohio allowed turkey hunting in Clearmont County. That meant you could now hunt one county over from my house. I was deer … More . . .
Last Tag Filled Amid Mortal Combat
In a way, I am somewhat relieved that the digital audio recorder was not working this morning. It saves me having to listen to it all again, to make it into a podcast. Now that it is over, I do not feel like I have achieved a great victory. In fact, I want to say straight off that I screwed up. Let me back up a bit. Last Saturday was the last chance any of the three of us, had a chance to shoot a bird. Most of the past week, there were no gobblers gobbling on the entire farm. … More . . .
PODCAST: The End of the Galloping Gobbler
Hens were roosting downhill from him, and I think he pitched down to them first. They came uphill to meet up, and then the hens and the gobbler walked the far fence line and emerged at the far end of the pasture, about 80 yards away. The hens crossed into the next pasture and started coming towards me, angling out into the field to feed. The gobbler stayed close to the treeline that held my blind and soon was making his final approach in full strut. I waited until he crossed behind a large tree and brought my gun up. … More . . .
The New Honey Hole
I was back at the New Honey Hole today, erecting a blind. This spot differs in one main way from the original Honey Hole, about 10 yards to the north: it is considerably more exposed. I took a 5X12′ piece of burlap and split it lengthwise, and surrounded it with a paracord. Here is the result after it was hung Views: 3 Related posts: PODCAST: The Honey Hole PODCAST: Three Jakes at the Honey Hole PODCAST: Gobblers at the Honey Hole Honey Hole II PODCAST: Return to the Honey Hole 2018 Requiem for the Honey Hole PODCAST: The Kitchen Sink … More . . .
A Question About Turkey Ammo
This is a question that is asked more out of ignorance than anything else. I don’t want to be confused with the Old Schoolers that think you have to limit your kit to what your grandfather used. I also do not want to suggest there is an ethical issue here. As far as I am concerned, all I owe the gobbler is a quick death. Period. Mine is a question of practicality and economy more than anything. My question is about the loads we choose to use turkey hunting. First off, my confession. When I started out, a 2 3/4″ … More . . .
The Westwood Blind
Over to the west of Garbage Pit, there was a bunch of fallen cedar boughs. I was out this morning scouting and decided that we probably needed a new turkey blind over that way. See what y’all think. Views: 5 Related posts: Do you hunt turkeys in a blind? The Blind Squirrel Gets Ambushed — A Pre-Season Tale A Turkey Hunter Takes a Fearless Inventory PODCAST: The Galloping Gobbler
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PODCAST: The Galloping Gobbler
Over Easter, I was finally able to make it back down to Turkey Camp. It was a quiet morning at the new Honey Hole when all of a sudden. . . Podcast — The Galloping Gobbler Click on the link. It runs about about a 1/2 hour right after I got up to stretch. If I had been sitting in my old seat at The Honey Hole, he would have stopped about 10 feet in front of my barrel. After the gobbler left, I started walking back towards the house. The galloping gobbler was still down in Left Leg Creek, … More . . .
Requiem for the Honey Hole
For the past ten years, I have spent a good deal of time out at The Honey Hole. The Honey Hole has been my goto spot for both Turkey Hunting as well as my pre-season recording sessions that end up in my podcasts. It has been a fantastic spot to hunt– probably about 20 gobblers have been shot by the Shamanic Dream Team. However, The Honey Hole is over. It came to an end sometime in the fall. We must have had a bad windstorm and the old tree fell over. I was heartsick when I saw the old trunk … More . . .
The Shamanic MK I
I’m not saying it’s a work of art, but I pulled it off. Allow me to introduce you to the Shamanic MK I It is a poplar over cherry with walnut ends and a cherry bottom. The goal was just to make something that vaguely sounds turkey-like. What I got was a deep raspy call with a lots of volume. Frankly, I’m leaving puddles, I’m so happy with it– not because of the tone, but that I got any tone at all. This was my first project of this level since 8th Grade Shop, and I came up out of … More . . .
Turkey Season Post-Mortem 2015
Sunday Morning, I decided a little bit earlier than usual to call it quits and come in. I had just had a ball playing with a mess of jakes. I could have all of them, many times over, but held my fire. These were probably the same bunch I had seen all season. Next year I should have a good cohort of 2-year-olds to hunt. I had taken the same spot near Midway that I had been seated the day before. They had run down the freshly seeded field. This scenario had played out several times this season. When they … More . . .
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