DartonJager
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- Apr 1, 2016
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I just finished my states two day youth hunt and would like to share with everyone the things that we did well and some greenhorn mistakes that should have NEVER been made by this veteran turkey hunter with 30+ seasons behind him and having taken over 45 turkeys and called in at least that many for friends and family.
Will say right off I made 3 mistakes and my friend made two that prevented my son from killing a turkey.
Things done well:
#1-Preseason scouting.
Even though my friend and I know this land well I still spent five mornings and three evenings rossting and two all day walks prior to season opening scouting. Especially the last two days prior to opening morning.
#2-Scouted and found multiple areas to hunt and confirmed 100% they had good numbers of Toms In them. Found three roosts Toms were using every morning and evening I sat them.
#3-Found paths into all roosts that allowed us to get within 70 or less yards as quietly as possible in the dark. And never once spooked a turkey while getting set up.
#4-Confirmed near exact locations of roosted Toms prior to each mornings hunt.
#5-Confirmed based on actual Tom sightings Toms were using same strutting/feeding areas as in years past.
#6-Set up both mornings within 60 yards or less of roosted Toms.
Now for the mistakes I/we made that caused my son to not kill a Tom:
#1-The evening before opening morning I was sitting in an adjoining hedgerow about 125 yards dead west of the roost which runs north and south and its split by a creek. I had with me an aerial photo (AP) of the roost. My original plan was to set up the field on the west side of the roost in a group of three trees I saw on my AP, as I had seen them fly down in to it two out of four mornings in a row, but while scouting that evening I discovered there was no way to set up on the trees facing the roost because they were in bush much to thick to set up in and we would have to set up on the edge of the actual roost with the roosted Toms to our backs. Also looking at the AP it dawned on me if they flew down into the field I was sitting near they had a very limited area to go to and were essentially trapped between two creeks and would be much easier to find and put a stalk on them VS if the flew down into the area on the east side of the creek which was 3-4x larger and area and would be harder to spot and put a stalk on if we needed to run and gun. My gut strongly said change plans and set up on the east side of the creek as it was even easier to get into that side of the roost than the side I was planning to hunt and I had heard a very large amount of gobbling after 8am in that area during recent scouting trips. Also if they flew down to the east side of the roost it would most likely be into a grass covered access path the farmer used to the fields the state let him farm.
Unfortunately for my son I didn't listen to my gut instinct and the overwhelming reasons I should've changed and I incorrectly and inflexibly decided to stick with my original plan. I visually confirmed at least three Toms and 5 hens roosted there and the Toms near exact locations.
Opening mourning found us set up on the west side of the roost. As it turned out we had four Toms roosted and one was literally roosted in a tree less than 10 yards behind us and above my sons and mines head and his first gobble about caused my son to soil his undies. My friend got his binos on the Toms and regrettably indicated none were facing the field we were sitting on and all flew down to the other side of the creek. My Gut instinct was right yet again.
We played sneak and peek the rest of the day on both sides of the creek were almost constantly into birds and had eight very close calls with Toms and my friend made a greenhorn rookie error and stepped out from the brush into a field and spooked a lone strutting Tom. Didn't help it was an absolutely immense Tom with a beard he claims he has never before seen the equal of and he's seen literally 100s of Toms.
What we both found unique to this turkey season and absolutely bewildering is only once did we ever see a strutting Tom either day while hunting. All other Toms we saw were walking and feeding, walking with hens, or just walking to get somewhere. Never in 30+ years of turkey hunting had either of us experienced this. WE ALWAYS had spotted strutting toms and were able to stalk up on them and either call them in or ambush them.
The fact the Toms were always on the move and save for one we never could hunt a strutting Tom made hunting very hard as we were constantly hauling *** trying to get in front either a lone Tom but most often it was a group of 2-3 Toms on the move with not always but often with hens.
Next mistake I made and the worst of the trip was on morning of day two.
I had roosted two Toms and knew literally the tree one was in as well as where two hens had roosted. I had picked out a good spot facing them to set up in the morning. I had a path in to the roost that would allow us to get in nearly silently. There was a set of RR tracks not to far away and a train went buy every few minuets that I planned on using that noise to cover our actual setting up. At dawn I had us set up with one tom about 60 yards away slightly to our left and the other was roosted about 80 yards away to our right. Two hens were roosted about dead even with our set up. One hen as it turned out was roosted in a tree directly in line with us about 20-25 yards away. We set out two hen decoys 25 yards to my sons right as he is left handed and we felt better to set the decoys closer to the Tom to our right as he was farther away.
Both Toms gobbled very well the Tom to our right gobbled almost non stop of 30 minuets. The tom to our right we didn't see but heard him fly down first. We did see him step out into the lane about 80 yards away we were set up on he looked at our decoys and walked away. The other Tom I had been watching since first butt crack of dawn was facing OH NO away from us towards the west field, but thankfully my friends and mines calling got him turned around on the roost and facing our way. About 40-45 minuets after sun up he flew down into the very thick brush on OUR east side of the creek. I told my son get your gun up and ready to take the safety off. But after 35 minuets no Tom, no gobbling from him or anything. The hens had flown down long ago.
Now for my absolute inexcusable greenhorn mistake.
I was set up somewhat back in the brush and couldn't see that far down the lane past where the Tom flew down. None of us ever saw the tom or saw him cross the lane like multiple toms with hens did yesterday. Because both hens flew down into the field behind us and to our right I decided to crawl over and peek into the field behind us to see if the Tom was out there. Just as I got on my hands and knees and started to crawl he popped out of the brush at 40-45 yards busted my movement and instantly disappeared back into the brush before my son could do anything. My son could see at least 200 yards down the lane and he never saw anything cross the lane.
So strong was my desire to get my son a Tom and I knew we were running out of time I allowed my impatience born of desire to overcome my better judgment learned from over 3 decades of turkey hunting to ignore what I knew was the right thing to do from countless previous experiences of successfully waiting out a near by Tom I knew was there and I KNEW was far more likely to STILL be there than not. It was an especially painful mistake for me as I knew based on the habitat of the land the Tom had essentially no choice but to come our way or at least cross the pathway in plane sight of us as to our southeast was habitat completely unusable by turkeys and if they have a choice they would avoid entering it and in the last 20+ years neither my friend or I had ever heard a turkey gobble from it let alone seen a turkey in it as it is a huge marshy treeless swamp. And I knew he almost certainly didn't cross the creek as no animal without wings can cross it and it was a windless dead calm morning and if a turkey had flown across the creek we would have heard it.
Then we spent the next 4.5 hours again unsuccessfully playing sneak & peak hide & go seek. Now for my next inexcusable greenhorn mistake I made. Later tgat morning in a different area, we spotted two big Toms and one Jake walking across a field through hedge rows and into the next field. At a decent jog we got to the next field but the Toms and Jake were already ahead of us. We then literally ran our butts off trying to beat them to the next field which was actually an intersection of three adjoining fields and hedgerows and a bigger block of nasty think woods.
We hid ourselves in the brush to our front so any turkey that stepped out into the field wouldn't see us but were not well hidden to our rear and waited to see if the Toms and Jakes would show up but about five minuets passed and with no sign of them. I told my friend I was going to use my favorite loudest mouth call to try to get them to shock gobble. He disagreed saying shock gobbling rarely worked for him. I said I had used this call to call in four of my last seven Toms all from more than 400 yards away out of huge fields I was hunting on.
Now for my mistake. I had learned the hard way over 20 years ago NEVER hen call (have added) (ESPECIALLY if you just saw one or more Toms in your immediate area less than 10 minuets ago) unless you are either set up or at least prepared to take a shot if a Tom silently comes in and shows up. I let out a five or six note string of yelps and a few clucks and waited to hear a gobble back. In less than a minuet after I called my son whispered "Dad we have company I can here someone walking in the woods towards us" before I could even think let alone react to his words out from those woods about 25 yards from us popped the two Toms and one Jake and there we stood unprepared and exposed out in the open, my son had no chance for a shot whatsoever before they instantly disappeared back into the woods they came from.
Last mistake we all made. While walking along the thick impenetrable hedgerows to get to the next field to look for turkeys my fiend got ahead of my son and was glassing before he moved closer to the field and sure enough a Tom just popped out of the woods between my son and him and started to walk towards the field my friend was glassing. As we were all standing still in some pretty thick brush the Tom didn't recognize us as humans and continued walking towards the field until my friend moved and he then the Tom departed like his a** was on fire and his head was catching. My friend did whole hardheartedly commend my son on his excellent sense of firearm safety in that he never made any attempt to shoulder his gun or attempt to shoot in any capacity as he was between the Tom and my son.
So be sure to not make the same mistakes I made especially if you only have two days to turkey hunt those mistakes being:
#1-When you suddenly discover your plan is flawed or a better plan presents itself do not be to afraid to change or at least discuss it with your fellow hunter who is as experienced as you are. Bottom line when you gut is screaming at you listen to it.
#2-Patience is a Turkey hunters best weapon and friend. If you ABSOLUTELY KNOW a turkey is VERY close by ESPECIALLY if you actually have SEEN him or watched him fly down off the roost and he was under 100 yards away and ESPECIALLY somewhere in front of you and you have ABSOLUTELY no evidence or reason to think the Tom longer is around for GOD's SAKE DON'T DO ANYTHING but especially DO NOT get up and MOVE!!!. At least not for an hour.
#3-NEVER step out into a field unless first you 100% confirm there are no turkeys in it.
#4-Never call to Turkeys unless you are prepared for one to come in fast and come in silently
#5-If you are sneaking and peaking and not the hunter, never get ahead of the guy who IS THE hunter.
#6-As a very accomplished turkey hunter I fallow on YouTube named Matt Dale says "Set up is EVERYTHING" I set up less than as well as I could have and I KNEW I was setting up less than as well as I could have. If you are going to set up on lane make sure if at all humanly possible you can set out far enough to see as far as you can down the lane both directions. If you can absolutely don't hesitate to cut some brush to put in front of you to allow you to sit farther out. You don't need much just enough to brake up your outline. We did sit my son farther out then both of us but we all should have been farther out form the brush and upon inspection there were other spots that would have been better to set up in I should have seen when I was there roosting the previous evening.
#6A-If your scouting a roost and If thorny brush is preventing you from sitting in the perfect spot do not hesitate to use a set of pruning shears to clear out for yourself a perfect spot. This is where turkey hunting chairs come into their own. If you have a set of pruning shears and a turkey chair this is no such thing as not a perfect spot due to thorny or impenetrable brush.
One other thing I listened to Matt Dale say that now makes absolute sense to me is that he feels what separates the consistently successful public land turkey hunter for the only occasionally successful is a hunter that learns to understand the topography of the land and how it will affect the turkeys and how it will then undoubtedly affect how you should hunt them. This is especially true on large and larger tracts of public land like I was hunting. Even though I had been walking by that huge swampy area in my pursuit of turkeys for over 10 years it was only this year I finally understood how it affected the turkeys and therefore affected how I must hunt them. I later took a walk around that swampy area with a AP in my hand and realized just how big of an area it was and how it was about 90% devoid of any thick cover and almost entirely water and now understood why neither my friend or I had ever seen a turkey in it or heading into it or heard a gobble we knew for sure came out of it. Seen countless waterfowl use it but never any turkeys.
#7-Carry with you at all times a set of pruning shears. 99.9% of the time I do but I failed to the last evening I roosted Toms and was unable to remove enough brush especially thorny brush so we could set up in what I knew to be a perfect spot across from the roost. You can also cut off some brush and lay it next to where you plan to set up to use to camouflage yourself so you can sit out far enough from the brush to maximize your field of view.
As a result we had to set up in a spot that limited my view of the grassy access lane and helped me to incorrectly think the Tom had crossed the lane. Had I'd been seated where I wanted that wouldn't have happened.
So this year I did all the hardest parts of turkey hunting more than well enough, but failed to do the more simpler of things well enough. I have learned from my mistakes and I hope those reading this will have also. I can not remember the last single turkey season I made any ONE let alone all five mistakes we made together in in just one season.
I have been drawn for a second 3 day season I plan on taking my older son hunting on so I hope I have made all the greenhorn mistakes for this years turkey season.
Will say right off I made 3 mistakes and my friend made two that prevented my son from killing a turkey.
Things done well:
#1-Preseason scouting.
Even though my friend and I know this land well I still spent five mornings and three evenings rossting and two all day walks prior to season opening scouting. Especially the last two days prior to opening morning.
#2-Scouted and found multiple areas to hunt and confirmed 100% they had good numbers of Toms In them. Found three roosts Toms were using every morning and evening I sat them.
#3-Found paths into all roosts that allowed us to get within 70 or less yards as quietly as possible in the dark. And never once spooked a turkey while getting set up.
#4-Confirmed near exact locations of roosted Toms prior to each mornings hunt.
#5-Confirmed based on actual Tom sightings Toms were using same strutting/feeding areas as in years past.
#6-Set up both mornings within 60 yards or less of roosted Toms.
Now for the mistakes I/we made that caused my son to not kill a Tom:
#1-The evening before opening morning I was sitting in an adjoining hedgerow about 125 yards dead west of the roost which runs north and south and its split by a creek. I had with me an aerial photo (AP) of the roost. My original plan was to set up the field on the west side of the roost in a group of three trees I saw on my AP, as I had seen them fly down in to it two out of four mornings in a row, but while scouting that evening I discovered there was no way to set up on the trees facing the roost because they were in bush much to thick to set up in and we would have to set up on the edge of the actual roost with the roosted Toms to our backs. Also looking at the AP it dawned on me if they flew down into the field I was sitting near they had a very limited area to go to and were essentially trapped between two creeks and would be much easier to find and put a stalk on them VS if the flew down into the area on the east side of the creek which was 3-4x larger and area and would be harder to spot and put a stalk on if we needed to run and gun. My gut strongly said change plans and set up on the east side of the creek as it was even easier to get into that side of the roost than the side I was planning to hunt and I had heard a very large amount of gobbling after 8am in that area during recent scouting trips. Also if they flew down to the east side of the roost it would most likely be into a grass covered access path the farmer used to the fields the state let him farm.
Unfortunately for my son I didn't listen to my gut instinct and the overwhelming reasons I should've changed and I incorrectly and inflexibly decided to stick with my original plan. I visually confirmed at least three Toms and 5 hens roosted there and the Toms near exact locations.
Opening mourning found us set up on the west side of the roost. As it turned out we had four Toms roosted and one was literally roosted in a tree less than 10 yards behind us and above my sons and mines head and his first gobble about caused my son to soil his undies. My friend got his binos on the Toms and regrettably indicated none were facing the field we were sitting on and all flew down to the other side of the creek. My Gut instinct was right yet again.
We played sneak and peek the rest of the day on both sides of the creek were almost constantly into birds and had eight very close calls with Toms and my friend made a greenhorn rookie error and stepped out from the brush into a field and spooked a lone strutting Tom. Didn't help it was an absolutely immense Tom with a beard he claims he has never before seen the equal of and he's seen literally 100s of Toms.
What we both found unique to this turkey season and absolutely bewildering is only once did we ever see a strutting Tom either day while hunting. All other Toms we saw were walking and feeding, walking with hens, or just walking to get somewhere. Never in 30+ years of turkey hunting had either of us experienced this. WE ALWAYS had spotted strutting toms and were able to stalk up on them and either call them in or ambush them.
The fact the Toms were always on the move and save for one we never could hunt a strutting Tom made hunting very hard as we were constantly hauling *** trying to get in front either a lone Tom but most often it was a group of 2-3 Toms on the move with not always but often with hens.
Next mistake I made and the worst of the trip was on morning of day two.
I had roosted two Toms and knew literally the tree one was in as well as where two hens had roosted. I had picked out a good spot facing them to set up in the morning. I had a path in to the roost that would allow us to get in nearly silently. There was a set of RR tracks not to far away and a train went buy every few minuets that I planned on using that noise to cover our actual setting up. At dawn I had us set up with one tom about 60 yards away slightly to our left and the other was roosted about 80 yards away to our right. Two hens were roosted about dead even with our set up. One hen as it turned out was roosted in a tree directly in line with us about 20-25 yards away. We set out two hen decoys 25 yards to my sons right as he is left handed and we felt better to set the decoys closer to the Tom to our right as he was farther away.
Both Toms gobbled very well the Tom to our right gobbled almost non stop of 30 minuets. The tom to our right we didn't see but heard him fly down first. We did see him step out into the lane about 80 yards away we were set up on he looked at our decoys and walked away. The other Tom I had been watching since first butt crack of dawn was facing OH NO away from us towards the west field, but thankfully my friends and mines calling got him turned around on the roost and facing our way. About 40-45 minuets after sun up he flew down into the very thick brush on OUR east side of the creek. I told my son get your gun up and ready to take the safety off. But after 35 minuets no Tom, no gobbling from him or anything. The hens had flown down long ago.
Now for my absolute inexcusable greenhorn mistake.
I was set up somewhat back in the brush and couldn't see that far down the lane past where the Tom flew down. None of us ever saw the tom or saw him cross the lane like multiple toms with hens did yesterday. Because both hens flew down into the field behind us and to our right I decided to crawl over and peek into the field behind us to see if the Tom was out there. Just as I got on my hands and knees and started to crawl he popped out of the brush at 40-45 yards busted my movement and instantly disappeared back into the brush before my son could do anything. My son could see at least 200 yards down the lane and he never saw anything cross the lane.
So strong was my desire to get my son a Tom and I knew we were running out of time I allowed my impatience born of desire to overcome my better judgment learned from over 3 decades of turkey hunting to ignore what I knew was the right thing to do from countless previous experiences of successfully waiting out a near by Tom I knew was there and I KNEW was far more likely to STILL be there than not. It was an especially painful mistake for me as I knew based on the habitat of the land the Tom had essentially no choice but to come our way or at least cross the pathway in plane sight of us as to our southeast was habitat completely unusable by turkeys and if they have a choice they would avoid entering it and in the last 20+ years neither my friend or I had ever heard a turkey gobble from it let alone seen a turkey in it as it is a huge marshy treeless swamp. And I knew he almost certainly didn't cross the creek as no animal without wings can cross it and it was a windless dead calm morning and if a turkey had flown across the creek we would have heard it.
Then we spent the next 4.5 hours again unsuccessfully playing sneak & peak hide & go seek. Now for my next inexcusable greenhorn mistake I made. Later tgat morning in a different area, we spotted two big Toms and one Jake walking across a field through hedge rows and into the next field. At a decent jog we got to the next field but the Toms and Jake were already ahead of us. We then literally ran our butts off trying to beat them to the next field which was actually an intersection of three adjoining fields and hedgerows and a bigger block of nasty think woods.
We hid ourselves in the brush to our front so any turkey that stepped out into the field wouldn't see us but were not well hidden to our rear and waited to see if the Toms and Jakes would show up but about five minuets passed and with no sign of them. I told my friend I was going to use my favorite loudest mouth call to try to get them to shock gobble. He disagreed saying shock gobbling rarely worked for him. I said I had used this call to call in four of my last seven Toms all from more than 400 yards away out of huge fields I was hunting on.
Now for my mistake. I had learned the hard way over 20 years ago NEVER hen call (have added) (ESPECIALLY if you just saw one or more Toms in your immediate area less than 10 minuets ago) unless you are either set up or at least prepared to take a shot if a Tom silently comes in and shows up. I let out a five or six note string of yelps and a few clucks and waited to hear a gobble back. In less than a minuet after I called my son whispered "Dad we have company I can here someone walking in the woods towards us" before I could even think let alone react to his words out from those woods about 25 yards from us popped the two Toms and one Jake and there we stood unprepared and exposed out in the open, my son had no chance for a shot whatsoever before they instantly disappeared back into the woods they came from.
Last mistake we all made. While walking along the thick impenetrable hedgerows to get to the next field to look for turkeys my fiend got ahead of my son and was glassing before he moved closer to the field and sure enough a Tom just popped out of the woods between my son and him and started to walk towards the field my friend was glassing. As we were all standing still in some pretty thick brush the Tom didn't recognize us as humans and continued walking towards the field until my friend moved and he then the Tom departed like his a** was on fire and his head was catching. My friend did whole hardheartedly commend my son on his excellent sense of firearm safety in that he never made any attempt to shoulder his gun or attempt to shoot in any capacity as he was between the Tom and my son.
So be sure to not make the same mistakes I made especially if you only have two days to turkey hunt those mistakes being:
#1-When you suddenly discover your plan is flawed or a better plan presents itself do not be to afraid to change or at least discuss it with your fellow hunter who is as experienced as you are. Bottom line when you gut is screaming at you listen to it.
#2-Patience is a Turkey hunters best weapon and friend. If you ABSOLUTELY KNOW a turkey is VERY close by ESPECIALLY if you actually have SEEN him or watched him fly down off the roost and he was under 100 yards away and ESPECIALLY somewhere in front of you and you have ABSOLUTELY no evidence or reason to think the Tom longer is around for GOD's SAKE DON'T DO ANYTHING but especially DO NOT get up and MOVE!!!. At least not for an hour.
#3-NEVER step out into a field unless first you 100% confirm there are no turkeys in it.
#4-Never call to Turkeys unless you are prepared for one to come in fast and come in silently
#5-If you are sneaking and peaking and not the hunter, never get ahead of the guy who IS THE hunter.
#6-As a very accomplished turkey hunter I fallow on YouTube named Matt Dale says "Set up is EVERYTHING" I set up less than as well as I could have and I KNEW I was setting up less than as well as I could have. If you are going to set up on lane make sure if at all humanly possible you can set out far enough to see as far as you can down the lane both directions. If you can absolutely don't hesitate to cut some brush to put in front of you to allow you to sit farther out. You don't need much just enough to brake up your outline. We did sit my son farther out then both of us but we all should have been farther out form the brush and upon inspection there were other spots that would have been better to set up in I should have seen when I was there roosting the previous evening.
#6A-If your scouting a roost and If thorny brush is preventing you from sitting in the perfect spot do not hesitate to use a set of pruning shears to clear out for yourself a perfect spot. This is where turkey hunting chairs come into their own. If you have a set of pruning shears and a turkey chair this is no such thing as not a perfect spot due to thorny or impenetrable brush.
One other thing I listened to Matt Dale say that now makes absolute sense to me is that he feels what separates the consistently successful public land turkey hunter for the only occasionally successful is a hunter that learns to understand the topography of the land and how it will affect the turkeys and how it will then undoubtedly affect how you should hunt them. This is especially true on large and larger tracts of public land like I was hunting. Even though I had been walking by that huge swampy area in my pursuit of turkeys for over 10 years it was only this year I finally understood how it affected the turkeys and therefore affected how I must hunt them. I later took a walk around that swampy area with a AP in my hand and realized just how big of an area it was and how it was about 90% devoid of any thick cover and almost entirely water and now understood why neither my friend or I had ever seen a turkey in it or heading into it or heard a gobble we knew for sure came out of it. Seen countless waterfowl use it but never any turkeys.
#7-Carry with you at all times a set of pruning shears. 99.9% of the time I do but I failed to the last evening I roosted Toms and was unable to remove enough brush especially thorny brush so we could set up in what I knew to be a perfect spot across from the roost. You can also cut off some brush and lay it next to where you plan to set up to use to camouflage yourself so you can sit out far enough from the brush to maximize your field of view.
As a result we had to set up in a spot that limited my view of the grassy access lane and helped me to incorrectly think the Tom had crossed the lane. Had I'd been seated where I wanted that wouldn't have happened.
So this year I did all the hardest parts of turkey hunting more than well enough, but failed to do the more simpler of things well enough. I have learned from my mistakes and I hope those reading this will have also. I can not remember the last single turkey season I made any ONE let alone all five mistakes we made together in in just one season.
I have been drawn for a second 3 day season I plan on taking my older son hunting on so I hope I have made all the greenhorn mistakes for this years turkey season.
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