WNY Bowhunter

I actually got my first taste of morel hunting while out in Indiana chasing gobblers last week. People out there are crazy for the things. I found a few and we cooked them up...they were pretty good but I don't plan on looking for any here in NY.

Having hunted many of the the same areas for nearly 20 years now, I have a good understanding of the habits of the local turkeys. I don't like to be too overly aggresive by getting in the woods with them when they are headed to roost. Besides, they just don't gobble much in the afternoon anyways. So, my primary method of roosting involves driving around and spotting birds from the truck in the evenings. If you spot a gobbler a hour before flyup time he won't be too far away in the morning. This method has filled many tags for my father and I over the past decade. Another benefit is that you get to cover alot more ground in search of a lonely longbeard for an early morning date. If I feel confident in where he is going to be in the morning I'll set-up and wait for him to show up. Other times, I like to hit him with a crowcall just as it's getting light and then move in on him while he's still in the tree and close the distance before commiting to a set-up. But as they say, even if you know exactly what limb he his sitting on...roosted ain't roosted!!!

Just got in from setting up a blind in the middle of a cornfield for tomorrow morning. The bird that I'm gonna be after gobbled @ 5:15...so, I plan on being all set-up and in position by 5:00.

I've got a date lined up with a big fat redhead on weds. morning... !!!

I love my Zink LCD hen, especially since I bought in on sale from Cabelas for $40!!!

Being a "run and gunner" myself, I have never hunted out of a blind very much. It was the most effective way to get on these birds...as soon as they hit the ground in the morning they went directly out into the huge fields to strut and pick around. I'd much rather have a hunt where my back is up again a tree trunk in the timber...

The Hevi-13 #7's pattern awesome out of my 3.5" Browning BPS. I prefer the Magnum Blends that are a mix of 5,6,7's...

Hard to tell from that angle...but definately not close to 157"!!!

That's just my B-Mobile with a real fan/wings attached...

He was a nice 2 year old: 20lbs, 9 3/4" beard. Another guy in camp killed a stud friday morning...it weighed 23 lbs, with 3 beards (totaling 21") and 1" spurs.

Well, we got back from our KY/IN hunt yesterday afternoon: The birds in KY were very tight-lipped, guess that's what happens during the second week of season on public ground. Hunting big-woods mountain turkeys sucks!!! After getting our butts kicked in KY, it was nice to get back to hunting the rolling farmland of Indiana. Opening morning was a wash-out and we spent 7 hours camped out in a groundblind. Despite the crappy weather, we saw a bunch of birds but couldn't get them to come in. There were 3 longbeards on the farm and two of them acted very aggressively towards the third one (he was a monster) and kept chasing him around the field. We decided that it would be a good situation to try my stutter decoy. On the second morning, all three toms were hammering on the roost and came strutting out in the pasture with 12 hens and a couple of jakes. Unfortunately, they came out on the opposite end of the field from where they were hanging out the previous day and just like before the two bullies proceeded to chase the big guy off again. After milling around the field for an hour or so they finally noticed my deke and came in running from 300 yds leaving thier girlfriends behind!!! They hung up @ 60 yds for a minute sizing up the competition when a small gust of wind caused the deke to spin around and face them. That's all it took and the lead gobbler came in to kick some butt while his timid buddy was content to stay back and watch just out of gun range which saved his life. Gobbler number one wasn't so lucky...he walked up to B-mobile, fanned out and stood next to the decoy just staring it down. I told dad not to worry about the double and he had better kill the one that was in range. A load of hevi-7's from dad's 11-87 ended the fight in a hurry. In hindsight, maybe we should have let things play out a little longer to see if gobbler #2 would have come in too, but I've seen too many hunts end up in disaster at the last second. To make it even better, the guy that was guiding us got some awesome video of the hunt!!!

We had a pretty eventful morning despite the cold, blustery conditions. The big gobbler had hens up in the woods when three jakes came in to check out the dekes and the live hen that I was messing with out in front of the groundblind. We only had until 8:00 to hunt due to a baseball game and seeing how I'll be on my way to KY in the morning, we decided to go ahead and take one of them. This one put on a good show strutting and gobbling the whole way in. Isaac pulled off a nice 45 yd. shot with my Browning and cruppled him in a pile. Not a bad way to start off the season...

My Browning BPS likes the 3.5" Magnum Blends through a Pure Gold choke. The turkeys don't care for them too much though...lol.

I'd say about the same around here. All i do know is that I have no intentions of giving it up. I'll be out every day of May until I kill two or season ends. Can't get enough of it!!!

They should just give the thing away...lol.

I can't wait for saturday morning!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Good luck. I'll have a buddy of mine's son out trying to call him up his first gobbler too.

I've been waking up gobbling every morning for the past few weeks now...lol. Can't wait to get out after the kings of spring next weekend!!!

I bought and extra box of my beloved Hevi Shot Magnum Blends will I was at Bass Pro this past weekend just in case too...

I'd say 3.5 or possibly 4.5. Aging deer by the teeth has way too many varibles to be hightly accurate.

My favorite is my lucky Mossy Oak hat. Man, I can't wait to get out there after some longbeards!!!

I hunted Daniel Boone National Forest last year for the first week of the KY season. It was a fun hunt but the area is pretty rugged with no fields and lots of other non-resident hunters trying to do the same thing that I was. Ended up taking a nice gobbler. I am certain that private land out there is phenomenal for turkey hunting... Where I'll be hunting in Indiana is only 30 minutes north of Louisville. Looks like I won't be too far from where you were.

Sounds like fun. Good luck!!!

I'M READY!!! I'll probably start getting up early and scouting out some property next week if the temps get a bit milder. My season will start on 4/20 for our youth season and then it'll be off to Indiana for the first three days of their season on 4/24 and maybe a few days in KY too. I can't wait...

I just breast out the gobblers in the spring and sometimes take the thigh meat too. In the fall I'll pluck them (typically you get the smaller ones)...LOTS of ingrown-feathers to pluck out on the little guys though. The key to plucking them is to get the water scalding HOT before you dunk the birds. Also, keep in mind that they sure stink when they're wet!!!