Youth season. Spring '24

[Enigma]

Who's going? What's your plan? 

I've got prospects that are coming down to hunt. I need to start looking for birds. 

[Moho81]

I have a friend that is taking me and my daughter out. I have never hunted turkey before so I have no idea what I am doing and he lives for getting people, especially young kids out turkey hunting. 

She will be shooting his .410 this weekend to get comfortable with it then we will be hitting the woods on the youth weekend. 

[Enigma]

9 hours ago, Moho81 said:

I have a friend that is taking me and my daughter out. I have never hunted turkey before so I have no idea what I am doing and he lives for getting people, especially young kids out turkey hunting. 

She will be shooting his .410 this weekend to get comfortable with it then we will be hitting the woods on the youth weekend. 

Best of luck to you and your daughter!

I've been fortunate over the years to be able to take a few new hunters out and help them get their first turkey. Young and old. In all honesty I could care less if I ever shot another one. To see the look on some newby's face when they crush one is the best! 

Edited April 3 by Enigma

[Enigma]

Took a short ride this morning looking for birds. Not the best day to go but I had the time. Spotted a few hens on some old stomping grounds but man o' man do things change fast in the world of agriculture.

Hit up one of my prime areas from a few years ago and it was completely different. Every square inch is now maximized for ag production. The small dairy farmer that used to spread manure with his JD4020 and beater box spreader leased his land to a larger farm. Those folks don't screw around when doing field work. We're losing alot of prime turkey habitat to modern ag practices but it is what it is. Just gotta find the survivors. 

[landtracdeerhunter]

April 20th and 21st. Wow, tomorrow and Sunday. Good luck to all the youth going a field. Always be safe.

[Enigma]

Was out yesterday with a 12yo young lady, the daughter of a friend. Her father was with us. Plenty of gobbling on the roost. They flew down into the field as expected, gobbling and strutting on the ground. It was a great show. Unfortunately they stayed just out of range from the blind. A couple of hens were leading two longbeards and no amount of my mediocre calling could convince them to commit lol.  We hung out in the blind for the next couple hours but no takers.

Got on the road early this morning to meet them at a different farm. Got a call about half way into my ride from her father saying she wanted to sleep in today. No big deal. Turned around and came home. 

A good day yesterday but the turkeys were just being, well, turkeys. Looking forward to next week.

[Moho81]

Saturday morning We had a super cool morning hunt. The birds just didn’t come in close enough. We had one Tom gobbling right away 100 yards straight away right where we expected them. Before the Tom came out of the wood line we had a hen clucking off to our right. She showed herself at 20 yards away and worked into the decoys that were 10 yards away.

She held there for a solid 15 min just clucking away while 2 Tom’s came out of the woods. No matter what my friend tried with calls he could not get the Tom’s to come in any closer than 60 yards. Eventually after about 30 min the hen joined them and they went back to the wood line. The entire time the one Tom was fanned out and strutting back and forth. His head was almost pure white!  after sometime the hen disappeared from view and I thought we where going to get the one Tom to come into the decoys but in the end the hen reappeared and all three walked off. 

Sunday Morning we went back to the same spot but set up differently hoping to take advantage of what they did Saturday. Had three different birds gobbling this morning. Had two come in behind us. The one got within 10 yards but no way could she swing on him. They both turned around and walked away not spooked or anything just walked away. I thought maybe they didn't like the look of the decoys and my friend thinks he heard a hen come in as well which might have pulled them off the decoys as well. 

I thought we had em. Ugh frustrating