BOWHUNT FOR THE RIO GRANDE
by Robert Hoague

The Last Stand

DAY 4 - The CamTrakker Longbeards

The CamTrakker: Before driving to Tennessee I set out a new CamTrakker digital game camera at the Gate so I could see what was happening there, wild turkey wise. After I returned home I wanted to see the pics. My blind is set up near the gate on a North/South dividing fence that runs through the entire property. Here is the CamTrakker after I put it in place. It is right in front of the blind so what it takes pictures of is real time information.

When I returned had I planned on moving away from the Gate to another area. As I started through the pictures I noticed several pics of 3 longbeards. And they had passed the blind every day, sometimes more tn once. The main morning times were between 7:30 and 10:15. The afternoon cruises along the Gate fence were between 2:00 and 4:30. But there were more morning sighting than afternoon. I wasn't moving anywhere, The Gate area would do just fine.

There were also pics of other gobblers. But the majority of the pics were hens -- which is probably the reason for the gobbler traffic. 

While I was looking at the pics on my computer its battery got low and I couldn't copy the pics over.  Since it was doing such a great job I wanted to keep the CamTrakker working so I ate lunch and went to Wal-Mart and picked up a new Memory disk while my computer charged. 

That afternoon I hunted at the River Ridge and switched disks on the way. After I was settled in at the blind I got my laptop out of my backpack and reached in my pocket for the disk with the longbeard pics. It was not there!

I looked hard for it because I wanted to show you the longbeard pics the CamTrakker took. They were better quality than I have seen for a game camera and the gobbler pics were extra cool. Regretfully I could not find the disk.

MORNING HUNT - At The Gate
At dawn my Pro Ears were picked up gobbles from the river area, 1,000 yards away and further. Things looked promising because the Gate's fence goes straight to the river and if they follow the fence they will go by the Gate.

An hour later it was the time that some turkeys could show up. Something else took an interest in the blind. Cows.

At 8:00 I was  listening to multiple gobbles coming down the fence like on a collision course with my blind. At 8:08 I took the first pic. 

This gobbler had the lead and the other two followed. (The camera focused on the dried grass in front of the turkeys.)

The lead bird passed me a little wide, I had the rangefinder on him ... 31.5 yards. You gotta love that Nikon Lazer 800 for its one handed use. 

As the other two gobblers came up I put down my Sony and got my BowTech. They followed the same route the first bird had. You can't tell it because of the objects in the picture but all 3 of were longbeards. They were further than I like to shoot and they continued down the fence and out of sight.

Wheew! A close call, for sure. The CamTrakker found these 3 gobblers and they will be back. And so will I. 

AFTERNOON HUNT: I went to the River Ridge and saw 8 different hens and got two responses from gobblers who came to the area but would not give me any pictures or get in bow range.

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