Join us as Fred Lutger, David Mills and Robert Hoague go for the Grand Slam this Spring. Our plan is to begin in Florida in mid March and move on to Nebraska, Texas, Missouri, Illinois, Ohio and Tennessee. Look for the daily updates, lots of on the spot pictures, and plenty of video for BowTube.com as the hunt progresses.
Apr 20 Turkey Hunt By Robert Hoague
Apr 20, 2008 - 8:33:02 PM
Daylight formed on the eastern horizon as we drove out to the Back 200 fence line. Dwayne Glover was along again to video. I called when the sunlight lit things up better. No gobbles sounded and we walked to the southern boundary of the property and checked the large field 100 yards below. A gobbler and a hen were walking around in the middle of the field, about 300 yards away. I called a couple of times but the gobbler was not interested this morning.
Next stop was the windmill area, its the highest place on the property. Two different gobblers responded to calls but didn't come where we were waiting. We walked back to my truck and put the blind, decoys and seats in it.
Gobble !!!
About 150 yards away.
Oh, oh. I didn't want to set up right by my truck so we grabbed our gear and set up 50 yards from it.
Gobble !!!
Closer yet.
Normally we have been setting up very quietly, but this time our haste to be ready for the gobbler we made some unintended noise.
Once we were ready our gobbler's gobbles were further away every time.
We drove to Robbie's corner and called and heard an answering gobble to the north. It took a while to drive to that area. We set up twice and heard gobbles but the gobblee did not come to hang out with my decoys.
Dwayne had to go home so we drove to my house and he left. It was already noon.
By any standards we had a very exciting turkey hunt this morning.
So ... What's The Deal, So Far ...
Realistically, things look very good. For the first time in several years we have a lot of weeds, grass and other ground cover to make places for hens to lay eggs. This is very likely the reason the gobblers are hanging around all morning instead of striking out for parts unknown, like they have done before in the spring.
Plenty of time is left in the spring wild turkey season. I think it's gonna be a good one.
Monday I have to do a bunch of work for the web site and Tuesday I'll meet up with Rick Philippi and we'll be hunting gobblers at his north Texas ranch.
