Apr16

Ever taken a gobbler with a muzzleloading shotgun?

by daverichey on April 16th, 2012 at 8:12 PM
Posted In: The Daily, The Field, The Woods

A nice beard on a very nice spring gobbler

Nice bearded tom turkey
Blackpowder and spring turkey hunting are like soup and sandwich; they go together – just keep the moisture out of the mix.
photo Dave Richey ©2012

Several years ago I killed a 24 1/2-pound long-beard gobbler while hunting in Iowa. My firearm of choice was a Knight muzzleloading shotgun with 150 grains of Pyrodex and two ounces of copper-plated No. 5 shot.

My first day of hunting with Tony Knight saw us spook a pair of roosted gobblers while opening a rusted and squeaky farm gate. Later, as we proceeded to look for unspooked birds, we stopped and began to call.

A nearby gobbler answered, walked right down the edge of an open field in broad daylight, gobbling his brains out, and one shot at 40 yards took care of him.

An easy shot with a muzzleloading shotgun

Mind you, 150 grains of Pyrodex and a two-ounce load of shot, produces a good bit of felt recoil. It wasn’t excessive, but 100 grains of powder suits my moods much better.

The load isn’t the issue here. I’m trying to decide in advance of April 30 whether to try with a muzzleloader this spring during my hunting period. It worked well for me three years ago, and it was great fun, and the Knight muzzleloading shotgun is very tightly choked, and it works like a dream when shooting at 40-50 yards.

Mind you, I don’t like to shoot gobblers that far out unless I can boost the downrange velocity without scattering bird-shot all over the place. I have no qualms with shooting a 50-caliber front-loader with an extra-full choke  and two ounces of shot and three Pyrodex 50 grain at that range.

Five years ago, I sat down, and began calling an hour after daybreak, as rain and snow fell in a deluge. Fifteen hens and gobblers filed past me at 20 yards. The two big gobblers in the bunch had several hens between me and them.

Moisture in the barrel turned to sludge when mixed with snow

They disappeared from sight, and I waited another 30 minutes for those birds to move off, yelped once, and here comes a single gobbler running across an open field. He ran every step of the way until he was 30 yards out, and then he stopped, raised his head and began looking around.

I had a red-dot sight on my muzzleloading shotgun, and put the dot where his head and neck meet, and pulled the trigger. A sharp pop sounded, and the gobbler ran off like the hounds of hell were eating at his tail feathers.

The old adage of “Keep Your Powder Dry” came to mind, and I walked out to the car and drove 10 miles home. The muzzleloader was taken apart, the saboted shot cup and shot, and the black gooey stuff that used to be Pyrodex pellets, was pushed out the barrel. I had forgotten to put a latex thumb from a rubber glove over the muzzle to keep the rain out while i quickly set up my one-man tent blind.

What works is patterning a regular or muzzleloading shotgun

I really wanted to take another gobbler with the muzzleloading shotgun, but I have a Remington Model 870 pump 3-inch magnum 12 gauge shotgun that looks as it has been used to sink fence posts, but the shotgun is over 30 years old, and it shoots copper-plated No. 5 shot very well.

It comes with a sling, as does my muzzleloader, and it has produced gobblers from Alabama to Michigan. When the trigger is pulled, the bird dies. With it, my choice is to shoot birds at 30-35 yards. It has a full choke, but not the extra-full turkey choke found on many muzzleloading shotguns.

It is like an old friend. The stock fits well against my cheek, and nestles comfortably against my shoulder, and my good right eye lines up easily with the fiber optic sight.

The 12 gauge is a bit lighter than a muzzleloading shotgun to carry, and on a cross-country hike to find gobblers after the initial dawn action, that regular shotgun can be a big point in its favor. However, the muzzleloader has an extra-tight choke, and can easily kill birds at 50 yards if I choose to take a shot at that distance (which I’ve only done once). Make a decision which one to use and pattern it well.

Either firearm is fine by me, and in all honesty, shooting a gobbler isn’t what tugs me gently into the turkey woods before dawn. It is the opportunity to attempt calling another bird within easy shotgun range. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t, but for me, being there and having a gobbler circle me at dawn is what my hunt is all about.

Pulling the trigger and killing the gobbler is nothing more than a heavy layer of frosting on my turkey-hunting cake.

Posted via email from Dave Richey Outdoors

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Apr14

Listening TO Only A Few Spring Gobblers

by daverichey on April 14th, 2012 at 8:12 PM
Posted In: The Daily, The Field, The Woods

Jakes – shoot or let them walk by

Wild turkey gobblers; listen to only a FEW spring gobblers.
Pick up on a FEW Spring Turkeys and listen closely
photo Dave Richey ©2012

It was a beautiful morning to be alive. I slipped out the door about 6:45 a.m. into 42-degree temperatures, and it felt wonderful.

The sun wasn’t up yet but sharp spears of golden light shot upward from the eastern horizon, and my thoughts were on how beautiful the morning was. I stood there, a moment frozen in time, and waited for the sun to start bulging the horizon of the eastern sky.

It seems to start slow, and then the top surface of the ball of fire broke through, and up came the sun, growing more orange and red as it rose. It’s a magic that I never tire of watching, and if there is a reason for rising before sun-up, it’s to witness the rare beauty of dawn.

Watching a golden sunrise on opening day

I stood, transfixed by its beauty, and asked myself how anything could be any better. And then I learned how.

Off in the distance, so far away it could hardly be heard, came the very soft tree yelp of a hen turkey. She cutt once, just checking on the whereabouts of the other birds, and then a full-throated gobbler chimed in and the sound was loud even from a long distance away.

It’s always amazing how loud a gobbler is when he roars as the sun comes up. The volume of sound is impossible to believe unless it is seen and heard up close.

He nailed that gobble with lusty exuberance for the day, and she gave another soft yelp. Big Daddy, still sitting in his roost tree, gobbled and then hit a double-gobble just to show everyone in the nearby trees who the Boss Gobbler in these parts happened to be.

Another Tom gobbled once, and again 10 seconds later, and then the Big Boss Man tuned up the woods again. The hen yelped a little bit more, just enough to keep the gobblers fired up, and then the Toms began gobbling back and forth at each other.

A gobble or double-gobble is pure Michigan excitement

Four individual gobblers were heard, and the fury of this sound was awesome. One or two small jakes tried to gobble but couldn’t quite pull it off. Like adolescent boys, their voices were changing but they simply couldn’t hit that low bass note and keep it going.

It was one of those days when I wished I could be sitting on the ground in my camo, a shotgun over my knees, and start lighting a real fire in their bellies. I love to listen to that low-pitched humming sound that gobblers make when they are close to a hen.

Many people have heard it, didn’t know what it was, but if you are hunting and hear it, don’t move because a gobbler is close. The sound doesn’t carry far, and two or three years ago I was calling a gobbler for a buddy when I heard it.

“Don’t move a muscle,” I whispered. “There’s a big gobbler behind us and he is very close. Don’t move anything. We’ll wait him out.”

If you hear a gobbler spitting and drumming, sit still and don’t move

That bird was within 15 feet of us, and I could hear him pacing back and forth in dry leaves, but he wouldn’t circle around. We later learned that he had two big hens with him, and he was trying to lure my two hen decoys to follow along with him.

Unfortunately, I was too far away to hear this sound but I have no doubt that once the hens and gobblers flew down, that it would have been audible if the birds were close.

These birds on this delightful day serenaded the morning for 20 minutes while I stood and listened. And then, as if the switch had been thrown, they shut up and started moving.

I pulled the newspaper from the tube, walked back to the house, and stood on the back deck for another 10 minutes. The birds were indeed on the move, and I heard one gobbler rattle out his love song to the hens as they walked off in the opposite direction.

The turkeys, just like me, appeared happy to see the snow gone off the hillsides. All of winter’s snow back in the hollows is gone, but I’ll greet the dawn with the birds many times before the hunting season begins.

There’s not much need for preseason scouting because I know the pattern of these birds and where they roost. I’ll stay far away from them, hope they are not spooked out of the area, and each day they greet my distant presence with a gobble, is another memorable moment in my life.

Calling gobblers is more fun than shooting one

Somehow, I hope that’s the way it may turn out but I have some doubts. It’s been spring for five weeks, and I doubt many birds will be in the mood this spring. Some hen  birds have been seen on nests, and we’re seeing very little gobbler activity if compared to past years.

But when my season open April 30, I’ll be out there as usual, to greet the dawn with optimism. And I hope for just one lusty gobbler to call to me and my buddy. One chance may be it for this spring season, and we’ll try to make the most of it.

Posted via email from Dave Richey Outdoors

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Apr13

Big gobblers attract attention

by daverichey on April 13th, 2012 at 8:12 PM
Posted In: The Daily, The Field, The Woods

This is one of the big boy’s smaller buddies

Smaller buddy of the big-boy tom
This jake can kickstart the adrenaline flow, but the truly ‘Big Boys’, attract attention; and no small amount of worry for the hunter(s!), hot-on-their-trail.
photo Dave Richey ©2012

One thing about turkey gobblers is true. There are far fewer big old longbeards running around northern Michigan than jakes.

The other day I spotted a huge longbeard in a field about 15 miles from home. The bird was wandering alone although two or three hens weren’t very far away.

What struck me about this bird, besides his larger than normal size, was his beard. The beard was at least 10-12 inches in length, and appeared to be as wide as a big paint brush. It hung ponderously off his chest, and swayed from side to side as he walked.

Big longbeards like that cause traffic jams

I noted the time of day, drove a half-mile down the road and out of sight of the gobbler, turned around and drove past him for another look. From this angle the bird looked even larger, and the beard was dragging the dirt whenever he bent over to feed.

This was a gobbler of extraordinary proportions. Such birds are difficult to keep hid because he seemed bound and determined to stand out in the open where he could be seen by every vehicle that traveled the busy road.

We drove away, and the next day we went back looking for this Monarch of the open fields. Sure enough, he was in the same field, walking the edge of a wood lot, and about 100 yards off the paved road.

The question is how long will he stay there? If he keeps showing himself, every turkey hunter west of Interlochen and north of US-31 will be trying to hunt him. The bird is on private land, and seems enthralled with the area.

It’s my assumption that the big gobbler and some hens are roosting nearby. I see him about two hours after sunrise, and the birds never stray too far from this spot.

My bet is the bird will be scared by human activity

Company came and spent three days here, and I didn’t have any chance to go out checking on the big gobbler. I know for certain that at least two other hunters know about him, and suspect he has now been seen  by many more people.

The burning question is whether he will still be around when turkey season opens. I spotted another car parked along the road, and figured he was watching the bird.

He had binoculars to his face when I pulled up. He turned, saw me and whispered “Big bird.” I nodded in agreement.

The bird walked off into the woods, and he asked if I had known the bird was there. I told him I’d been watching the gobbler for a few days.

“Are you planning to hunt him?” he asked. I told him that I might if he sticks around.

“Do you think he will still be in this area when the season opens,” he asked. “I just spotted him on my way home,  and I’ve never seen a beard like that before.”

His was a valid question. Would this bird still be in the area when the turkey season opens? It’s not very likely.

I felt the big gobbler would disappear before the opener

“I doubt if he will still be here then,” I said, being honest with the guy. “A bird that big attracts a great deal of attention, and I suspect people pressure will force him to move on.

“How far he and the hens will move is just a guess. I’d expect him to breed those hens before the season opener, and then he will be off in search of other hens. He could be several miles away when the season kicks off.”

Would I hunt him? Certainly, if I could get hunting permission for that land. However, my guess is he will be gone in a week or less because other people now know where he is, and if cars continue to stop and watch him, the pressure will force him to get on his way.

And, perhaps that is a good thing. Such big birds are tempting, and poachers often figure a way to shoot such birds out of season. That is one reason why I didn’t say how far west of Interlochen Corners or how many miles north.

I may go looking for him again tomorrow, but it wouldn’t surprise me if he is gone already. Perhaps I’ll be lucky and find him again, and then, I may never see that gobbler again.

The next time I spot him, if there is a next time, there will not be any notations in my blog. The only reason I’ve written about the bird is because of his size and because I know he won’t hang around there long.

He will shove off, move elsewhere, and it’s likely he will take over the hens of a smaller gobbler, and soon he will be following the hens. They will keep him moving, and the more nearby eyes and ears there are, the safer that bird will be.

Posted via email from Dave Richey Outdoors

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