Had a beautiful morning in Virginia with my son today. He's 10 and got his first turkey on youth Day a few weeks ago.
Since then we've been skunked.
But here in gobbels together before sunrise is a special experience.
Still would like to bring home the turkey.
There's an old gobbler my buddy and I have been hunting for a couple years that just simply won't come closer than 65 yards.
We're pretty sure we were on him again this morning even though he's got to be about a 7 year old bird at this point.
He started gobbling on his own at 5:45 and then consistently gobbled back to my hen calls and moved about 200 yards in our direction but at about 85 yards he stayed down in the bottom we were up on a ridge above and we never saw him although he gobbled back and forth with me for at least an hour.
I tried different calls and also tried shutting off the calls completely and then each time I would call if you were quiet I would get a gobble again from the same location.
Eventually he gave up and seemed to wander off more or less back the direction you came from.
We're thinking of setting up down in the bottom he was calling from next time over the ridge.
But what I'm wondering is if some turkeys just won't come past a certain distance from where they hear the calling from?
So would it be futile to move a hundred yards closer to where he's roosting or to go to the bottom that he came to?
Since maybe he just insists on having the hands come to him and regardless of where we set up he won't come within reasonable shooting range.
Is this a common phenomenon or would it help to move to a physical location that he will go to in other words setting up closer to the location that he gobbled from after he moved towards us?
Since then we've been skunked.
But here in gobbels together before sunrise is a special experience.
Still would like to bring home the turkey.
There's an old gobbler my buddy and I have been hunting for a couple years that just simply won't come closer than 65 yards.
We're pretty sure we were on him again this morning even though he's got to be about a 7 year old bird at this point.
He started gobbling on his own at 5:45 and then consistently gobbled back to my hen calls and moved about 200 yards in our direction but at about 85 yards he stayed down in the bottom we were up on a ridge above and we never saw him although he gobbled back and forth with me for at least an hour.
I tried different calls and also tried shutting off the calls completely and then each time I would call if you were quiet I would get a gobble again from the same location.
Eventually he gave up and seemed to wander off more or less back the direction you came from.
We're thinking of setting up down in the bottom he was calling from next time over the ridge.
But what I'm wondering is if some turkeys just won't come past a certain distance from where they hear the calling from?
So would it be futile to move a hundred yards closer to where he's roosting or to go to the bottom that he came to?
Since maybe he just insists on having the hands come to him and regardless of where we set up he won't come within reasonable shooting range.
Is this a common phenomenon or would it help to move to a physical location that he will go to in other words setting up closer to the location that he gobbled from after he moved towards us?