Atchman2
Well-Known Member
Been awhile....
After spending a week in Northwest Kansas hunting for turkeys with my bow, it was back to the grind in Knoxville. A week's worth of work had piled up and I frantically scrambled to try and catch up. One day, I finished an appointment with a customer early and went out to the place where I used to hunt in North Knox County. It has all been leased by a private club which seems to have every piece of land in the valley posted. Nothing wrong with that, except I was hoping to hunt where I have hunted for the last five years.
Instead, one of my friend's bought some property for a future retirement home down in Roane County. He was busy this weekend, so he couldn't go with me. He has never seen turkeys there, but he said the last time he did see some tracks that he thought were turkey tracks. With nowhere else to go anymore, I took a chance on the 40 minute drive down to his property.
The night before I got my stuff ready. I reached in my ammo cabinet to grab some shells. Oh oh! I only had two shells! It has been three years since I shot a turkey. The weekend before, I used four of the shells on a coyote. Somewhere along the way, I'd lost some out of my vest or misplaced them. I scrambled and found some Remington Express High Brass 6 shot. That would be my backup shells if I used the other two shells. Couldn't happen right?
Blurry picture of where I sat down. The turkeys came from my left, when I expected them to come down the road or from my right side.
I missed it the first time in the dark, but found the driveway and drove partially onto the property. The temperature had dropped 10 degrees from when I left the house. Luckily, I had my coat in the car or it would be a fridgid morning. In Kansas, we used blinds and decoys because we were hunting with bows. That morning, I just had my vest, my shotgun, and my turkey hunting chair (which I love).
When I got to within a hundred yards of the shallow ridge, I blew my Primos crow call. Sure enough I heard a gobbler sound off on the next ridge over. Moving onto the road, I went in reverse order to how I'd been on the property before moving closer to the gobbler. There is a place where someone had setup a bunch of targets to shoot. It is little more open there in the dense trees, so I setup where I could look three directions on the logging roads.
I sat down and tried to setup my POV camera. I just couldn't seem to get it working correctly, so I went to calling. My friend Jim had given me an old box call. It was in his garage for decades, so I've used it now here and in Kansas. I love the tone of that old call. Earlier that morning, I had put some chalk on it so it was a little more crisp sounding. In my vest, I also have a slate call that I like to use, but with the early morning moisture in the air it sounded really lame, so mostly I just used the box call.
Calling every few minutes or so, I heard the gobbler on the ridge again. I also heard one behind me, and one near the top of the ridge I just walked over! They were muffled by the dense trees and green leaves, but I could tell they were hearing me. Suddenly it went quiet for a long time, I didn't hear anything! I just knew that I had overcalled, or made some mistake. So I got distracted and grabbed the camera trying to get it to work.
Sure enough, I had taken off my gloves and was messing with the camera paying no attention. Then I heard that dreaded sound "putt-putt". I knew I was spotted! I saw a decent sized gobbler through the dense brush. He was easily in range of my shotgun I thought. On my Mossberg Turkey Thug pump, I have a Tru-Glo red dot that I like a lot. I put the dot on the turkey's head and fired. WHOMP! I saw him flinch, but I thought maybe the brush stopped or deflected some of the shot. Well he took to the air. As he crossed the logging road, I put the bead in front of his head and pulled the trigger. WHOMP! Another good hit! He landed in a tree and was swaying. WHOMP! My third shot smacked into him and I heard a sure, "THUMP" as he hit the ground. My first TN turkey in three years! It was also chaos as other turkeys were, "putting" and flying all over the place. I loved it!
THUMP! He hit the ground in this little ditch. I thought for a minute he hit that ground and ran! I was elated to find him.
It was a young bird probably two years old. It wasn't impressive in the least, but it was mine. I wasted no time when I got home cleaning him and putting him in a brine bath. He is going in the roaster on Monday morning. I'm still pumped about it! It has just been such a long time. Now that I kinda know the property, I'm going to take my blind and my bow down there and start working on my archery "Grand Slam" for next year.
There he is posing with the box call my friend Jim gave me and my "Turkey Thug" shotgun.
Another friend of mine, has offered to let me come to his place and try with the bow. Getting any turkey with a bow or crossbow is difficult. In three years of trying, I've gotten one turkey (in KS). Out there the wind and conditions are very hard. Here the dense brush and such make it difficult in a different way. Last year I had a gobbler at about 10 feet, but couldn't shoot through the brush with my crossbow. If I would have had been able to use a shotgun in KS or TN last year, I would have limited in both places with ease. However, my hunting partner that goes to KS with me, only uses archery and has persuaded me that it is one of the hardest challenges in hunting. I'm starting to believe him.
After spending a week in Northwest Kansas hunting for turkeys with my bow, it was back to the grind in Knoxville. A week's worth of work had piled up and I frantically scrambled to try and catch up. One day, I finished an appointment with a customer early and went out to the place where I used to hunt in North Knox County. It has all been leased by a private club which seems to have every piece of land in the valley posted. Nothing wrong with that, except I was hoping to hunt where I have hunted for the last five years.
Instead, one of my friend's bought some property for a future retirement home down in Roane County. He was busy this weekend, so he couldn't go with me. He has never seen turkeys there, but he said the last time he did see some tracks that he thought were turkey tracks. With nowhere else to go anymore, I took a chance on the 40 minute drive down to his property.
The night before I got my stuff ready. I reached in my ammo cabinet to grab some shells. Oh oh! I only had two shells! It has been three years since I shot a turkey. The weekend before, I used four of the shells on a coyote. Somewhere along the way, I'd lost some out of my vest or misplaced them. I scrambled and found some Remington Express High Brass 6 shot. That would be my backup shells if I used the other two shells. Couldn't happen right?
Blurry picture of where I sat down. The turkeys came from my left, when I expected them to come down the road or from my right side.
I missed it the first time in the dark, but found the driveway and drove partially onto the property. The temperature had dropped 10 degrees from when I left the house. Luckily, I had my coat in the car or it would be a fridgid morning. In Kansas, we used blinds and decoys because we were hunting with bows. That morning, I just had my vest, my shotgun, and my turkey hunting chair (which I love).
When I got to within a hundred yards of the shallow ridge, I blew my Primos crow call. Sure enough I heard a gobbler sound off on the next ridge over. Moving onto the road, I went in reverse order to how I'd been on the property before moving closer to the gobbler. There is a place where someone had setup a bunch of targets to shoot. It is little more open there in the dense trees, so I setup where I could look three directions on the logging roads.
I sat down and tried to setup my POV camera. I just couldn't seem to get it working correctly, so I went to calling. My friend Jim had given me an old box call. It was in his garage for decades, so I've used it now here and in Kansas. I love the tone of that old call. Earlier that morning, I had put some chalk on it so it was a little more crisp sounding. In my vest, I also have a slate call that I like to use, but with the early morning moisture in the air it sounded really lame, so mostly I just used the box call.
Calling every few minutes or so, I heard the gobbler on the ridge again. I also heard one behind me, and one near the top of the ridge I just walked over! They were muffled by the dense trees and green leaves, but I could tell they were hearing me. Suddenly it went quiet for a long time, I didn't hear anything! I just knew that I had overcalled, or made some mistake. So I got distracted and grabbed the camera trying to get it to work.
Sure enough, I had taken off my gloves and was messing with the camera paying no attention. Then I heard that dreaded sound "putt-putt". I knew I was spotted! I saw a decent sized gobbler through the dense brush. He was easily in range of my shotgun I thought. On my Mossberg Turkey Thug pump, I have a Tru-Glo red dot that I like a lot. I put the dot on the turkey's head and fired. WHOMP! I saw him flinch, but I thought maybe the brush stopped or deflected some of the shot. Well he took to the air. As he crossed the logging road, I put the bead in front of his head and pulled the trigger. WHOMP! Another good hit! He landed in a tree and was swaying. WHOMP! My third shot smacked into him and I heard a sure, "THUMP" as he hit the ground. My first TN turkey in three years! It was also chaos as other turkeys were, "putting" and flying all over the place. I loved it!
THUMP! He hit the ground in this little ditch. I thought for a minute he hit that ground and ran! I was elated to find him.
It was a young bird probably two years old. It wasn't impressive in the least, but it was mine. I wasted no time when I got home cleaning him and putting him in a brine bath. He is going in the roaster on Monday morning. I'm still pumped about it! It has just been such a long time. Now that I kinda know the property, I'm going to take my blind and my bow down there and start working on my archery "Grand Slam" for next year.
There he is posing with the box call my friend Jim gave me and my "Turkey Thug" shotgun.
Another friend of mine, has offered to let me come to his place and try with the bow. Getting any turkey with a bow or crossbow is difficult. In three years of trying, I've gotten one turkey (in KS). Out there the wind and conditions are very hard. Here the dense brush and such make it difficult in a different way. Last year I had a gobbler at about 10 feet, but couldn't shoot through the brush with my crossbow. If I would have had been able to use a shotgun in KS or TN last year, I would have limited in both places with ease. However, my hunting partner that goes to KS with me, only uses archery and has persuaded me that it is one of the hardest challenges in hunting. I'm starting to believe him.
arty: 
