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Thoughts on the 4/15 opener?

I think it's intentionally vague and impossible to define. In "a lot of cases" decoys may not bring a turkey in. But they kill thousands of turkeys that would't die if decoys weren't used. Do you disagree?
 
Southern Sportsman said:
Will every turkey charge in? No. But take two novice turkey hunters with little or no understanding of turkey behavior, calling, set ups, or woodsmanship. Send them both afield and give one a hen and jake decoy and a tent. Give the other his choice of calls. Which do you think will kill a gobbler first?
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That's how I was when I started. I had decoys and my first few birds came from learning that my calling sucked and my decoys sucked and I didn't know what I was doing. I got them by locating them, guessing which direction they were going, and getting in front of them.

I've seen decoys work, I never denied that they do. I called out specifically the comparison to a feeder. Hens will come to a feeder daily and throw intuition to the wind. I've seen many people hunt them like deer in Kentucky. Add that scenario to your guys with no experience and see who is more successful
 
Southern Sportsman said:
I think it's intentionally vague and impossible to define. In "a lot of cases" decoys may not bring a turkey in. But they kill thousands of turkeys that would't die if decoys weren't used. Do you disagree?
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I see people kill turkeys with decoys on TV. I see the same people kill turkeys with specific calls, specific guns, specific gear, etc. I don't put much weight on the fact that a decoy was used. For all I know they're on their 15th set to get everything just right for the show.

All I know for sure is what I've seen with my own eyes. Every morning I set up with decoys (for the first 2 weeks-ish). After a couple hours or being drawn to another area by sights and sounds, I abandon my decoys. Out of all the birds I've killed in 26 years of hunting them (all 26 using decoys to some extent), I would wager that 10% or less came from successfully using the decoy as seen on tv. Are there birds I've killed while using decoys that I otherwise wouldn't have? Sure. Are there birds I could have killed had they not been spooked by my decoys? Im absolutely certain of it. In my opinion with what I've seen, I don't believe that the use of decoys plays a significant role in turkey populations. They are barely useful to me at all. I think what you will find, is that most people who use decoys will agree. They're far from a guarantee
 
Urban_Hunter said:
I called out specifically the comparison to a feeder. Hens will come to a feeder daily and throw intuition to the wind. I've seen many people hunt them like deer in Kentucky. Add that scenario to your guys with no experience and see who is more successful
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Sadly, a lot of people use both.
 
Based on what I have heard from turkey researchers, the later start is going to be good for the birds. If the delayed start proves to be better for the resource, it is well worth it. I think it will take a few years to have enough data to make any kind of determination.

All of that said, we were on birds Saturday and Sunday.

I got my first turkey Saturday at 6:45 AM. Been after them for 4 years, so that was exciting. He came running in like a linebacker at the jake decoy.
 
Coker said:
DONT LIKE IT AT ALL!!!!!! I wish they would change it back the way it was years ago when it opened the 3rd weekend in March. But, I will settle for the weekend closest to April 1st.
Gobblers are grouped back up, gobbling less, harder to find (due to lack of gobbling), less responsive (due to breeding almost over), etc etc etc.
And yes, I have killed one already.
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And if people think hunting is good now they should have experienced it when it opened in March. Good grief it was insane.
 
I dont like the delayed opener for a few reasons. Selfish reason: I hunt private that borders public and the last few yrs have been great getting a head start on the private due to the public opening 2 weeks after private. Reason 2 is the fact that all i have access to is river bottom groung and the green up makes it almost impossible to hunt anything but a filed edge in a W TN river bottom. Birds have not gobbled very much at all even the week leading up to opener while out listening. This coupled with the reduced limit is a bit depressing. Those that follow the rules will continue to do so but those that were killing 5-10 birds a yr and checking none will continue to do so as well.
 
muddyboots said:
And if people think hunting is good now they should have experienced it when it opened in March. Good grief it was insane.
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The season would start the last weekend in March about half the time under the "Saturday closest to April 1" framework. I don't remember when it started in March by design, but I suspect it was late 90s/early 2000s when populations were at all-time highs. So yeah, hunting was good.
JDUB said:
Reason 2 is the fact that all i have access to is river bottom groung and the green up makes it almost impossible to hunt anything but a filed edge in a W TN river bottom.
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90% of what I hunt is West TN river bottoms. Not to argue, but I MUCH prefer hunting after green-up. Before green-up it's hard to move on a bird at all (no topography to hide behind) and equally hard to set up without a turkey being able to stop at 80 yards, see that there is no hen, and walk off. What about the green-up makes it almost impossible for you in the bottoms?
 
The later opener doesn't bother me as most of my kills over the years are after April 15. Opening weekend heard birds just couldn't get them to leave the hens. This morning hunt I was greeted with atleast 6 birds gobbling hard on roost only to heard one gobble on the ground. I setup near them on a power line waited to see what might happen. At 7:52 11 hens came in with gobbler. He ran off another bird straight to me only putting himself in range at 46 yds. I'm on the board with 2 year old.
 
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In the name of "science" i will not slam the change. But i will say that the hunting has absolutely sucked for me personally. My best farm and the the best i have ever hunted is essentially useless. It was nothing to hear 100 gobbles for a mile each way on the ridge on the old opener from lord knows how many birds, but it was pretty well done by the end of the second weekend. I heard 3 gobbles one of which was no less than a mile away opening morning.

Went out on the Watts Bar yesterday. Heard 0 gobbles even before the winds picked up. Went out on Norris today and heard 1 bird gobble 4 times. Covered 16 miles trying to locate a bird. Nothing. Caught a few crappie and headed out about 2:30.

Congrats to all that are having good hunts. Love to see that.
 
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This morn, i went to a farm I haven't even hunted yet this year. Heard 1 from my listening spot 750y away. Hauled over there, got set up, and he crushed a single note bubble cluck. Waited a bit, gave a 3 note tree yelp, and I ended up being in the middle of 4 gobblers raising Cain within 100y of me. The original bird only gobbled 3 times on the limb, once on the ground at 40 yards just over the rise as he came to me, but never peeked iver that I saw. The second tom only gobbled twice all morning and followed a hen straight away. But holy cow, a duo of toms gobbled at me from 545 until I left at 10am.... at least 200 times. And they continued gobbling even after I flushed them away from me trying to focus on the big boy. Literally I flushed them into flight, they flew 400y away from me, then started gobbling all over again and came right back in. Had to flush them off a second time, and they KEPT gobbling... while the bird I wanted only gobbled one more time all morn, and the 4th bird never gobbled again all morn. They just all have different personalities.

I haven't seen this much craziness since the early 2000s when TWRA trapped 60 hens off the farm next to me and left a tom to hen ratio of about 2:1.... That year you could fart and a tom would come running to the sound of it.
 
Southern Sportsman said:
Then we can agree to disagree. But I know a lot of people who would do well to kill a turkey every 3rd year without decoys who are tagged out.
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They must know more about how to use them than I do. I have never had success using them. As soon as the birds see the decoys they bolt. I guess I am more at odds with how many are supposedly killed using decoys. I just don't see it with the hunters I know.
 
I absolutely love it. Called 5 within 30 yards in 2 days on public and they were blowing the doors off of it. This was in southern middle and in west Tennessee.

I would say the baiters and field decoy lovers aren't about it but those that like to cover ground and kill them tight in the timber are having a very memorable season.
 
I don't know how old the posters are but imo we saw the high point 10 -15 years ago and we will never see it like that again. Before it was empty habitat that was there waiting for stocking and it worked, now it's different, we've created a world that isn't friendly for turkeys same as we did to quail and grouse. They may hang on in pockets and we may have a short season with low limits but most hunters will lose interest with that and it won't matter, turkeys, turkey hunters and turkey hunting will fade away just like quail/grouse and quail/grouse hunters/hunting did. It's sad. TWRA isn't at fault here, there is little they can do, they can't magically change the landscape back to what it was for either species. The only thing that can fix it is a time machine and I haven't seen one of those laying around. Enjoy what you have for now and if you're old enough to have gotten in on the good years at least you got to see it at its best.
 

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