If I have the worst luck or it's just one of those days..to start the day off yesterday I went back to hunt a bird that I heard on Friday. Went into a new spot blind so I was just poking around trying to find a bird. Struck him at 645 got setup and never heard him gobble again, whether it was the pouring rain or fog that shut him up don't know. Anyway went back yesterday morning to where I thought he was roosted ended up being about 200 yards in the wrong direction so after a while I got up and slowly started working to him stopping about every 50 yards and soft calling.. No response..well I ended up blowing him off the tree at about 0745. Waited an hour and went down the mountain to try to find him..no luck. Decided to come back home and try to find one. Got on another one at 1030 but apparently he wasn't ready to sign the dotted line either..called and he responded right away figured it was a done deal but ended up messing with him until 12. Don't know what held him up but I think the closest I had him was around 80 yards..couldn't see him over the hill..hoping this luck turns around
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Bad luck or misfortune all around. It can only get better!
Quote from: Turkeybutt on April 30, 2023, 10:36:56 AM
Bad luck or misfortune all around. It can only get better!
Always light at the end of the tunnel
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Persistence will prevail. Stay the course, your luck will break in your favor.....be safe....
Definitely the fog and rain didn't help. But we all get frustrated with hunting these gobblers. Stay persistent and hopefully all your time and effort will pay off. I tell people I've been so mad at myself and frustrated in chasing these gobblers that i have come out of the woods whipped and wanted to cry all the way back to the cabin or truck...But I'm back at it and the chase is on again... LOL... Those easy hunts are far and in between ...LOL..
Sounds like great luck to me. Come down here to S. MS and we can go listen several days and we may hear one gobble a time or two.
Definitely sounds like one of those days. You could go tomorrow and everyone of those birds might come in on a string. The good days make it worth the bad days you struggle through chasing them.
I've had way worse luck. I watched a bird in the same spot for weeks. Went to set up on him my first available day. Didn't hear a thing off the roost. By 0900 I decided to pack it up, walked towards his little strut zone to see if there was fresh sign from the day before. There was! And there was some neck feathers and a flight control wad!
Lol that is bad luck..wasted 3 hours looking for a ghost.
Persistence is definitely the key to this game..might take a sick day tomorrow and see if I can get back on him..shouldn't necessarily say it's bad luck, I've found birds..just need that one to make the wrong move
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Quote from: 357MAGNOLE on April 30, 2023, 11:37:32 AM
I've had way worse luck. I watched a bird in the same spot for weeks. Went to set up on him my first available day. Didn't hear a thing off the roost. By 0900 I decided to pack it up, walked towards his little strut zone to see if there was fresh sign from the day before. There was! And there was some neck feathers and a flight control wad!
Lol that is bad luck..wasted 3 hours looking for a ghost.
Yeah that's never good lol
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Quote from: olemossyhorns on April 30, 2023, 11:25:30 AM
Definitely sounds like one of those days. You could go tomorrow and everyone of those birds might come in on a string. The good days make it worth the bad days you struggle through chasing them.
100% right mossy..
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Quote from: Tom007 on April 30, 2023, 11:11:47 AM
Persistence will prevail. Stay the course, your luck will break in your favor.....be safe....
Hope so. Thank you, same to you
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Quote from: Greg Massey on April 30, 2023, 11:17:16 AM
Definitely the fog and rain didn't help. But we all get frustrated with hunting these gobblers. Stay persistent and hopefully all your time and effort will pay off. I tell people I've been so mad at myself and frustrated in chasing these gobblers that i have come out of the woods whipped and wanted to cry all the way back to the cabin or truck...But I'm back at it and the chase is on again... LOL... Those easy hunts are far and in between ...LOL..
Definitely how I was feeling this weekend lol..makes me sick having to leave the woods with a bird gobbling!
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Quote from: BBR12 on April 30, 2023, 11:17:48 AM
Sounds like great luck to me. Come down here to S. MS and we can go listen several days and we may hear one gobble a time or two.
Gosh that sounds like hard hunting there..makes me feel a little better about my season so far
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You ain't killin but you are striking birds- THATs 67% of the equation right there. Be patient- they almost in the right frame of mind. It doesn't take but a few minutes for the other 37% to pan out. Shoot straight
Keep on keeping on
To the OP.
On your second turkey, it is what it is, sometimes they play rough.
On the first turkey. I do not mean to be a penis. But, you have identified a couple issues. Whether you realize them or not. You pinpointed a couple reason in your post WHY this happened.
Mother nature played a part, you did the second, the gobbler did the third. You finished it by flushing him from the limb.
Good lessons in what you wrote. Identify them and fix the ones you control.
Best of luck.
That is true Flopper, but when one of my nephews was striking out on his own, one piece of advice I gave him that he said was the most useful (I took him with me plenty when he was younger) was that you are going to bump a bird on the limb every once in a blue moon. If you never do it, ever, you are probably not getting close enough. He was so scared to bump one, he would not get in tight on them (like before he even called).
I have flushed a few truck loads of turkeys off them limb. Mostly when the leaves came out heavy while I was working. One week no leaves, next weekend lots of leaves.
But, if you don't know where he is setting do you keep advancing? I don't, you shouldn't. That was issue #4.
I don't like being inside a 100 yards. This is my personal preference. I know a lot of guys like to get tight, I do not.
If your within 60-70-80 yards and a turkey flies down and covers 30 yards on fly down he can be perfect. He can be to the left or right. Then you have to move! I like to let them fly down so I can adjust to his landing location while still having a little distance between us. A 100 yards is as close as I want to be, open woods will be more.
Quote from: WV Flopper on May 01, 2023, 08:23:06 PM
I have flushed a few truck loads of turkeys off them limb. Mostly when the leaves came out heavy while I was working. One week no leaves, next weekend lots of leaves.
But, if you don't know where he is setting do you keep advancing? I don't, you shouldn't. That was issue #4.
I don't like being inside a 100 yards. This is my personal preference. I know a lot of guys like to get tight, I do not.
If your within 60-70-80 yards and a turkey flies down and covers 30 yards on fly down he can be perfect. He can be to the left or right. Then you have to move! I like to let them fly down so I can adjust to his landing location while still having a little distance between us. A 100 yards is as close as I want to be, open woods will be more.
Will for sure say the bird on the limb was my fault. I honestly thought by that time of morning he was already down and I went looking for him because he was a ways off when I heard him gobble. Lookin back now I wish I would've just stayed put for another hour or so and seen how he played it out..he wasn't in a hurry and I shouldn't have been either. Just one of those stupid mistakes
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Quote from: WV Flopper on May 01, 2023, 08:23:06 PM
I have flushed a few truck loads of turkeys off them limb. Mostly when the leaves came out heavy while I was working. One week no leaves, next weekend lots of leaves.
But, if you don't know where he is setting do you keep advancing? I don't, you shouldn't. That was issue #4.
I don't like being inside a 100 yards. This is my personal preference. I know a lot of guys like to get tight, I do not.
If your within 60-70-80 yards and a turkey flies down and covers 30 yards on fly down he can be perfect. He can be to the left or right. Then you have to move! I like to let them fly down so I can adjust to his landing location while still having a little distance between us. A 100 yards is as close as I want to be, open woods will be more.
I agree. 100 yards is very tight in some situations. I just wanted to say that busting one will sometimes happen-try not to ever do it, but don't beat yourself up when it does. And for sure, if you do not know where he is, sit down. That philosophy cost me a lot of time this year on one bird, but ended with him taking a truck ride. I wanted to err on not busting him and being patient. I kept him interested and he eventually worked around to me.
And Mick, turkeys work on turkey time and that is different every day. Sometimes they will cover a 100 yards in less than 5 minutes and sometimes it will take an hour.