"ThunderStruck" - Official Site for Team #5

[Archerysniper]

Congrats Don you had a great year. You get any with the bow yet?

[DonBo]

Okay guys, here's the story of my WS hunt:

The winter of 2010/2011 was extremely hard in the west central part of Wisconsin that we hunt. A bad ice storm late that winter along with a very wet and cold nesting season a year ago left the local population lower than we've seen it it the 15+ years we've hunted here.

Opening morning (last Wednesday), without warning 3 hens came into our set-up followed by a nice tom. At 6:30 I had my bird. Just over 20 lbs. 10" beard, spurs just under an inch and very sharp. Probably a 3 year old.

The whole rest of the day we saw maybe 3 or 4 more hens. Never heard one single gobble that day.

Day 2. We did hear some gobbles from pretty far away. Soon, one was much closer. After a brief call/answer session one came into the field we were hunting and walked well within range of Dave's gun. At 7:30 we both had a bird. His was a pound heavier than mine, but had shorter, duller spurs, probably a two year old.

Again, just a few hens today.

Day three found us at the same spot. This time I'm carrying my bow. Dave's only job is to use my rangefinder to tell me how far the bird is. (BTW, he is pretty hard of hearing and forgot his hearing aids today) Gobbling activity today is similar to yesterday, some pretty far off, but one definetly interested. Dave said "when do you want me to tell you the range?" "When I start to draw" Well the bird came straight into the decoys but stopped out a ways and was seemingly a bit unsure. I said "How far?".....nothing. How far?"......nothing. Louder. "HOW FAR?" By this time I'm drawing but the bird is turned around and headed away. "30 yards" he says. Dang. Anyway it didn't happen.

We stuck it out a bit longer, but my mind is now on the WS fishing opener and we called it a season. So, in three days, we saw exactly three toms, fortunately for us two rode home in the back of the truck. I was useing two new decoys on this hunt. The Avian X feeding hen and The Best Turkey Decoy (Dakota) Jake. They seemed to be a good combo as we had opportunities at every single tom we saw. (All three ) But I do believe these new lifelike decoys are starting a new era of turkey hunting, at least till the birds start to catch on...again.

[sticknstring]

Congrats Don! Great year for ya. Now you can start chasing those pesky walleyes!

[Shu]

Very nice, congrats! That is 3 more birds than I saw last weekend.

[Bowfin]

Nice job Don.

I start my season tomorrow. Hopefully they are still active and not too educated by now in the area I hunt.

[DonBo]

Good luck Bowfin! Keep us updated if you can. Looks like some pretty decent weather for ya.

[DonBo]

Bowfin and duckhuntr21 are both half way throigh their seasons right now. Come on guys, don't keep us wondering. How's it going???

We need you both to come through big to bring this home. No pressure though...

[mrklean]

nice job don

[Bowfin]

Sorry team - no birds shot by me. Hunted pretty hard 4 of the 5 days, saw quite a few birds but very little gobbling and absolutely no reponse to my calls. I was restricted to public land, had other hunter competition in 2 of my 3 spots and started trying to pattern a couple toms and hunt them like deer. My closest chance came Wednesday afternoon when I tried to get ahead of a tom coming off a private corn field heading toward a nice funnel between 2 swamp potholes - when I rounded the corner he was already in the funnel and I spooked him - would have been a nice set up if I would have gotten there 2 minutes quicker.

I watched a tom coming out with hens every morning and evening and moseying out in a private corn stubble field 30 yards out from the public land. I tracked down who owned the field, drove over and asked for permission to hunt the edge of the field and was turned down.

All in all I think the birds I was hunting were hunted hard all year and were wise to calling by now. I still had a lot of fun and will try again next year.

[2044Mustang]

Well Bow, like the old saying goes, it's called hunting and not getting. Sounds like you had a good time out in the woods and that's really what it's all about. I always love hearing the woods wake up around me on a spring morning. And on the bright side, there's always next year!

Mustang

[duckhuntr21]

Tag soup for this guy too. I started hunting Wed morning and hit up a few private spots that I have as well as a handful of public spots. Two of my private spots were hunted during season E without finding out until after my season was over. I got to see turkeys almost every time that I went out but couldn't convince any toms or even hens to come check me out. On Saturday morning I was able to get out for a few hours before work and had a tom heading towards me gobbling like crazy. I first spotted him on the other side of the field about 400 yds away and he closed the gap to 100 yds in no time. He stayed right at that distance strutting and gobbling for 25 minutes until a car stopped on the road and scared him off. It was beautiful weather to be out in and it was kind of nice to have 3 nice days off in a row so it wasn't a total loss. Congratulations to the rest of our team that were successful in bagging a bird. Awesome pictures as well!!

[DonBo]

Well, that's the way it goes sometimes. Was a pleasure meeting and hunting with all my team mates. Maybe next year huh guys?

[Bowfin]

Maybe next year huh guys?

I plan to be back next year