2020 Spring Turkey

[Borch]

Don't pass up the opportunity to hunt later in the day and late afternoon and evenings can be dynamite.   Two for the kids in our group were shot at 5:30 pm and 11:00 am this week.  That is not unusual for us either.  Late morning through evening the birds have been very cooperative over the years.

[IceHawk]

Check this out pretty cool if your a Turkey hunter!

[Borch]

Cool hunt!  Beautiful, rare bird.

[monstermoose78]

Wow

[Dave S]

A friend of mine that I introduced to turkey hunting a couple years ago went out with his dad this morning for his dad's first hunt. He managed to bring in a 22lb tom with a 10+ inch beard for the kill. I don't have permission to post the pic yet. 

His dad put this on his bucket list since he's been battling cancer for a while now. What a feeling to wake up to a text this morning with a pic of their success. New hunters with new memories and experiences to pass down through the generations.

[Harv]

Well boys got my first turkey today, first time I've ever hunted.  I'll post pic later; still in blind; my buddy missed one with a his bow and we've heard a few others.

 

Got some gobbling now, back to the hunt

[ANYFISH2]

Get em'

[LETSgoFISHIN]

[ANYFISH2]

Way to go LETSgoFISHING and Harv.

 

Had 3 gobblers keep me company this morning.  One got to with 20 yds but on the wrong side of the blind.  No decoy out, it is hard to get the to come around the blind without the deek.

 

[Borch]

Way to go Harv and LETSgoFISHIN!  Sure gets the blood pumping when they are coming in.

[Borch]

Congrats to your friends dad Dave.  Had a similar hunt with my father in law the spring before he passed away.  Still a very special memory for me hunting with him for his first bird.

[Harv]

I breasted mine out.  I've heard of cutting the meat in 1 inch strips or chunks and battering in shore lunch and deep frying.  How do you prepare your turkey?  

[gimruis]

11 minutes ago, Harv said:

How do you prepare your turkey?  

 

I give mine away if I'm able to.  I used to have to choke them down before I found a source.  I don't care for them.  Most people that have never had one think they've got a nice tender Butterball on their hands...until they start eating what more closely resembles a form of shoe leather.

 

I went for 4 days during season A.  I had about 15 turkeys dialed in for 3 of the days and then another hunter put up a blind on the property next door, and spooked them all out of the roost.  On Friday, I had 4 toms strutting on the field in front of me following a bunch of hens for over an hour.  I had one of the toms come within 45 yards.  I had the gun up ready to shoot but he never came out of full strut and by the time he did, he was too far again.  That's never happened to me before.  If he had been really close, I would have shot him in the strut but that far his head basically sinks in and disappears into the body armor of feathers.

 

I think this over the counter license thing combined with an early spring plus people being cooped up is putting a lot of hunter pressure on them early.  I am going to re-consider what season I intend to hunt next year and probably go for season B or C instead to avoid the initial wave of hunting pressure.

 

Hunter success rate in MN for turkeys is not very good.  Its about 22% so about 1 in 5 or 1 in 4 hunters fills their tag.  If you're able to bag one about every third season you're ahead of the curve.

Edited April 20, 2020 by gimruis

[huntnfish]

18 minutes ago, Harv said:

I breasted mine out.  I've heard of cutting the meat in 1 inch strips or chunks and battering in shore lunch and deep frying.  How do you prepare your turkey?  

 

I normally breast mine out as well. The last one I shot I cut it in 1 inch strips and put them in a bag and poured Italian dressing on them and let them sit for a day. Then I took them out and wrapped them in bacon and cooked them on the grill. They were very good. I thought about slicing a fresh jalapeño and wrapping that up with the turkey but didn’t have any on hand. 

[CLPDB]

I breasted mine out and brought it into the local meat market and had them make it into turkey jerky.  It was really good.  

[Borch]

15 hours ago, Harv said:

I breasted mine out.  I've heard of cutting the meat in 1 inch strips or chunks and battering in shore lunch and deep frying.  How do you prepare your turkey?  

Lots of options.  Marinate and cook in a manner that preserves moisture as they are very lean.  Turkey soup is awesome.  So is marinating and wrapping in bacon and grilling.   Have a friend who grinds his up along with bacon, some seasoning and makes turkey burgers out if them.  

[McD]

Hello from the Leech Lake area.  I've been searching for a Minnesota Turkey Forum and I'm glad to finally find one!  This is my second year chasing toms; both seasons with my bow.  Got a taste of it last year but couldn't get one within range.  This year I splurged on decoys and a decent ground blind.  Had a close encounter with a 2 year old tom on Saturday morning but he got held up on the edge of this ravine and ran off after a few minutes.  I kind of froze with excitement and stopped calling so he must of gotten nervous or something?  Last fall we saw at least 5 jakes and 6 toms roosting in the group of red pines I've setup next to but since opening day I've only heard 1 gobbler.  Do they typically roost in the same spots fall and spring or do they spread out? It was pretty quiet Sunday morning but man it was cold too.  Hoping for some better results this week when the weather warms up!

[ANYFISH2]

Welcome McD to the forum, and to turkey hunting.

First piece, and most important piece of turkey wisdom I can share with you is, a human being/hunter will never truly figure these critters out!  We might feel we have then they change the game constantly. Thats why they are so much fun.

 

In my experience I have found turkeys roosting and using similar areas in spring and fall.  Again, in turkey fashion, Sometime not.

Turkeys cover alot of ground each day, they may not roost in the same area each night.  However, if you find a roost, there seems to be birds there regularly.  I think turkeys have some environmental elements they look for in roost locations, and regularly use the same areas.  River bottoms and wet swamp areas have been good places for me to find roost locations.  I have seen roosted birds near Ag fields as well.

Turkeys in my experience group by sex after breeding season in June.  They seem to stay as groups of males or females through most of the year.  So seeing a group of Tom's and/or Jake's in fall is only a gage on the number males In an area.  As the snow starts to melt and birds get reproduction on their minds they begin to break up and spread out.  Males and females begin intermix and spend day and night together.  The males you saw in the fall will now be spread out over a great amount of land.  Filtering throughout the landscape. You see one Tom in the morning and see a different on that was a mile away in the afternoon.

The best advice I can give you is be patient.  Let the birds tell you what to do, it is a never ending learning experience. 

Most of the time, less is more, when it comes calls and decoys.

When you get the interest of a gobbler by calling, they will cut off, continue your sequence and shut up!  Only calling sparingly, and just loud enough to keep tabs on his location.  If he is coming to you, trust me, he already know right were you are.  He will find you, no need to call, except to maybe bring him In a yard or two closer with very soft clucks or putts.  Make him look for the hen.  If you call too much, or answer his gobbles he will often hang up out of range, expecting the hen to come to him.

I am finding that no decoys can be the best way to go in heavy woods.  They come in better to calling trying to find the hen.  In an opening that you need to call him across, a decoy can be the ticket.  With a bow sometime a decoy is needed to draw him to the shooting side of the blind if you are unable to shoot in all directions .

 

Spend more time chasing these frustrating yet amazing birds, and they will teach the best way to hunt them in your area.

 

good luck and tell us more about your hunts.

 

[Barbelboy]

Borch, Shhhhhhhh! So many people seem to forget that the turkeys are still in the woods after 10 AM. 

Anyfish has the right of it. If the bird is calling to you when you call, stop calling! I know, i know. it is incredibly tempting to keep calling and hear him respond. That's part of what makes turkey hunting so fun, it's interactive! But resist the urge. Trust me, they know where you are, they spend every minute of their lives out in the woods listening and finding girls. They know. I've had a bird show up after not calling for well over an hour. They remember and come looking for you too sometimes. 

McD, as a fellow bow hunter i have found there are 2 things you need (or should have) to greatly increase your success. The first is a blind (buy one with a big window for shooting a bow through). Drawing your bow is just too much movement for all but the dumbest turkey. Pro tip, use a taller chair in the blind. That way your arrow clears the window when you shoot. I already messed 1 up this season by using a little stool and having to half stand up to shoot. 

Second is a decoy(s). For bow hunters it focuses the bird. The idea is that the bird will work to the decoy where you placed them for an ideal shot for you. With no decoy in place it's just chance that the turkey will pass through your shot window at the proper range for a bow.  Also spend a lot of time on youtube and get good with a mouthcall, and i mean good. Practice, practice, practice. 

finally, don't overthink it. You can't imagine the hours i've spent talking about what a turkey was thinking or why he did something. Getting outsmarted by a critter with a brain the size of a grape is just part of the game!

 

 

[gimruis]

Good advice so far.  I'll add a couple items.  I don't hunt them with a bow so my strategy is different.

 

When you find the roost, don't set up too close to it.  I have made that mistake and have seen others do it.  If you set up right on top of it, you'll scare them out and they won't roost there anymore.  Resist the urge to get super close because there's a good chance they'll be back every single night.  They prefer really big trees with flat branches like mature oaks or pines.

 

Patience...Remember, you're not going to harvest one every season.  The success rate in MN is about 20-25% and with a bow its about 10%.  Anything better than these two averages would indicate that you're ahead of most hunters.  Heck, even if you get one about every other season or every third season you are WAY ahead of the curve.

[CLPDB]

Wish I would of read the last couple post before I went out this morning lol.  I've gone out with my son to help call or sit with him the last couple years but this is my first year buying a license and having the time to hunt a whole week.  Had a couple Tom's below a ridge on the dead river this morning so I moved closer and probably got within 50 yds of a Tom and Hen but they still were over the ridge in the oak woods.  Sat and called for 30+ min but they wouldn't come any closer so I decided to move closer.  That was a bad idea, they were closer than I thought and next thing I see is one running away.   Hopefully get chance again tomorrow.

[gimruis]

2 hours ago, CLPDB said:

That was a bad idea, they were closer than I thought and next thing I see is one running away.

 

I learned a long time ago that trying to sneak up on a turkey doesn't work too.  Even if you army crawl through mud on your belly you will NOT sneak up on one.

[Borch]

It's tough to make a move on them now with so little foliage.  Much easier once all the leaves pop. 

 

The best call in the woods for closing the deal isn't sold in the store.   The sound of a turkey scratching leaves for food is the most reassuring sound a turkey can hear.  So the scratch, scratch, pause,  scratch is killer when the birds are inside a 100 yards.

 

As far as the best piece of advice goes...  never stop scouting.   I've killed more birds due to in season scouting as I hunt than I have from preseason scouting.  Their patterns change, especially early in the season.   Another bit of advice is if you have a tom hammering in response to your calling and then gets quiet, get ready.  More times than not they are on their way and too busy cutting the distance to gobble.   Seen guys get impatient and leave busting the bird sneaking into their setup.  I've made that mistake myself before.

 

Once the hens start nesting the best time to be in the woods is late morning and afternoon/evening.  When the hens finish with the gobblers they head to their nest to lay/sit on eggs.  The tom is still looking for the girls and without one will be much more cooperative at these times of day than early morning.   You may not hear as much gobbling.  But when you do, that bird is killable.

 

Finally, be safe and have fun!

 

[Wanderer]

Save a wing off a bird too.  Nail it to a board, fanned out about half way and borax the wing bones to preserve.  Flapping a wing, especially at at fly down time, can be deal sealer.

 

They can be used just like rattling for bucks at other times.  

[CLPDB]

When do the hens typically start laying eggs?

[monstermoose78]

Now my buddy found a nest with eggs already 

[Borch]

Like MM said,  its started already.   It'll become more and more of a pattern as the season progresses. 

[Barbelboy]

yup, scratch away. Like Borch typed. Scratch scratch, pause, Scratch, scratch pause. I'll lightly purr or cluck on and off while doing that too. maybe a very light set of yelps. somedays that is what my entire calling consists of. with all the guys out there calling loudly and frequently as if turkeys are deaf i start to lean towards very subtle, very quiet and infrequent calling. Mostly because all i hunt is public land. As the season progresses my decoy techniques change as well. early on i use a hen/jake combo. man it can be deadly. but after a few weeks on public land every bird has seen 200 decoys. so i'll pare it down to 1 hen or maybe just the jake if i'm still bowhunting. If i'm shotgunning, no decoys is often the way to go. 

Early mornings unless i have a Tom that is obviously working towards me I call to the hens with the idea that where they lead, he will follow. If you can get a hen calling to you, mimic her exactly, cut her off, mimic her. it might anger her and she'll come in. I had one hen last year who HATED ME. literally every time i called she'd sound off and work into me. she must have seen my decoys 4 times and yelled at me every time. I'm convinced the combination of us yelling at each other lead to so much of my success last year. The Toms just couldn't resist investigating what the flying heck was going on over there. 

 

instead of a wing i use my hat. it can be flapped against your leg in a pretty genuine sounding representation of a wing flapping. I've done the wing thing, the hat just makes it one less thing to carry around. 

Edited April 24, 2020 by Barbelboy

[going4it]

Was a fun morning. He beat the crap out of my decoy for 5 min before I got a chance to pull back. Unreal to watch this all unfold before 6:30 am. Think he flew down and ran right at us.  

[Borch]

Hope your decoy is alright. 

 

Congrats!