21 lbs- 9" Beard - 1" spurs
A good friend of mine, Brandon got his first Tom Saturday, April 21, 2012. It was a fun filled hunt filled with many twists and turns. We had a “pack” of jakes that kept running our Tom around and almost ruined our hunt, but in the end he was able to get it too close and Brandon put the hammer down! The video pretty much tells the rest of the story.
Beautiful Bird
20 lbs - 1" spurs - 11" beard
Had an excellent hunt this morning down in SW Missouri! The birds were making up for the dead Monday in my area by gobbling their heads off! The first bird I went after flew off the roost landing about 150 yards out in the middle of a pasture. He was very content to gobble all morning, but he expected the hen to come to him – he wasn’t moving! I ended up leaving him and went to a neighboring property that I’d heard some gobbling coming from earlier in the morning.
After giving some sharp cutts I got the response I was looking for which was a thundering gobble. I snuck to the edge of a pasture and saw this strutter out at about 200 yards with a group of hens. I was able to craw and stick a couple decoys in the edge of the field and slip back into cover. The bird answered to any and all sounds my call made – he was hot! He began to slowly strut my way but started to hang up at about 100yrds. When this happens the best thing to do is to shut up and play hard to get which is exactly what I did. He began gobbling his head off wanting a response from me which I would not give. It didn’t take long before he gave in and began walking straight for me. He gobbled the whole way and began strutting at about 50yrds when he spotted the decoys. I gave a couple very soft purrs to which he spat and drummed all the harder!
The crazy bird ended up coming up tight to the timber in which I was hiding to go around a curious cow that wandered into the scene. The problem with that was that I was in a mess of brush that was taller than me (I was still standing) and I now wasn’t going to have a shot until he came around the brush which would put the bird at a mere 10 feet! Not a good scenario, but that’s what happens when you’re running a gunning. He did end up staying tight to the brush keeping me from having the 20 yard shot I was expecting. I shot the bird in full strut at 10 feet, the closest shot I’ve taken to date! It was pretty awesome being able to see the bird through the brush for those last 30 seconds just mere feet in front of me in full strut! I tell you what, you just can’t hardly beat spring turkey hunting!!
I’ll be posting a vid here in the next day or two that I shot just after I took the bird. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to get the shot on tape due to my quick set up on this bird. Good luck to the rest of you turkey hunters out there and feel free to share your stories as well along with pics – I’m always up for a good hunting story!
God Bless!
If this doesn’t get your blood pumping I don’t know what will!! Did a little scouting with the kiddos the other morning on a few properties I hunt on and was pleasantly surprised.
We’ve got a week and a half before youth season and I’m chomping at the bit. What a great way to enjoy these beautiful spring days – get out there and get some pics – I’d love to see em!!
Mossberg Model 510 Mini - 20 ga
15 yrds - 2 3/4" shells - 8 1/2" min recoil load (Held 3" low cntr mass on top right target)
25 yrds - Held center mass
Cricket .22 cal
Tripod Coverted to Adjustable Brace
Over the last few years I have had the priviledge to take part in a local NWTF Chapter youth hunt. The chapter does a great job of working to get youth out into the woods and intense focus is put on selecting great land to up the percentage of success among the hunters. I have to say that I get just as much or more pleasure from watching a 13 year old bag his or her 1st Tom as I do smoking an ol long spur of my own.
While taking any youth is great, little compares to the joy that a hunting dad feels when his son or daughter begins to express interest in getting out into the woods hoping to bag a Tom. My daughter has expressed such interest this year and we are hard at work preparing for the youth hunt which is the last weekend in March for us in MO.
Let me just say to all you hunting dads out there that it’s never too early to engage your kids in the sport of hunting. My son has been going hunting with me since he was two years old and my daughter since she was 5. My son saw his first turkey kill from dad’s gun at age 2 and has seen countless ducks and geese fall from the sky over the past few years. Hunting is not something that is pushed on your kids, rather it is an activity that they do with dad and it MUST be made fun for them! I’ve saw many diehards like myself turn their youngster away from the sport simply because they didn’t have the foresight to let the kid have fun while hunting. Yes, they might spook a few deer/turkeys, but make sure they’re having a good time and pretty soon they figure it out and become amazing little hunting buddies!!
Back to the youth hunt with my daughter. We recently purchased her a Mossberg 510 mini in the 20ga. model. This is a sweet little gun and I’d highly recommend it for youth hunting. I did put some lead shot in the butt stock to help reduce recoil. I’m also only having her shoot reduced recoil 8 1/2 shot as this little gun is a bit light at 5lbs for a 20ga. We went out today as a family: son, daughter and lovely wife, to pattern the gun and well as have some fun shooting my son’s new .22 cal cricket. The pics attached to this post give a glimpse of the capabilities of the little mossberg. Keep in mind that this was 2 3/4″ reduced recoil 8 1/2 shot, but to be honest, this is all the recoil that most youth under 10 years old are going to want. The gun seems to pattern a bit high – on the pics shown I actually was holding closer to the base of the neck than center mass. Long story short on lethality for turkeys – 25yrds is pushing it with this gun/shell combo but very doable. 20yrds and in it is golden keeping in mind that it’s necessary to hold about 3 inches low from where you want the bulk of your shot to hit. FYI – the little cricket is a nail driver – great little starter gun – highly recommend!
Hope this info was helpful and do all us hunters a favor and find a youth to take hunting with you this youth season and keep our sport alive, but most importantly make some youngster’s dream come true!
Coyote #3
The HunterByDesign team Was able to finally get out and predator hunt a piece of land that I’ve been wanting to get out on for some time now. This property is set up great for coyotes complete with many draws, large open areas, and a lot of cattle nearby.
We arrived at the land about an hour before dark and quickly moved to get set up. We were just getting to a clump of trees that overlooked a large draw when I spotted a coyote approx 250-300 yrds away just before he slipped into the brush.
We quickly sat down and after a few minutes and I began the rabbit squealing both from the Primos Catnip call, and the Verminator Tweety call. Our patience was rewarded about 15 minutes later as the dog cautiosly stepped into an opening in the brushy draw about 80yrds away. The Remingtion R-15 ,223 was already in postion on the shooting sticks. I was shooting through a briar bush was made me a bit squeamish with a .223, but my cousins couldn’t see him so I took my chances by putting the hammer down. The coyote never took another step, it went straight down – not bad for a lung shot!
This is a great time of the year to get after the predators as most regular seasons for deer, and waterfowl are starting to close up. This can be a great way to keep enjoying God’s creation and scratch that hunting itch that most of us diehards have year round! Best of luck!
I try not to plug myself very often, but here in the past month I’ve had significant interest in my waterfowl trailer layouts/decals. I wanted to show a few of the projects/layouts that I’ve designed and give you a brief rundown of the process. As you can see from the pics, I have both geese and duck decals. All of my decals I personally traced off of pics of actual birds, so if you’re looking for the cartoon style of decals these are not them. A significant amount of time was spent trying to capture the reality of the bird along with the functionality of vinyl decals.
I can do these layouts custom, meaning that if you’re wanting more birds, less birds – whatever – it can be accomplished. The colors of the actual decals can also be switched up depending on your trailer color and what sort of look you are wanting. I can also design logos that can be incorporated into the layout. The logos I make are saved in all the formats that you could possibly need to do anything from letterhead, to website headers, to signs, to t-shirts, to hats, etc etc.
All the vinyls that I use are high performance which is the highest grade vinyl that can be used and in reality, the only vinyl recommended for vehicle graphics. You can definitely get graphics cheaper with economy grade vinyls, but in the long run, they become more expensive as they’ll last about half as long on most applications. Sometimes I’ll cut the vinyl myself and send it to you, or I also like to work with a local sign co in your area. I send them the files needed and they cut and prepare the vinyl for installation and/or install depending on what you’d prefer.
Plese feel free to contact me with any questions regarding your trailer/vehicle. Best way to reach me is by email at www.HunterByDesign@gmail.com. In the mean time, good luck hunting!!
9 Geese (limit) & 2 Ducks
Had a great hunt this morning with my best little hunting buddy and two great friends. We were hunting a big pond that both geese and ducks frequent so we set out our spred with ducks on one side of us and geese on the other. I’ve been very successful with this layout as both geese and ducks will usually come right into the hole between the two groups.
We had 4 big honkers come and sit down about 25yrds in front of us – the only problem was that it was 10 minutes before shooting time 🙁 They slowly swam away and there was nothing we could do but watch. We didn’t have to wait long. About 25min later we had a group of about 30 geese do a half circle, they locked up about 150 yards out and sailed right into our faces! I gave the “take’em” when they were about 3 feet off the water with their feet dangling. The pic pretty much tells the rest of the story! We were still in the process of reloading and taking care of some stragglers when a group of about 20 gadwall came sailing in. Unfortanately we weren’t completely reloaded so we only managed to bring 2 out of that group.
We stayed put for about 20 more minutes only to watch two more geese sail right in to us, but we were limited out so once again, we had to just watch them swim away! We decided that it would be best to clear out so they could come back in if they wished and give the pond a break. It’s been an extremely mild winter up to this point and we really don’t have many migratory birds in the area. It’s in these times when scouting is of utmost importance as there aren’t necessarily a lot of opportunities. Thankfully, we made the most of our opportunity today and ended the morning with a great bag of geese and even a couple of ducks!
Happy New Year to You All!!
Greenwing Teal
Wrapped up the duck season in North MO (north zone) this morning with my twin cousins Bryan & Ryan. We made our last stand today on a farm pond that has been the resting place for a few ducks and some geese. The action came early and fast this morning and I do mean fast. I don’t know if you’ve ever shot teal before, but they are little speed demons! We didn’t shoot great, but I’ve seen much worse.
On to chasing geese over the next few days – I’ll keep you posted!
Jessie
Fetchin Up
Successful Greenhead Retrieve 😉
I grew up with laborador retrievers, so when we got a place with a big back yard my first thought was to get a lab. The only problem with that is that we also had two very small children. If you know anything about labs, they aren’t the most calm dogs in the world, especially as pups. We opted for a schnauzer which has turned out to be a great choice, but not much help in the duck blind.
Our kids have since gotten bigger as has my desire to have a real huntin dog. Retrieving ducks and geese out of water with a fishing pole and treble hook works, but not nearly as effectively or as natural as a dog doing what it’s bred to do. Working with my dogs in the past had really made up for half of my enjoyment of waterfowling. I loved watching those dogs jump in the icy water time and again without a moments hesitation. It does something special to the bond between a man and his dog to see them work so hard for you (even though they would rather be doing that than anything else!)
So when I saw an ad online for half lab/half golden retriever pups, I was very excited. I love training dogs and to be doing it again after a several year drought is a lot of fun! I’m no training master, but I’m not half bad. It’s very rewarding to see your dog do the things you’ve worked hours to ingrain in them. I’m hoping that by next year she’ll be ready to work – doing what we both love to do. Now if I can just have someone board her for the 1st couple of months as she tries to chew on everything in sight and howls/cries when she’s left alone, I’d really have it made!
That's How It Felt 😉
If you had asked me this past weekend if I would like to take an early morning swim complete with rubber boots, wool pants, multiple layers of coats/sweatshirts, all in 29 degree weather, I probably would have told to call me on Monday to set up an appointment for a psych eval. Then ask me to do all this with my 4yr old and I would’ve really thought you were nuts! Well I’m sure you’ve guessed this by now, but that’s exactly what we did this Monday.
We were just finishing up a less than stellar hunt with Chris, a good friend of mine. I had just trolled around in my canoe picking up the decoys and went back to the little island to pick up my boy and Chris. My boy came in first and sat between my legs and we waited as Chris loaded up the canoe with the rest of our stuff. I’m still not sure what happened next, but the next thing I remember is that Chris was getting into the canoe and all of a sudden the canoe is upside down. The water was deep and I wasn’t able to touch so I went in up to my neck while holding my boy up as high as possible. Chris was quick to right the canoe and I was able to get my son back into the canoe even though it was half full of water.
Talk about exhilarating!! I was trying to say something to Chris but I just couldn’t quite catch my breath! I don’t think I’ve ever felt such shocking cold in my life! We rushed to the Jeep and started the thawing process. Fortunately we all survived and though we were very cold it is something we are laughing about now. It did open my eyes to the danger that cold water and boating/canoeing presents, especially loaded down with winter clothing.
Thought I’d share the experience with you all – good luck out there and above all, be safe!!