trophy-hunting: Spring Gobbler Scouting

Friday, March 18, 2011

Spring Gobbler Scouting - 2011

March 12, 2011

Saturday I made it out for my first day of scouting for the 2011 spring gobbler season that opens next weekend.

I have been seeing some birds here and there and have seen several strutters. Turkeys have been gobbling and strutting here for about a month now. On the way to the hunting club this morning I saw a tom blown up, way out in middle of a pasture with 5 or 6 hens.

As soon as I rolled onto the property this morning I drove up on 2 does crossing a powerline. That was probably about 8:30 am. I made a note to self to check this spot out. Every other time I come by here there are deer crossing this spot.

Well, back to the turkeys. I cut some turkey sign in the road right away. Unfortunately, there was no strut sign, just a gaggle of tracks. Since were huntin gobblers, strut sign is of utmost importance. When you find it you've found the mother load. From there it's not to hard to figure out where he's roosting most of the time.

I headed over to a spot along the border of the club to check a spot that always holds a bird. I was not disappointed. In Short order I picked up some hen tracks in the sugar sand road and I followed them until they led me to some gobbler strut sign in the road. You could read the sign like a book....A big gobbler track traveling alone from the north and brakes into a strut when he came up on some hens loafing in the shady road. His strut sign was tight with a lot of back and fourth and circles. He had obviously spent a lot of time there displaying for the hens. From past experience I have a good idea where this bird will be roosting.

I cut a small bear track traveling the road here. It's always neat to come across a bear track.

When I'm scouting like this I'm looking to locate as many gobblers as possible before the season opens so I pressed on to locate another bird.

A long stretch of road that passes thru some low flat woods and has a lot of water holes in the road revealed another big track but no strut sign with it. He could be a jake but there was a pile of hen sign around the water holes so sooner or later a strutter will be there. Hard to tell where the roost might be here.

Another bigger bear had been in the road here. He had an impressive track on him.

Just for the heck of it I decided to check out another popular spot even though I know I couldn't squeeze in there edgewise on opening weekend. Sure enough, there had been a gobbler strutting all over the road. It was some serious strut sign with a high concentration of turkey sign in general. Just before I got there I cut a man track in the road with a kid in tow. Apparently, they hunted that morning on the new youth hunt that opened this morning. There is always people sign here and it's not worth trying to hunt it, you'll just get messed up. The hot sign was sure interesting to see though.

Great strut sign in the pic above!

I tracked the low road and found another strutter but there were some man tracks all over it. I had a nice wildcat cross the road in front of me at a high rate of speed coming off the black jack hill but he looked a little rough. I checked a road thru a pine plantation where I filmed my buddy Steve miss a bearded hen after dueling with a hot gobbler for half a morning that I felt slipped in from behind us and saw us. All of the sudden for no apparent reason he just quit gobbling. Steve did kill a coyote the following weekend that came running in to his turkey call. That could have been what killed the deal also. Any way, last year the strut sign was stand up but this year I could barely find a track.

From there I tracked the camp road and was a little disappointed with the sign there, weak!

I did find another gobbler track on an old food plot. No strut sign but a couple hens are using there.

I tracked my way to the creek road and cut another gobbler and a few hens on the north end. The road was really weak for sigh however and I was counting on a bird being there. No strut sign at all, just a few hen tracks. Something will show sooner or later here though. There is always a bird here. I hunted one here last year for 6 days straight before I finally killed him. I'll post some video of that when I can get to it.

I checked one last spot that I killed a bird at a few years back. It's a little dead end road along a creek bottom but there was no visible turkey sign to be seen. It's a pretty hit or miss spot, heavy on the miss.

I only actually saw one live turkey and from the track it was a hen.

I did manage to find 6 or 8 different birds in a couple hours of scouting and opening day looks pretty promising. I'll home in on them a little closer a day or two before the opener.