ATTEN: Team 8

Even if you have harvest multiple turkeys post everyone you harvest with pics of the measurements. There is a contest that includes ALL turkey's harvest by a team.

Below is a list of all the contest catagories:

1. High Team Score - 1 bird per hunter/per team (can be your best bird if you do shoot more than one)

2. Overall Team Score - Overall of ALL birds taken by any team member on that team (Means enter all the birds you harvest we will keep track)

3. Hunter - Best bird overall as per NWTF scoring system

4. Best Rio

5. Best Eastern

6. Best Merriam

7. Best Osceola

8. Best Typical

9. Best Non-Typical ( Multiple beards and or spurs)

Thanks!!!

Thanks Steve. The lord has really blessed me way more than I deserve. My wife and three boys work hard while I'm away. Tough for one person to take care of all the responsibilities that come with this family. But, they have always known my passion for turkeys and I always make it up to them when it's over. Headed for Oklahoma tomorrow. Heard it is really dry out there with nothing to hide in. Going to be tough, but hopefully we can find a few. Good luck guys and keep the pictures and stories coming in. Best to all.

Tomorrow is opening day and Im off of work on Monday as well. Wish me luck!

Alright guys and gals. Back from Oklahoma/Texas and what a trip it was. Weather was normal. Warm with windy afternoons, but Oklahoma and Texas delivered. My first morning in Oklahoma I hunted a familiar piece of ground. I had roosted more than 100 birds the evening before and knew where I wanted to sit. I don't like to setup close to the roost on Rios because I like to encourage them to roost in the same spot each night. I setup across a dirt road(very remote and not much traffic) on the edge of a wheat field. I built a blind out of dead wood and cedar limbs. It was awesome. They started gobbling before daylight and eventually flew down. I had out my B-Mobile and hen decoy about 25 yards out. I could hear all the hens and gobblers just over the hill forever as I called relentlessly. Finally a group of hens came over the hill and passed by followed by two or three more flocks of hens. I was saying to myself where are all the gobblers when I started hearing drumming. Just then I look up and see several fans coming over the hill. Two gobblers skirted me, but two saw my setup and ran the remaining distance to my decoys. The first one ran up to the strutter decoy and I noticed he had a double beard. BOOM! I let him have it. He flopped around up there as I started to do fight and purr on my mouth call. One of the other gobblers ran down to stomp him then ran back up the hill after spooking. I gave him a double dose of my mouth call and slate call and he couldn't stand it. I let him have it when he was standing over my first bird. It was truly an awesome hunt. Just an incredible hunt!
The outfitter I use in southwest Oklahoma has ground in Texas as well and I killed my two turkeys in Oklahoma in a two bird county, so I ran over that afternoon to some of their Texas ground and scouted and ended up roosting about 50 birds including 8 toms and numerous jakes. The next morning I was in there early and ended up setting up in the wrong spot. They flew down in a big wheat field and ended up not seeing my decoys. They went back and forth and up and down in that big field until they were almost over a dirt road, so I crawled over to my decoys and grabbed them and walked over to a burm that bordered the field. I sat there and watched in disbelief as a large herd of cattle had come into that end of the field and were pushing the turkeys back to me. They were about 250 yards away so I quickly put my decoy up on the burm so they could see it and got on my stomach and in position for a shot. I called really loudly as two gobblers and several hens angled for my position. They got closer when I realized this was going to happen. They saw my strutter decoy and made a beeline for me. I dropped the first one in his tracks and the other one proceeded to stomp him in the dirt. I went ahead and let him have the business then rolled over on my back before walking out to get my turkey and thank the herd of cattle for their generosity. Crazy, crazy development. That is why you should never give up. Up loading pics now and will have them up shortly.

My two Oklahoma Rios.

One had an incredible double beard.


My beautiful blind that over 50 hens walked by without busting me.

Both beards on the double were exactly 8". he weighed 18 1/2 lbs. and had 1 " spurs. I did a poor job on the spur pictures.




The single beard turkey was 16 1/4 lbs. had an 8 1/2" beard, and 1" spurs. The pic on the spurs was not good.

Going to sleep. I will post the Texas Rios later.

helluva job nauticstar! opening day starts at daylight however my schedule wont allow me to go hunting til monday afternoon. me and my buddy went scouting thursday evening we had 3 gobblers coming up a ridge gobbling thier heads off they came within 20-25 yrds but not within sight b/c of all the timber and angle of the hill. they gobbled for 15 minutes str8 i'm uploading the video on youtube i'll post a thread when i get'em up! i shot the video from my phone so the sound quality was a little low for the gobbling but you can hear it. we went in pretty loud just hunting sign when i found some sign of scratching and hen feathers i said to my buddy "put ya mask on and lets do some calling.
within minutes we had one gobbling at the bottom of the hollar and 2 to the left and right of us one wouldnt gobble but the one coming thru the laurels was raising hell ;) i had a good time woulda loved it had it been season my bow was itching to let one go!

those are beautiful birds nauticstar! you are a turkey thug bubba ha-ha! give'em hell!

Here are my Texas Rios.




Had to include all my help. This is Henry and Rita. My beloved decoys. Rios can't stand a full strut decoy.

First bird was 20 1/2 lbs, with a 9" beard and 7/8" spurs. Really nice bird.



Second bird weighed 18 3/4 lbs. had a 9 1/4" beard and 1 1/8' spurs.

You can legally take up to 7 birds on this trip, but I had two unbelievable hunts and decided to sit with one of my friends the rest of the trip that is just getting into turkey hunting. He actually killed his first bird on this trip, but missed two others. He learned a great deal during our hunts and is hooked for life which was my goal when I introduced him to the sport. Headed to Missouri on April 17th. Doubt I will hunt Alabama again. Kinda scared to ask my wife.

Nauticstar got your birds entered except the double beard, not sure how to score it so I pmed TG and when she gets back with me I will update the score.


Also all team members get me your addresses if you haven't yet so I can get the stickers out.

I will mail them this week sometime

Thanks Steve. Been a dream season so far! I left OK/TX Friday afternoon April 8th and won't hunt again until April 18th in Missouri. I wanted so bad to try and get a couple more here in Alabama, but kinda scared to ask my wife. Ha! Ha! Good luck to all.

Nauticstar - WOW! WOW! WOW!!! Congrats man!!! That double beard is unbelievable - all your turks have been great!!! I think you're winning the "TURKEY THUG" Award... LOL!!! ;)

P.S. The pics are AWESOME too!!!!!

Kim :)

Nauticstar

Got your scores I think I have them in order of you posting measurement

2 Oklahoma Rios

Bird 1

Rio Double Beard

Your score is 18.5 + 10 + 10 + 32 = 70.5

Bird 2

Rio

Your score is 16.25 + 10 + 10 + 17 = 53.25





2 Texas Rios

Bird 1

Rio

Your score is 20.5 + 8.75 + 8.75 + 18 = 56

Bird 2

Rio

Your score is 18.75 + 11.25 + 11.25 + 18.5 = 59.75

Nauticstar, What an awesome year for you so far!!! I wish I had the opportunity to hunt several states, maybe some day! This year I MIGHT hunt Arkansas too but that is up in the air right now.

Also great stories and pics!!!!

I have just 2 tags (unless I go to Arkasas this year) so I hope I get at least one nice one but if not that is OK too.

It has been 2 years since I harvested a turkey so if it has a beard it is going down at least for the first one then I can be more selective on the last one.

As I said before the harvest numbers have been dropping fast in the county I usually hunt so this year may spend a day or two at that area to see what it has to offer, if it is slow there then I will going into a new area blind. But something got to give.

Thanks Steve. Like I said before I have been very blessed to be able to travel a good bit. It doesn't always turn out like it has this year, but we usually have good trips. I have three young boys 3, 5, and 7. In a year or two they will all three be in three different baseball leagues. That means three practice and game schedules. My turkey hunting schedule will be severely crippled. Just having a little fun while I can. Good luck Steve. I hope to see some great pictures of some fine turkeys! Best......

had a good hunt yesterday. my buddy and I have been knee deep in birds since bout a week b4 season came in. they have been responding to our calls and in the areas that we have been hunting. yesterday evening we stalked up a pasture/laurel thicket I was calling with the mouth call got one to answer as soon as we hit the woods. there was a group of birds but i only saw the lone gobbler working the edge of the field.
we jumped to getting set-up my buddy was gun hunting and i with the bow. so i knew my shot window was limited. green light for him as i'm mouthing ranges. he's done had a bachelor group run out 15 yrds below him he fires looks like a decent shot. they scatter we got a good idea as to where they are going so we back out to the 4 wheeler, ride to the other side of the mtn.
we jumped in the blind after setting up a group decoys we made the hen laying with a jake on her back and a hen to the side i hit the mouth call got an immediate gobble within 30 yrds we called a little bit more the gobbler was coming face first towards the decoys. I knew that wasnt going to be the way it went down i seen the bird cut up the ridge he was drumming hard cause i was hitting him with gobbles and fighting purrs.
the purrs did him in he come off the hill with bad intentions he got between 3 small saplings which killed my opportunity so i told my buddy "give it to him" and the gobbler dropped his head and that was it my buddy ate him up with that 20 guage. he was beautiful. Big blue head, gorgeous fan, nice beard. spurs was average he was about a 2year old bird 25 lbs. very nice day of hunting. weather is the only reason why i'm talking to you. post pics here in a minute.

Nauticstar, you are on fire. A one man team. Congrats on all your birds.

Thanks Kim. It has been a dream season so far. As hard as it is to believe, I usually hunt several other states each year as well, but with my three young sons, it has become quite difficult to manage the hunting and their schedules. I have had to cut back some. Ha! Ha! I saw the double beard on that turkey before I shot him. He turned sideways and was about to kick my decoy's butt and I decided I better shoot him fast before I lost the chance. I have hunted the better part of my life for turkeys and have never shot one with two thick beards like that. Most of them have had those small, thin beards. I was really excited. Turkey Thug???? Hmmm.....I might could get used to that! Ha! Ha! Good luck this season. Headed to Missouri Sunday. Weather looks marginal, but it will be fun!

Thanks Talondale. It has been one heck of a season. Trust me, it's not always like this. Hope to finish up strong in Missouri and Montana. Missouri is my favorite place by far to hunt. I love the woods, hills and fields. The turkeys are really big and loud. Good luck to you this season.

ATTEN: TEAM 8


If you haven't PMed me your mailing address for the stickers please do so in the next 2 days. I will be mailing them Thurs. or Fri.

Thanks

Well I got my second and last turkey this morning. He is another two year old bird. I will get the pictures up when I get a chance this evening.

Congrats!!!

Can't wait for the pics and story if you feel like telling it.

Awesome Ks. Can't wait to hear all about it. Looking forward to the pics as well. I'm dormant right now. Leave for MO Sunday. Having serious withdrawals. This thing they call work is highly overrated. LOL!

Update: Well opening day was a wash out,well a fog out actually. From daybreak till the noon cut off time the visibility was at best 50 yds and we saw one hen and never heard the first gobbler. On Monday the birds gobbled till they came off of the roost and went silent the we got burned later that morning when 2 nice gobblers came in silent behind us. So goes the normal for me.

Here is the pictures and the story. So I wake up this morning and get my things together and head out the door. As soon as i step out the door I am greeted with a gobble from one of three toms roosted south of my house, I knew it was going to be a great day. I get to my spot get set up and the roost is silent, which i find kind of weird considering the # of birds. Well they fly down and finally start to gobble and the hens start to yelp. At about 7 I get a call from my good friend saying he just shot a tom with 1.5" spurs I was like that is awesome man, those were the biggest spurs he has ever taken! So he asked how my hunt was going and at that point I had only seen two hens. But I knew that they were getting close. So I finish talking to him and congratulating him, and I hang up and look over and here come the toms. at first there was one then two more joined them as well as three hens and three jakes. They slowly make there way over to me. Right as the first tom crosses the fence on to my property he goes on alert. I look up and here come a coyote running across the pasture, great this hunt is done. But he pays no attention to them and keeps on going. The other toms cross and then the jakes cross, the toms started to chase the jakes. They started heading north way from me and the biggest tom finally clears the hens and gives me a perfect 30yd shot. I sent some Hevi 13 #6 his way and he dropped like a rock. It was a fast hunt, and the best part is I never even called once!

Here is the pictures. He weighed 19 lbs, 9.25" beard and right at 1" spurs He is a Rio.

Nice work Ks. That must be really nice to walk out your door and hear gobbles. Very envious. Looks like a really nice bird. Congrats!

ksfolwer

Your score is 19 + 10 + 10 + 18.5 = 57.5

Got it posted in the harvest thread.


Great lookning bird!!!

I am still waiting on the 18th, will it ever get here?????????????????????????????????????????????

Good job. Congrats on a nice bird.

Opening day in MO.

It just wasn't my day. I pulled up to an old logging road and yelped a got an answer about 100yrds out, great get all my stuff on and get after him, when I put my keys in my fanny pack I hit the panic button horns starts blowing and lights flashing. Got that turned off and waited a bit and yelped sofly and he is still there. So I am walking down the logging road and told myself when i get to that tree up there I will setup. About 20 feet before the tree he gobbles so I get up agains a tree and lightly call and he is coming right at me up the ridge he turns just before he gets in sight so I turn to where I thing he will come up and there was a hen out of no where 20ft from me. I never heard her I guess because I was so focused on the Tom. She bolts and so does he.

Then I walked out 2 miles and found a spot to just take a rest and set out the decoys and as soon as I get the decoy set up another bird starts to gobble and he would gobble at everything I done if I yelped he gobbled if I made noise in the leaves he would gobble but will not come in even when I gave him the silent treatment he was still gobbling his head off. So I try to sneek up on him and move and I seen him struting at about 70yrds he got as close as 40yrds but it was just to thick and to top it off when he left with is hen they went right where I was setup before.

I had to other birds that just refused to come in.

I didn't get a turkey but I sure did have a blast other than the walk back to the truck.

Hey guys, just a quick update from Missouri and Kansas. Opening day in Missouri was awesome. My best friend and I called in four lone gobblers to the decoys and watched one absolutely destroy my full strutter before we popped a double. This all happened before 6:30. Not monster birds, but solid. Mine was 21 1/2 lbs, with 1.25" spurs and a 11 1/8" absolute paint brush. Thickest beard I have ever taken. Sean's bird, which bounced my decoy was only a two year old. Kinda funny because I gave him first shot and he thought he shot the dominant bird. We laughed, but it was a great hunt. As most of you know you can only kill one bird the first week of the Missouri season. Ridiculous rule because you get two tags and I think you should be able to take both of your birds the first week if you choose. That law kills the first week for most of the outfitters in the state. We fortunately have ground just across the line in Kansas just for this reason. We hopped the line this morning and I slammed a giant, but he flipped off the bank of a small stream and landed in the water. He was soaking wet and looked aweful. I took pictures and laughed the entire time. He weighed 27 lbs, but he was soaking wet. Not sure if he will qualify. I mean what do we take off for water weight. I will get the pics up and posted next week when I get back from this trip. Take care and good luck.

Congrats on the birds Nauticstar. That rule in Missouri does sound pretty ridiculous. I cant wait to see the pictures of this weeks turkeys!

Congrats on the turkeys Nauticstar.

Congrads Nauticstar!!! It is like a broken record in this our team thread:hail:

I been busy for the past several days and haven't had much time to check the foum. Looks like Nauticstars birds is all I have to update. I am going to PM Kim and see what we do about the weight on the wet turkey. Can't wait for the pics!

I hate that rule in Mo also but this year it won't effect me.

Other than opening day my hunts have pretty much sucked!! Wind blowing 20mph with gusting to near 40mph, thunder storms all the time or it is just raining. Over the next 5 days they expect us to get anywhere from 5-9" of rain!!! That is going to really hurt the nesting again this year.

I checked weather.com and the areas I hunt where all under tornado warnings and flash flood warnings. I am sure there will be more blown down trees!! The second day I hunted it looked like a war zone in spots due to the trees being up rooted. The weather is not suppost to clear until next Thursday!!! I guess I am going to wait on the weather to break before I head back out.

Just has not been good weather wise this year. This morning it was misting rain and wind in the 20's with higher gusts and we hunted until around noon today and did not hear not one gooble. Tried setting up in various places but no dice.

No doubt the weather has been really bad. It was wet, windy, and cold for most of my trip, but we managed to take advantage of the small windows we had. On opening day my best friend Sean and I returned to my favorite farm and walked in the dark to my honey spot. We were almost to where I wanted to setup and he grabbed my vest and pointed out a turkey roosted about forty yards to our right. The moon was almost full and I raised my binoculars and could see it was a gobbler. He had his head under his wing and was sleeping. We were very quiet and careful as I set out the B-Mobile decoy and one hen. We backed off to two trees and settled in. It was super early, but very cool watching him on the limb so close. Got to watch him wake up, stretch, etc. Funny but he never gobbled. Just as light started to increase a turkey gobbled down in a meadow below us. He gobbled pretty good, but the one close to us never did. I was disappointed. Finally the one below us flew down and I could see two more with him. Turns out all three of those were gobblers. They slowly made their way to us and were about 60 yards when the one very close to us pitched down about 10 yards from our decoys. Immediately went into full strut and walked over to B-Mobile and the show began. He flogged, stomped, pecked, this poor decoy. One of the best shows I have seen in some time. Sean being the good friend he is, held off until the other three gobblers came in. They had to cross a small stream and a four strand barbed wire fence before running into our setup. I picked one out that had a really thick long beard and waited for Sean to shoot. He finally decided to shoot and I followed up with a clean kill myself. Another opening day Missouri Double. Really awesome hunt.
Because you can only kill one bird the first week of Missouri, we jumped over to Kansas to a farm near White Cloud in the NE corner of Kansas. Loaded with turkeys, but proved to be difficult. I was lucky to setup blind on the edge of a field that was bordered by a small stream and some timber. The turkeys were roosted on the edge of the field and pitched down and eventually walked my way. Not sure why but this gobbler doubled back and came off my left shoulder. There were two more gobblers in the flock that stayed in the field, but this one was sneaking down the edge of the small stream in the timber. Guess he was going to put the surprise attack on the decoys. Just as he walked behind a blown down tree, I spun around and pointed my gun where he was going to pop out. When I did several of the other turkeys saw me and got nervous. He walked out upright and alert and I had to go ahead and shoot him. When I did he flipped off the bank of the stream and landed in a deep pool and just got soaking wet. I was so disappointed. He looked horrible. I had to just laugh when I was taking the pictures. Body wise, he was a huge bird. I know he was wet, but not sure how much that added to the weight. He topped the scale at 27 pounds. I will post all the pictures and measurements/stats next.
This my friends wraps up my turkey season. I had planned a trip to Montana, but not going to be able to make it. My family has been so understanding, especially my wife and now its time to get back to work with them and my career. I want to say I really enjoyed this season. Been fun interacting with everyone. Hope everyone enjoys their season as much as I have.

Mine and Sean's opening day birds from Missouri.



Behind me you can see the meadow the three gobblers came from.




The stats for this bird were 21 1/2 lbs., 11 1/8" beard, and 1 1/4" spurs. Very nice bird for Missouri.
Here are the pictures of my poor pitiful Kansas eastern turkey.






The stats for this bird were a soaking wet 27 lbs., 10 1/2" beard, and 1 1/8" spurs.
Here are some random pictures I took on the trip.




This is where we sat for our opening day Missouri birds.

Wasn't sure about this Kansas turkey. He had a full fan, full gobble, but his beard wasn't that long. Think it might have froze off or bugs could have eaten it. Either way he gave us a show and stayed around forever.

Nauticstar Got your Missouri turkey entered.

Your score is 21.5 + 12.5 + 12.5 + 22.25 = 68.75


Also you got some great pics on those gobblers you let slide!!

I am waiting to here from Kim on what to do about the wet turkey and what weight we should use in the scoring.

What happened to the Kansas bird wing?

Some of the shot pattern got him in the wing and with all his flopping around those rocks near the stream and then getting wet, it really made him look bad. I gave you guys fair warning that the pictures were really pitiful. Ha! Ha!

nauticstar you are the man! you are a bonafide turkey thug (ha-ha) good job bubba.
ksfowler helluva job as well ya'll have killed some beauts. I went out friday morning set up on a pasture sat for awhile heard a gobbler off in the distance knew exactly where he was as I've been on this bird a few times since before opening day just locating and twice since the season has been in.
Anyhow I woke up that morning running a little behind schedule got my gear loaded up come in to tell the old lady goodbye she says your blind is sitting on the porch I said " I dont need it" anyhow get on to the spot like I said heard the gobbler knew where he was went to him set up on a old cabin in the middle of a cow pasture.
Hit him with a few yelps got him stirred up and then i gave him a gobble to mess with his head he let loose with a stream of gobbles I had him figured then jumped out the old cabin bee-lined for the woods but it was a clear cut that had been turned into a section of cowpasture set-up my hen decoy got behind a oak stump that was pretty big that had been blowed over, let him have that fighting purr and he came in like he was on a string blowed up like a beach ball, boy he was hot! He came in to the barbwire fence which was 15 yrds but he came in so fast I just had got done ranging it and let my rangefinder go was getting ready to grab the bow and he busted me. He deflaited and hit the laurels and all i could hear was the old lady saying "the blind is on the porch"! I'm still sick about that. He was beautiful. a good 30lbs bird with at least a 8-10" beard. hopefully I can get on him monday afternoon but I'm thinking tuesday morning he's done! ya'll boys wish me luck or hail mail me some cause i need it ! our season ends may 7th times a ticking!