Buckeye Mike

A friend and I took my middle son out last Saturday for the special youth hunt two days before the Ohio season comes in. We got in place well before sunlight in a pretty good listening spot. Our plan was for me to sit with my son and our friend to sit behind us and call. It had rained the night before and there was very litttle gobbling. We did hear one faint gobble behind us and we were listening to try and pinpoint the location. Suddenly, we hear a very loud gobble within 100 yards and decide to set up on the spot (we were on an old logging road). Before we could get set up we hear a hunter using an owl call coming from the same direction as the gobble. The bird didn' t answer so we decided to set up anyway and hope the hunter moved on.

Next my son see another man and his son coming down the logging road. It was still pretty dark so we just kept still and they passed without seeing us. A few minutes later we hear the owl call again in the direction the other hunter and his son were moving. The owl call was immediately followed bya gobble from the same location. It was then that it hit me that this guy was just trolling along using his owl call and a gobble call as locators. He was doing this all on public land, before daylight and taking a kid with him. I was sitting with a 10 year old with a loaded shotgun and something is comming down the dark road in the exact spot we just heard a gobble. I am pretty cautious but I would never want to point a gun at another hunter. If we hadn' t picked up on the fake owl and had not known there was another hunter in that area my son would have definetly been aiming his gun in that direction and you never know what could happen. It could have been a disaster.

In any event, please keep this kind of thing in mind and think through your plan first. By the way, the guy did come back by us again and saw us the second time. I didn' t say anything because I didn' t know what good it would do at that point out in the middle of the woods. We did go the opposite way for the rest of the morning.

MOTurkeyTamer

What a deal, Mike! Just goes to show you that you must always stay on your toes while hunting. You did the right thing by not confronting the guy there. It would have probably only caused more trouble. Some people just don' t have a clue by applying dangerous tactics like walking in the near darkness and gobbling. Wow! Just remember, always identify your target before raising your gun. And you did well my friend!

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trapper T

Wow, shows we always have to be on our toes, I know this WE I accidentally wreck a guys hunt, was the 1st on the hill and after awhile I was heading back to break camp I got a gobble from about 50 yds away in the brush,so I sat down and made a couple of clucks. Well another hen tried to mimmick me? So I sat there with binoculars until I realized I walked in on other guy setup. Tried my best to sneak out w/out bumpimng the Tom, felt bad I no I wouldn' t like that happening to me.

Stickemup

Gobbling on public ground is generally not a good idea because all it' s going to do is draw other hunters to you. I' ve even seen people use a full strut tom decoy on public ground. Talk about nuts! You couldn' t pay me money to sit by a jake or gobbler decoy on the GMA I hunt.

huntnma

seeing i have had some real winners walk up on me and my sister, we learned to tie a ribbon near or on the tree we' re hunting and we talk to them, someone once told me that hunters yelp as a way to alert them that they are closing in....sorry ,not after calling the hunters in....i' m not going o call even more......nope..can' t make me......ya' ll please be careful out there.....glad everything turned out for the good.......

trapper T

That' s a great idea, I might try that out

Turk_man

As crazy as that sounds, two days ago another hunter accused me and my 12 nephew of busting his set-up on public land because his bird had been right at the bottom of the hill we were walking down. I asked him if he had seen my hunting partner who should have been there, he said no, my partner started cutting on a mouth call from 75 yards away and this hunter got excited because his bird was still there. After warning him that it was another hunter, i walked to where my buddy was. He asked what that was all about and I told him that guy thought he was a gobbler. The scariest part is my partner never gobbled or anything crazy like that all he did was some yelping and a little cutting. None of this was missed by my nephew who now wonders about his safety while turkey hunting. This will be my last year hunting public land for turkeys here in Ontario.

trapper T

That' s just plain scary. Be nice to see some education for these dim wits runnin around " hunting"