QuackAttack101
Senior Member
Well, I’m about 2 months late posting this, but hey, now we’ve all got some fresh turkey stories to read in June when this forum is usually deathly quiet. Hope you enjoy.
Also, this is a really long read, so feel free to just look at the pics if you want.
Anyway, my wife is a teacher and loves to chase turkeys as much as I do, so for Christmas, I bought her a guided Rio hunt in Oklahoma during her spring break. We also hunted Osceolas earlier that week but we left FL empty handed, so I’ve left FL out of this story.
We flew in on a Thursday night and planned to hunt with the guide Friday-Sunday. We paid to kill one bird each. After arriving in camp and talking to other hunters, I didn’t like our chances. They had been hunting out there each year for over 10 years and said it was the worst year they had ever seen. Little gobbling and little turkey action in general. Oh well, probably still better than what we’d experienced in GA.
Day 1
We ride with our guide to the ranch we’d be hunting. We got set up well before daylight (at least an hour before the sun would start peeking through) along this fence separating two cow pastures, and the coyotes went to howling as soon as we sat down. And as soon as they howled, several gobblers sounded off too. It was an awesome sight to see (or hear). Coyotes going absolutely crazy and the turkeys gobbled at every noise they made. This lasted for what seemed like an eternity. Only problem was that the bulk of the coyote howls were coming from somewhere between us and the turkeys. Daylight finally breaks and we’ve been sitting there for about 20 minutes and haven’t heard anything (coyotes or turkeys). The guide asks if we want to sit a while or if we want to walk to some high ground and try to find some with the binoculars. He ends up leaving us there and goes in search of some birds with the binos. He hadn’t been gone but 10 minutes when a bird sounded off. And he was close. Probably only 60 yards away. My wife was up first, so she eases her gun to the direction where he gobbled from. I throw a few soft clucks and yelps at him and he gobbles several times, right on top of us just behind some cedar trees. Then I catch movement. It’s about 5 hens and they’ve kind of circled around and end up crossing the fence much closer to us that we anticipated. The gobbler was soon bringing up the rear (Side note: I thought a strutting Eastern Turkey was the most beautiful creature on the planet. That’s until I saw a Rio strutting in person. It was absolutely beautiful. Trust me. Pictures and videos don’t do it justice. You’ve just got to see it with your own two eyes.), but he too came out much further down than we anticipated. By this point, the hens are within 15 yards of us and my wife can’t move her gun to get on the Tom. The hens finally pass us and the gobbler is walking down the fence working away from us. She swings around and fires one off when he’s about 7 steps away. Clean miss (that choke is very tight!!) He flies over the fence (the fence isn’t a property line, FYI. Our guide owned both cow pastures. Lol) and lands about 30 yards from us. Boom!!!! He was flopping as soon as those feet hit the ground.
Bird #1
Double Beard
You can see for days out there
We celebrate and take a few pictures. Then it’s my turn. We drive around the property looking for some birds. We saw a few hens but no toms. We tried a few set ups and managed to call in a few hens but still no gobbler. The guide picks us back up and asks what we want to do. I suggest going back to where we started at daylight given the amount of gobbling we heard over there. So that’s what we do. We walk up and down hills through thick brush for an hour or so trying to locate one. Still no luck. We finally come out of the thick stuff and come up on that fence that the turkeys crossed that morning, but we’re a few hundred yards away from my wife killed her bird. We literally get to the tree that we were set up on that morning and notice movement back in the woods behind the tree. We squat down and bust out the binoculars. We could see at least two red heads and possibly some hens. Definitely two male turkeys though. We throw everything in the book at these turkeys. Nothing. No gobbles. They didn’t even lift their heads up to look in the general direction from where those turkey sounds were coming from. They just kept scratching around and feeding. All of this is going on and these birds are 60 yards away. We finally accept the fact that these birds aren’t moving, so I decide to belly crawl up there. If I can make it 20 yards without being busted, I should have a good opening to shoot through. Well I make it about 10 yards and realize we’re not getting any closer. The guide and my wife can see the gobbler but I cannot. I finally see a red head and ask if it’s a gobbler or jake. We both thought gobbler because we saw him strut and the fan appeared to be full. Well I shoot (and miss the first time but connected on the second shot – recurring theme out there I guess) and the bird starts flopping. My wife says she never saw the bird I shot at and she had been watching another one strut. Come to find out, the one I shot was a jake. After taking some pics and looking at his fan, we soon realized why we thought he was a gobbler. His outer feathers were shorter than the middles ones, but you really couldn’t tell when he was strutting behind some brush. Oh well. He was legal and it was the first time that my wife and I would be able to get pictures with two turkeys, so we were perfectly happy. The guide kept apologizing that he told me it wasn’t a jake, but I didn’t really care. It was a fun hunt and we finally got a double. All is good.
Anyway, it’s just after 1PM on our first day in OK and we’ve killed both of the birds that we’ve paid for. We had two options. 1) Pay for more birds or 2) Find some public land to hunt on the last two days (Not hunting just simply wasn’t an option)
It was fun hunting with a guide and having someone else do all the work for you, but we just didn’t feel that accomplished after those two birds. So we chose option #2.
By the time we got back to the lodge, cleaned the birds, and calmed down from all the excitement, we really didn’t have time to go scout any public land. There were 4 WMAs within an hour and a half of the lodge. I picked the closest WMA although it was described as only having a “fair” population of turkeys while two of the others had an “abundant” population. Oh well. It was closer and if we hunted it over the others, we got to sleep in (4:15AM woo hoo!!).
As much as I didn’t want to, we were just going to have to walk onto some public land before daylight, sight unseen. Oh well, going in blind was better than not hunting. I looked around as much as I could online but could only find a map that appeared to have been drwan in a kindergarten art class. On to google earth. I finally find the WMA and notice what appears to be a creek bottom with some trees. From what I had seen so far in Oklahoma, if you find water, you find trees. If you find trees, you find turkeys. Well I was pretty sure I had found some water that was lined with trees. Well, that’s our spot. No turning back now.
Day 2
We arrive well before daylight and walk towards the water. We can see tree tops over a hill and can see one big, lone tree out in the open prairie in the other direction. When the sun started to show, my wife noticed a strutting tom in that lone tree. Then the gobbling started. Not from the stutter but from the tree tops off in the distance. I just couldn’t let those turkeys gobble without going after them, so I headed their direction. My wife stayed put and set up on the strutter. He appeared to be facing the opposite direction from us and it was still fairly dark, so I thought there was a decent chance he hadn’t busted us.
View of WMA
View of WMA
Beautiful sunrises out there all week
Anyway, I strike out over the hill, cross a little creek and set up on a tree looking towards the trees with the gobbling turkeys. I can’t see them, but I can hear them. They’re probably only about 150 yards away. The trees were thick enough where they never saw me. So maybe I can convince one to fly my direction. Of course not. They flew west down the creek. They gobbled as soon as they hit the ground and were probably 300 yards away. I close the distance slowly and hear no gobbles. I came up on a hill and was worried they were just over the hill and would bust me. Luckily, they were not. I went to the bottom of the hill and got set up on this little tree. As I was putting on my facemask, one hammered. Yikes! He’s close! Really close!! Still can’t see him though. Finally get my mask and gloves on and let out some soft calls. He hammers and it kind of sounds like more than one bird. We go back and forth for a while but he never gets any closer. I finally see him strutting behind a bush about 65 yards away. He struts for a while but doesn’t leave his hens (imagine that!!). Speaking of his hens, I finally got them fired up and lots of them were yapping back at me. I was certain the boss hen would get fed up and bring the whole flock to me. Nope. Not so much. After about 30 minutes of silence, I decide to try to sneak up on them. I belly crawled about 60 or 70 yards and got behind a thick cedar tree. I can hear them scratching around but cannot see them. I’m searching and searching, and I guess I’m just blind. All of a sudden, hey, there’s a turkey. And another. And another. And many more. There were 9 hens standing within 50 yards from me and it took me 2 minutes to finally see them. Then I saw the red head. Jackpot! This is the joker that had been gobbling and gobbling at me. I’m just across the creek from these turkeys and they’re down the creek just a little ways. There are also two mallards in this creek, but they’ll come into play later. Then the red head starts walking up the creek and getting closer and closer. Oh yeah. It’s about to happen!!! He sticks his head straight up in the air and kind of turns to the side and I see a 4 inch beard. Dang it! Another jake. I know I heard more than one gobbling, but oh well. I guess the mature bird moved on somewhere. Well I’m just happy to have 10 turkeys within 50 yards or so. I figure if I spook them it’s not the end of the world because I’m not gonna shoot another jake anyway. So I get out my phone and start taking pictures of these birds to show my wife. I can’t believe how much movement I got away with and the birds were all within 50 yards. If this had been in GA, those birds would have been halfway to Alabama. Actually, I never would have even tried to sneak up on these birds from GA but from what I saw the day before, these Rios were kind of dumb.
As I’m taking pictures of the birds right out in front of me, I catch movement to my right. Jackpot!!!! It’s the long beard. And he’s only 25 yards away. Got my gun up and he stuck his head up. There was a log in the way and I didn’t like the shot so I was going to wait on him to come out from behind it. Of course, he changes directions (not spooked though. No clue how he didn’t see me but he didn’t) and walks over this steep hill. Then all of the other birds start to follow the gobbler (completely backwards, I know, but that’s how it went down). They weren’t spooked or in a hurry. Just time to move along I guess. As soon as the last bird tops the hill, I decide to give chase. (This hill is really steep and the hole they’re in is really deep. If I get to the top of the hill, which is only 20 or 30 yards away, I should be within 20 yards of the birds before they can see me or I can see them.) As soon as I get up to move, those dang mallards spooked and got out of there in a hurry and made lots of noise. This spooked the turkeys and they took off into the prairie. Yep, I did all that moving with 11 turkeys nearby and somehow didn’t spook a single one. Then those two dang ducks got me. Oh well. It was still an awesome experience sneaking up that close to them and watching them for so long.
The one on the left is the jake and you can also see one of those dang ducks in the creek
Since this post is already too long, I’ll give you the abbreviated version of what happened next. I basically crawled after these birds for another 45 minutes or so but couldn’t ever get within 60 yards. Finally I bumped them right into the path of a coyote. They luckily saw him and flew back to the creek. All 11 birds flew right over my head (well not all of them were right overhead but I could see all of them flying over me) and back to the creek. It was absolutely amazing seeing that many turkeys flying overhead. Sounded like thousands of wood ducks piling into a beaver swamp at daylight. It was very loud….and awesome! I decide they’ve been pressured enough and decide meet back up with my wife and find some breakfast.
We come back after breakfast and find a strutter. Tried to circle around on him but he eventually moved and started walking the creek and busted us when we were crossing it. Oh well. Can’t win them all. Excellent day in the turkey woods. Called up some more hens later that afternoon and had some of the most curious deer ever check us out for a half hour or so. These deer were dumber than the turkeys. They came in from straight downwind and circled within 10 yards of us. Then I moved and spooked them and they circled around and almost did the same thing again. They just couldn’t figure out what we were and were very curious to find out!
We finally call it a day and I immediately formulate a game plan for the next morning. I knew where they were roosting and where they flew to at daylight. Easy enough. I’ll set up in basically the same spot from where I had taken those pics the previous day. They should fly right to me.
Although we left the WMA without a dead turkey on day 2, this is still probably my most favorite hunt I’ve ever been on. We were on turkeys all day. Got way too close to a bunch of turkeys. Watched a coyote chase turkeys and deer around. Watched an entire flock of turkeys fly right over my head. Thought I was going to get to pet a wild deer (twice – man they were dumb). And also watched two of the most beautiful white owls that you can imagine. Amazing day enjoying God’s creations. Wouldn’t trade that day for the world.
Also, this is a really long read, so feel free to just look at the pics if you want.
Anyway, my wife is a teacher and loves to chase turkeys as much as I do, so for Christmas, I bought her a guided Rio hunt in Oklahoma during her spring break. We also hunted Osceolas earlier that week but we left FL empty handed, so I’ve left FL out of this story.
We flew in on a Thursday night and planned to hunt with the guide Friday-Sunday. We paid to kill one bird each. After arriving in camp and talking to other hunters, I didn’t like our chances. They had been hunting out there each year for over 10 years and said it was the worst year they had ever seen. Little gobbling and little turkey action in general. Oh well, probably still better than what we’d experienced in GA.
Day 1
We ride with our guide to the ranch we’d be hunting. We got set up well before daylight (at least an hour before the sun would start peeking through) along this fence separating two cow pastures, and the coyotes went to howling as soon as we sat down. And as soon as they howled, several gobblers sounded off too. It was an awesome sight to see (or hear). Coyotes going absolutely crazy and the turkeys gobbled at every noise they made. This lasted for what seemed like an eternity. Only problem was that the bulk of the coyote howls were coming from somewhere between us and the turkeys. Daylight finally breaks and we’ve been sitting there for about 20 minutes and haven’t heard anything (coyotes or turkeys). The guide asks if we want to sit a while or if we want to walk to some high ground and try to find some with the binoculars. He ends up leaving us there and goes in search of some birds with the binos. He hadn’t been gone but 10 minutes when a bird sounded off. And he was close. Probably only 60 yards away. My wife was up first, so she eases her gun to the direction where he gobbled from. I throw a few soft clucks and yelps at him and he gobbles several times, right on top of us just behind some cedar trees. Then I catch movement. It’s about 5 hens and they’ve kind of circled around and end up crossing the fence much closer to us that we anticipated. The gobbler was soon bringing up the rear (Side note: I thought a strutting Eastern Turkey was the most beautiful creature on the planet. That’s until I saw a Rio strutting in person. It was absolutely beautiful. Trust me. Pictures and videos don’t do it justice. You’ve just got to see it with your own two eyes.), but he too came out much further down than we anticipated. By this point, the hens are within 15 yards of us and my wife can’t move her gun to get on the Tom. The hens finally pass us and the gobbler is walking down the fence working away from us. She swings around and fires one off when he’s about 7 steps away. Clean miss (that choke is very tight!!) He flies over the fence (the fence isn’t a property line, FYI. Our guide owned both cow pastures. Lol) and lands about 30 yards from us. Boom!!!! He was flopping as soon as those feet hit the ground.
Bird #1
Double Beard
You can see for days out there
We celebrate and take a few pictures. Then it’s my turn. We drive around the property looking for some birds. We saw a few hens but no toms. We tried a few set ups and managed to call in a few hens but still no gobbler. The guide picks us back up and asks what we want to do. I suggest going back to where we started at daylight given the amount of gobbling we heard over there. So that’s what we do. We walk up and down hills through thick brush for an hour or so trying to locate one. Still no luck. We finally come out of the thick stuff and come up on that fence that the turkeys crossed that morning, but we’re a few hundred yards away from my wife killed her bird. We literally get to the tree that we were set up on that morning and notice movement back in the woods behind the tree. We squat down and bust out the binoculars. We could see at least two red heads and possibly some hens. Definitely two male turkeys though. We throw everything in the book at these turkeys. Nothing. No gobbles. They didn’t even lift their heads up to look in the general direction from where those turkey sounds were coming from. They just kept scratching around and feeding. All of this is going on and these birds are 60 yards away. We finally accept the fact that these birds aren’t moving, so I decide to belly crawl up there. If I can make it 20 yards without being busted, I should have a good opening to shoot through. Well I make it about 10 yards and realize we’re not getting any closer. The guide and my wife can see the gobbler but I cannot. I finally see a red head and ask if it’s a gobbler or jake. We both thought gobbler because we saw him strut and the fan appeared to be full. Well I shoot (and miss the first time but connected on the second shot – recurring theme out there I guess) and the bird starts flopping. My wife says she never saw the bird I shot at and she had been watching another one strut. Come to find out, the one I shot was a jake. After taking some pics and looking at his fan, we soon realized why we thought he was a gobbler. His outer feathers were shorter than the middles ones, but you really couldn’t tell when he was strutting behind some brush. Oh well. He was legal and it was the first time that my wife and I would be able to get pictures with two turkeys, so we were perfectly happy. The guide kept apologizing that he told me it wasn’t a jake, but I didn’t really care. It was a fun hunt and we finally got a double. All is good.
Anyway, it’s just after 1PM on our first day in OK and we’ve killed both of the birds that we’ve paid for. We had two options. 1) Pay for more birds or 2) Find some public land to hunt on the last two days (Not hunting just simply wasn’t an option)
It was fun hunting with a guide and having someone else do all the work for you, but we just didn’t feel that accomplished after those two birds. So we chose option #2.
By the time we got back to the lodge, cleaned the birds, and calmed down from all the excitement, we really didn’t have time to go scout any public land. There were 4 WMAs within an hour and a half of the lodge. I picked the closest WMA although it was described as only having a “fair” population of turkeys while two of the others had an “abundant” population. Oh well. It was closer and if we hunted it over the others, we got to sleep in (4:15AM woo hoo!!).
As much as I didn’t want to, we were just going to have to walk onto some public land before daylight, sight unseen. Oh well, going in blind was better than not hunting. I looked around as much as I could online but could only find a map that appeared to have been drwan in a kindergarten art class. On to google earth. I finally find the WMA and notice what appears to be a creek bottom with some trees. From what I had seen so far in Oklahoma, if you find water, you find trees. If you find trees, you find turkeys. Well I was pretty sure I had found some water that was lined with trees. Well, that’s our spot. No turning back now.
Day 2
We arrive well before daylight and walk towards the water. We can see tree tops over a hill and can see one big, lone tree out in the open prairie in the other direction. When the sun started to show, my wife noticed a strutting tom in that lone tree. Then the gobbling started. Not from the stutter but from the tree tops off in the distance. I just couldn’t let those turkeys gobble without going after them, so I headed their direction. My wife stayed put and set up on the strutter. He appeared to be facing the opposite direction from us and it was still fairly dark, so I thought there was a decent chance he hadn’t busted us.
View of WMA
View of WMA
Beautiful sunrises out there all week
Anyway, I strike out over the hill, cross a little creek and set up on a tree looking towards the trees with the gobbling turkeys. I can’t see them, but I can hear them. They’re probably only about 150 yards away. The trees were thick enough where they never saw me. So maybe I can convince one to fly my direction. Of course not. They flew west down the creek. They gobbled as soon as they hit the ground and were probably 300 yards away. I close the distance slowly and hear no gobbles. I came up on a hill and was worried they were just over the hill and would bust me. Luckily, they were not. I went to the bottom of the hill and got set up on this little tree. As I was putting on my facemask, one hammered. Yikes! He’s close! Really close!! Still can’t see him though. Finally get my mask and gloves on and let out some soft calls. He hammers and it kind of sounds like more than one bird. We go back and forth for a while but he never gets any closer. I finally see him strutting behind a bush about 65 yards away. He struts for a while but doesn’t leave his hens (imagine that!!). Speaking of his hens, I finally got them fired up and lots of them were yapping back at me. I was certain the boss hen would get fed up and bring the whole flock to me. Nope. Not so much. After about 30 minutes of silence, I decide to try to sneak up on them. I belly crawled about 60 or 70 yards and got behind a thick cedar tree. I can hear them scratching around but cannot see them. I’m searching and searching, and I guess I’m just blind. All of a sudden, hey, there’s a turkey. And another. And another. And many more. There were 9 hens standing within 50 yards from me and it took me 2 minutes to finally see them. Then I saw the red head. Jackpot! This is the joker that had been gobbling and gobbling at me. I’m just across the creek from these turkeys and they’re down the creek just a little ways. There are also two mallards in this creek, but they’ll come into play later. Then the red head starts walking up the creek and getting closer and closer. Oh yeah. It’s about to happen!!! He sticks his head straight up in the air and kind of turns to the side and I see a 4 inch beard. Dang it! Another jake. I know I heard more than one gobbling, but oh well. I guess the mature bird moved on somewhere. Well I’m just happy to have 10 turkeys within 50 yards or so. I figure if I spook them it’s not the end of the world because I’m not gonna shoot another jake anyway. So I get out my phone and start taking pictures of these birds to show my wife. I can’t believe how much movement I got away with and the birds were all within 50 yards. If this had been in GA, those birds would have been halfway to Alabama. Actually, I never would have even tried to sneak up on these birds from GA but from what I saw the day before, these Rios were kind of dumb.
As I’m taking pictures of the birds right out in front of me, I catch movement to my right. Jackpot!!!! It’s the long beard. And he’s only 25 yards away. Got my gun up and he stuck his head up. There was a log in the way and I didn’t like the shot so I was going to wait on him to come out from behind it. Of course, he changes directions (not spooked though. No clue how he didn’t see me but he didn’t) and walks over this steep hill. Then all of the other birds start to follow the gobbler (completely backwards, I know, but that’s how it went down). They weren’t spooked or in a hurry. Just time to move along I guess. As soon as the last bird tops the hill, I decide to give chase. (This hill is really steep and the hole they’re in is really deep. If I get to the top of the hill, which is only 20 or 30 yards away, I should be within 20 yards of the birds before they can see me or I can see them.) As soon as I get up to move, those dang mallards spooked and got out of there in a hurry and made lots of noise. This spooked the turkeys and they took off into the prairie. Yep, I did all that moving with 11 turkeys nearby and somehow didn’t spook a single one. Then those two dang ducks got me. Oh well. It was still an awesome experience sneaking up that close to them and watching them for so long.
The one on the left is the jake and you can also see one of those dang ducks in the creek
Since this post is already too long, I’ll give you the abbreviated version of what happened next. I basically crawled after these birds for another 45 minutes or so but couldn’t ever get within 60 yards. Finally I bumped them right into the path of a coyote. They luckily saw him and flew back to the creek. All 11 birds flew right over my head (well not all of them were right overhead but I could see all of them flying over me) and back to the creek. It was absolutely amazing seeing that many turkeys flying overhead. Sounded like thousands of wood ducks piling into a beaver swamp at daylight. It was very loud….and awesome! I decide they’ve been pressured enough and decide meet back up with my wife and find some breakfast.
We come back after breakfast and find a strutter. Tried to circle around on him but he eventually moved and started walking the creek and busted us when we were crossing it. Oh well. Can’t win them all. Excellent day in the turkey woods. Called up some more hens later that afternoon and had some of the most curious deer ever check us out for a half hour or so. These deer were dumber than the turkeys. They came in from straight downwind and circled within 10 yards of us. Then I moved and spooked them and they circled around and almost did the same thing again. They just couldn’t figure out what we were and were very curious to find out!
We finally call it a day and I immediately formulate a game plan for the next morning. I knew where they were roosting and where they flew to at daylight. Easy enough. I’ll set up in basically the same spot from where I had taken those pics the previous day. They should fly right to me.
Although we left the WMA without a dead turkey on day 2, this is still probably my most favorite hunt I’ve ever been on. We were on turkeys all day. Got way too close to a bunch of turkeys. Watched a coyote chase turkeys and deer around. Watched an entire flock of turkeys fly right over my head. Thought I was going to get to pet a wild deer (twice – man they were dumb). And also watched two of the most beautiful white owls that you can imagine. Amazing day enjoying God’s creations. Wouldn’t trade that day for the world.
