Turkey Time - Are You Ready?

For some states Turkey season is already under way, but here in Connecticut we still have a few days left before our season opens on April 30th, 2014 so I know I'm a little late with this post but what better time then now for a turkey hunting refresher. 

No turkey hunting post is complete with mentioning the NWTF - National Wild Turkey Federation and what there efforts have meant to restoring wild turkey populations across North America.  If you hunt turkey then in my opinion giving back to the sport is important and becoming a member of NWTF or attending a NWTF event or fundraiser is an excellent way to do so.  Check out this link for ways you can give back.  http://www.nwtf.org/help_now/

What is the NWTF?

The NWTF — a national nonprofit organization — is the leader in upland wildlife habitat conservation in North America.

Founded in 1973, the NWTF is headquartered in Edgefield, S.C., and has local chapters in every state. The NWTF is dedicated to the conservation of the wild turkey and the preservation of our hunting heritage.

Through vital partnerships with state, federal and provincial wildlife agencies, the NWTF and our members have helped restore wild turkey populations throughout North America — from a mere 30,000 in the entire United States to more than 7 million across the United States, Canada and Mexico.

Who Are They?

We are sportsmen, women and children who care deeply about our natural resources and the wild places we love to hunt.

We cherish the memory of the ridge top gobbler we hunted last spring and fondly remember the cornfield where we saw that big buck at sunset two years ago.

Collectively, we come from all walks of life to engage in conservation and preserve the hunting heritage we all hold dear.

... the champions of conservation.

According to many state and federal agencies, the restoration of the wild turkey is arguably the greatest conservation success story in North America's wildlife history.

We have spent more than $412 million to conserve nearly 17.25 million acres of habitat.
That area is larger than the state of West Virginia.

Wild turkeys and hundreds of other species of upland wildlife, including quail, deer, grouse, pheasant and songbirds, have benefited from this improved habitat.

Our dedicated volunteers bring new hunters and conservationists into the fold — nearly 100,000 every year — through outdoor education events.

Most certainly in the the State of Connecticut I do believe that the restoration of the wild turkey to be the greats conservation success story in our history.   I watched out turkey season go from a lottery only hunt in just one small corner of our state to the entire state being open to turkey hunting and now the ability to purchase and hunt both on state land and private land.  As you can see from this Wild Turkey facts sheet post on the Connecticut DEEP Wildlife website.

Wild turkeys were abundant in Connecticut when the first settlers arrived. However, a combination of forest clearing and a series of severe winters eliminated the turkey from Connecticut by the early 1800s. From the 1950s through the early 1970s, attempts at wild turkey restoration through artificial propagation were largely unsuccessful. The major breakthrough in restoration efforts occurred when free-roaming wild turkeys were live-captured and translocated using a rocket net. This large, lightweight net is fired by rockets from a remote blind and carried over turkeys that have been attracted to the area by bait.

Between 1975 and 1992, 356 wild turkeys were released at 18 sites throughout the state. These releases and subsequent population expansion have resulted in the successful restoration of wild turkeys to all 169 Connecticut towns. Recent land use practices in Connecticut have also favored the expansion of wild turkey populations as the landscape has become more forested. As a result of restoration efforts and the increase in forest habitat, sportsmen have been able to hunt wild turkeys since 1981, and landowners and others have enjoyed observing them in their natural state.

Know and obey all the local hunting laws.  You have to understand things like license requirements, gun and ammo restrictions,  Private land permission, legal birds and bag limits, hunter orange requirements, decoy regulations and sometimes just knowing what other hunting opportunities are available during the spring turkey season can shed light on what you might encounter while out there.  If you plan on hunting other states, make sure to keep your regulations straight.  In Connecticut during the spring season any legal turkey must have a visible beard.  That means it is legal to shoot a bearded hen, but just because it is legal doesn't mean you must.  My clan chooses to let the bearded hens walk on by.  Sometimes we might choose to shoot mature birds only and let the young ones take jakes if they want to.  As long as it is a legal bird and you choose to take it then it's a trophy in my book.

Hopefully many of you planning to hit the woods on opening day to chase turkey have already got your preseason preparations done, but if not you still have time to hit the woods and get your scouting in as well as patterning your shotgun, choke and ammo combination.  These birds are not only smart but they are tough so doing your homework and knowing where they roost, feed, strut, breed is crucial to a successful hunt, but even if you know all these things and have practiced your calling you better make sure you are putting enough pellets on target so spending time on the range to get the best possible choke/ammo combination for your firearm is extremely important.  For those chasing turkey with stick and string, well I have major admiration for you folks.  I have yet to use my archery gear for turkey and plan to some day but they are challenging enough for me with the firearm so I'll stick to that for now.

Making turkey sounds is important, but knowing what sounds to make and when to make them is even more crucial to success.  Some times I ask myself - do I really need to carry all these different calls with me?  Well the answer many times is yes.   There have been hunts where I have used every call in my vest within a 100 yard area, knowing there are turkey's there only to have no response on all but one of those calls.  The tone, pitch and volume sometimes just need to be what they want to hear and it is the only thing that works.  One tip about calling - try to sound natural.  What this means is don't use the same sequence, tone and volume when you call.  Mix it up.  If you are letting out some yelps in a 5 or 6 note string then for the next series maybe only yelp twice then pause and then yelp two or 3 more times and even through in some clucks in between and after.  Listen to the real turkeys and you will quickly notice that don't sound like a broken record repeating the same sounds and notes over and over so you need to do the same.  YouTube has plenty of great videos of live hens calling in the field.  Watch them and practice mimicking their calls.

Think safety and think defensive minded!  There is so much to cover when talking safe turkey hunting but understanding what you are actually doing out there will help put it all in perspective.  You are most likely dressed in full camo and hidden well.  You probably have a realistic turkey decoy out in front of you somewhere and you are making realistic sounds of a turkey.  This could be a recipe for problems but if you pay attention to these 10 Tips for a Safe Spring Turkey Hunt provided by the NWTF then you have the building blocks for a safe hunt.   If you are using decoys spend a little extra time when setting them out to make sure that anyone that might come across your decoys in the field can be seen and that if they take a shot at them you are not in the line of fire.  Remember think defensive minded at all times.  Decoy setup isn't necessarily a science but if you observed enough turkeys during your scouting you've picked up some little tidbits of information on how other hens, young toms and that old mature tom interact with each other.  Use that to your advantage when setting up your decoys.  Make them visible and position them in a way that causes that old tom to concentrate on them and not you.  There are times when the best decoy is none at all.  Don't worry the birds will tell you what they want.


Patience is key when turkey hunting.  If you've spent time in the spring woods chasing turkey then at some point I'm sure you've been in the situation where you've been working a gobbler that was sounding off and all of a sudden everything goes quiet.  Not a peep.  Your brain goes into overdrive trying to figure out what went wrong.  You change up call after call and still nothing.  It's time to move, right?  So you start to stand up and your hear it.  Put, put, put... and off he runs.   Turkey's have incredible hearing and eyesight and they use this to their advantage.  In nature it is the hen that usually goes to the tom so you are asking him to come to you.  Learn to be patient and not to quick to move your setup when a bird goes quiet on you because he just may be circling in nice and quiet for a look.  If he is with other hens, once those hens start to wonder off, he might just come back looking for you.

Once you got that bird on the ground make sure you take care of any tagging requirements before setting up for some nice in the field photos.  If you are allowed multiple birds, maybe even set back up and see if you can't get another bird to commit.  If you are going to mount the whole bird, cape it or even just mount the fan, take time in the field to keep blood off the bird and all the feathers in tact.  If you don't plan to use the turkey feathers maybe you cans wing by the local fly fishing shop or know some folks that tie their own flies and offer those feathers up to them.  I've tied many flies using feathers from turkeys I was luck to harvest.

For most the most regarding part of the hunt comes when that turkey is sitting on the dinner table.  I know for a fact that after harvesting a bird a comment will be made about eating turkey poppers before we even make it half way back to the truck.   You can pluck the bird, skin it or even breast it out.  Most folks I know just breast it our, but don't ignore those legs and thighs as they make great additions for soup.  My two favorite recipes are Southwest Turkey poppers and Turkey, mushroom and Wild Rice soup and you can get those recipes here:  My Favorite Turkey Recipes.

I wish everyone a very safe and successful spring turkey hunt and remember to share the outdoors with someone new if you can.

Additional Turkey Hunting Resources:

Turkey Hunting Success and Safety pamphlet from the NWTF.
Turkey Hunting Tactics  - NWTF Website

Another Successful Youth Turkey Hunt

Me, Dylan and Busch Pilot with Fingers

Passinthru Outdoors is all about sharing the passion for the outdoors with others and this past weekend Busch Pilot and I had the opportunity to take a youngster out for only his second turkey hunt ever.  Earlier this week Bubba was telling us about Dylan, whose father had just been deployed and his serving his country as a member of the Air Force and that Dylan had no one to take him Turkey hunting.  Bubba was going to be out of town with his family so we didn't hesitate to say yes when asked if Busch Pilot and I would take him out for youth day here in CT.  The chance to take a youngster out for a hunt is always top on our list, but to take a youngster who's father is currently serving our great country and protecting our freedoms is definitely number one on the list.

Turkey we named Fingers who was on our hit list.

Dylan had completed his hunter safety course last spring and got his license just in time to hunt the last day of the 2011spring turkey season.  Dylan was fortunate enough to tag his first deer last fall and was really looking forward to trying his luck at spring turkey and we were excited to be part of it.  Any time we take a new hunter out to the woods, especially a youngster, it always adds a little bit of extra pressure as you always take the opportunity to teach and you want that person to see game and have a positive experience and if possible to fill a tag.  Well this hunt offered up everything we had hoped for.

Busch pilot and I spent time doing our scouting and getting an idea for what was going on and it was interesting how things changed in just one week.  The birds were broke up even more and were much more quiet.  Even their roosting habits changed. There are hens on nests and we are catching them returning to roost very late in the day.  This is why scouting on a regular basis is important to successful turkey hunts.  Friday evening before the hunt we had 6 jakes work through the farm and head off to roost on the adjoining property, the good news was we felt they would work right back on to the farm or at least we could get them to do so as they would be well within range to hear us calling.

I picked Dylan up at his house at 4:30am and we made the short drive to the farm where we parked and waited for Busch pilot to show up because stopped down the street to talk with fisherman waiting for the 6:00am start time for Connecticut's opening day of fishing season. We got our gear loaded up and headed off to the lower part of the farm which would put us close to where those jakes headed off to roost.  The first signs of light were greeted with a long distance gobble, which perked all 3 of us up.  It wasn't long after that when the next gobbler sounded off and others responded.  We had gobblers close enough that we knew we could work one and it wasn't long before Busch Pilot was working his magic and talking turkey.  We had been talking and teaching Dylan about what was going on and what we thought might happen and he was very attentive and asked some questions.  The best question was when he asked us if we should load the gun!  We got caught up in listening for birds and explaining things to Dylan that it was almost 15 minutes into legal shooting and we still hadn't loaded the shotgun.  We all had a good laugh about that one.

Check Fingers off the hit list

We had gobbles not far from us and knew they had crossed the property and were in the lower pasture of the farm we were hunting and now all we needed was a visual.  I caught the first bird moving up the field and put the binos on him and could see it was a good tom so Busch Pilot gave him a few calls and he stopped and looked right into our setup.  As he stopped to look, we noticed more birds coming in the field below him and it was the 6 jakes from the night before.  All we needed now was for one of them to get interested in the sweet sounds coming from Busch Pilot's slate call.  When that tom took two steps towards us, we knew that this was going to happen.  That tom worked our way while the jakes continued up the field and out of sight.

I had the camera running, BP was calling  and we couldn't forget about coaching Dylan who was extremely calm and ready to go.  At one point when the tom was in range BP and I had a discussion and we decided to let him keep coming to the decoy to offer up a closer shot and the Tom obliged.  When he got to the jake decoy Dylan had the gun up and a bead on him and when we gave Dylan the okay to take the safety off and take his shot.  When the Remington 870 20 gauge barked that tom flipped over and Dylan had his first turkey on the ground.  I think Busch Pilot and I were way more excited at first but it didn't take long for Dylan to join in the celebration.  We exchanged high fives and hugs and let our adrenaline calm down and then sent Dylan out to retrieve his longbeard.

Dylan brought the bird back over to the blind and we looked it over, filled out his tag and took some pictures before breaking down the blind and packing up the decoys.  Dylan's first bird was a two year bird weighing 20lbs and had a 9" beard and had just incredible color.  His bird was also one of the birds on our hit list known as Fingers and there were plenty of folks in our crew hoping to claim his as their own, but not a one was disappointed in the news that Dylan shot fingers.  Matter of fact, everyone was extremely happy and excited for him, even my daughter who held out last weekend in hopes of getting a poke at Fingers.

Dylan with his first turkey - 20lbs 9" beard

 Just as we made it back to the trucks, some friends showed up to check out Dylan's first bird and offer up congrats for a job well done. We then headed off to Busch Pilot's house to clean Dylan's bird and call it  a day.  Dylan plans on mounting the tail and beard and I hope that every time he looks at it he remembers this hunt and thinks about how he can share the passion with someone new.  Because in the end, it's not about the trophies on the wall or the filled tags, but the memories of sharing the passion for the shooting sports with someone else.


Congrats Dylan!

My favorite Wild Turkey Recipes

With spring turkey season on deck I figured I would use this opportunity to share my favorite wild turkey recipes.


How to cook those legs and thighs:  I slow cook the legs and thighs in a slow cooker with some chicken broth and some seasonings and the real secret is low and slow.  I start them in the morning and cook them on low and they are done by the time I get home from work.  I don't want the meat to fall off the bone, but it's close to doing so.  Remove them from the crock pot and let them cool on a plate.  You can strain the liquid from the slow cooker and save for adding to the soup or use for another soup.  Once the turkey is cool place them in the fridge over night and then pick them apart cold.  It seems easier to separate the meat from all those pesky tendons after it is cold.  I've also picked them after letting them cool on the counter.  I then use this picked me in the recipe below.  If you are one of those folks that swear the turkey legs are no good, then give this cooking method a try and I'm sure you will change your mind.

The first is Turkey, Mushroom and wild rice soup.  I found this recipe on a states fish and game website many years ago when I was looking for a way to use the turkey legs and thighs which is the same time I came across the cooking method above.  I can't remember which one either but some of you may have seen it.

Turkey, Mushroom and Wild Rice Soup

• 3-4 cups of cooked turkey, cubed or pulled -I use turkey legs and thighs cooking method above.
• 3 stalks celery, chopped
• 2 pkgs of mushrooms sliced - what ever kind you like
• 1 - 2 cups of cooked long grain wild rice
• 1/2 cup of white wine
• 2 cups of milk
• garlic - as much as you like but at least 2cloves - crushed/minced
• 1/2 cup chopped green onions
• 1/2 teaspoon of thyme
• 2 tablespoons parsley
• 1/4 cup of parmesan cheese, I use shredded
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 2 tablespoons cornstarch
• Water or stock (can use the stock from the crockpot here)
• Salt and Pepper to taste

Cook the rice as directed.  In a large skillet, melt the butter and add the onion, celery, mushrooms and garlic and cook until tender.  Add Turkey, wine and salt and pepper and cook for a few minutes while stirring.  Add cornstarch to milk, mix and add to skillet.  Cook until bubbly.  add rice to pain and remaining seasonings and Parmesan cheese.  Add water or turkey/chicken stock to make everything a little soupy.  Simmer for another 20 minutes and serve.  Add some biscuits or some crusty bread and you have a warm hearty meal.

The next favorite is what we call Turkey Poppers.  There are many recipes out there that are the same, but with a different name and no matter what they are called, these are great tasting little treats that everyone enjoys and go a long way when introducing others to eating wild turkey.

Southwest Turkey Poppers

• One Turkey breast - boneless
• Thick sliced hickory smoked bacon- your favorite bacon will work
• jalapeno peppers - sliced
• Southwest salad dressing - substitute your favorite dressing or BBQ sauce.
• Toothpicks

Cut the turkey breast into strips just wider than your bacon - about two inches and marinate overnight in southwest dressing (substitute your favorite dressing or BBQ sauce).   Prepare the jalapeno peppers by cutting in half and removing the seeds and slicing them into long pieces.  Take a marinated strip of turkey and lay it flat.  Place a slice of pepper on the center of the turkey strip and roll up.  Place a strip of bacon around the rollup and secure with a tooth pick.  Now you can cook these on the grill, my preferred method, or bake/broil in oven until turkey and bacon is cooked.  Take care to not over cook.  

If you have a favorite wild turkey recipe feel free to share it in the comments section.

A few more 2011 Connecticut Turkeys

Connecticut's 2011 Turkey season has been open for 3 days now and I've been stuck in the office all week, man I need a new job.  Maybe one that allows me to hunt and fish all day, every day.  Anyone know of any openings?

So the second of CT's two youth turkey hutning days was this past Saturday and I awoke to rain, wind and even snow flakes - and they were sticking to the grass even.  After checking in with the boys it was decided that we crawl back into the sack and see how it is a little later in the morning.  Well about 8:30ish the rain lightened up enough to make a run to provate land, but my daughter and I had to back out as we had family coming in from out of state for the holiday and the wife needed our help.  That's okay because Busch Pilot and Bubba took Bubba's son James - aka Little Bubba - out for a run at some birds and it is a good thing they did.  Little bubba scored on a pair of soaking wet jakes that just couldn't resist checking out that crazy hen making all that noise in the rain.  This was Little Bubba's first ever turkeys and he was excited and I think he forgot about how wet he was.

Busch Pilot & the victory sign after running down one of Little Bubba's Jakes

Little Bubba with his rain soaked Jakes

Busch Pilot has been at it since the opener where he had to contend with some other hunters with a not so nice attitude.  It's a good thing I wasn't there because I am no where as nice and as patient as BP is.  Anyway BP didn't get any shooting in but he did work a few birds.  Busch Pilot does his homework and he has been on the look out for Chief - the tom with a missing tail feather that my daughter missed on youth day -  and BP had him put to bed the other night and at just after 7am the next day Chief stepped out and gave BP a perfect shot and down he went.  There was another tom with Chief and all he had to do was to walk away but he stayed around and BP gave him the same welcome he gave Chief.  My daughter is a little unhappy that BP got Chief, but she says she will just shoot a bigger one.  Gotta love that confidence.

Busch Pilots 2011 Toms

Bubba finally got out as well and during my 7:30am check in with him he had only seen one hen and it was quiet.  For the piece of land he was hunting, this isn't a good sign and it wasn't looking very promising.  It wasn't long after that Bubba started working a bird and a lone jake came running right in to the setup.  With 3 private land turkey tags in his pocket and turkey poppers on his mind, Bubba never hesitated and down went the jake.

Bubba's 2011 Jake

Just a few Connecticut Turkeys showing off their 2011 birds

So let's take inventory here.

Kaleigh - 1
Little Bubba  - 2
Busch Pilot - 2
Bubba - 1
ME - ZERO.

OUCH!  I better get on the stick and get in the woods.  Hopefully tomorrow will be my day, but with turkey hunting you just never know what is going to happen and that is one of the reasons we all love turkey hunting - Every outing brings hope, disappointment frustration and hopefully success.  But no matter what the day holds for you as a turkey hunter it always serves to drive the passion. 

Boys Will be Boys

As I break down the 20+ minutes of video that we took during my daughter's youth hunt I continue to be impressed with everything she got to see that day.  We had action from 11am until quiting time and we just didn't know what would happen next.

This clip is of some young toms and jakes trying to impress the ladies.  Hope you enjoy it.

A Hunt We Will Never Forget

I'm writing this in response to a recent writing prompt from Outdoor Blogger Network.

"It’s time to write about the outdoor kid in you or the kid(s) you have exposed to the Outdoors."

OBN suggested writing about a memory from your childhood of being exposed to the outdoors or from an experience where I introduced a child to the outdoors.   Seeing I have already written about my first deer camp, which is definitely the one outdoor experience responsible for fueling my passion for the outdoors, I decided to write about introducing others to the outdoors seeing my blog tag line is "Sharing the Passion". 

As I sit and think about all those people I have introduced to some of my outdoor passions and places I find it difficult to pick just one.  I could get into one of the many times my wife was thrust into an new outdoor adventure, usually reluctantly,  like the time I took her steelhead fishing for an 8 hour drift boat trip in a blizzard or the first time I handed her a warm pair of venison tenderloins just removed from a deer.  I could write about one of my brothers first deer hunts or fishing trips as well.  All of which have some funny and interesting moments in them but I have to be careful not to get the wife or family mad at me so maybe I'll save those for another time.

There is no doubt that I get the most enjoyment out of introducing kids to the outdoors especially my own kids, but any youngster will do and they have.  I have had the pleasure to introduce a few of  my kids friends to fishing, turkey and deer hunting and every single outing was special.

One hunting trip that really stands out is the time I took my son Brendan and his friend Michael and Josh out on a youth turkey hunt in the spring of 2005 when they were just 13 & 14 years old.  Both Brendan and Michael had taken their first turkeys in the years before this trip so they were, in their minds, seasoned turkey hunters.  We also had another of their friends along for the trip, Josh, who never hunted but was at the time experimenting with photography and videos and he wanted to video tape the hunt for me.  What made this trip special was the events of that morning hunt which are documented below.

Brendan, Josh and Michael - 2005 Turkey hunt

The trip started out with my son Brendan and his friends Michael and Josh all sleeping over at my house.  I'm not sure Sleeping over is the right way to explain this, maybe just staying over because they didn't sleep much and neither did I as I kept waking up to the sound of their excited little voices talking about previous hunts and their expectations for their hunt in the morning.  Surely anyone that has every had to wake a youngster early for a hunting trip knows that it usually doesn't take more than one or two shakes before they jump up and say they are ready to go and this trio was no different.  Tying to keep them quiet so they didn't wake Momma and my daughter was a challenge.  It was as if they were continuing their excited conversations from the night before and I found myself overloaded before getting a full cup of mornign starter fluid.  I don't remember being that amused at the time, but I can surely close my eyes today and see myself doing the same thing on many a morning when I was young.

We loaded up the gear under a dark sky with a light drizzle of rain coming down but no worries, we had the pop-up blind in the truck because without it there was no way I was going to keep 3 teenagers still and quiet in this weather or any weather for that matter.  We were hutning a piece of private land that had a large pasture that went from the road uphill to a flat where the woods started and that flat just happens to be a common place for turkeys to cross as they work the woods around us.  We've taken a few turkeys from this same pasture and I harvested my biggest bird every just inside the wood line the previous year hunting with Brendan and Michael so I knew the birds would be around but would they cooperate is the question.

So we had four of us crammed into my Ameristep Doghouse blind with only two folding chairs and both of them were taken up by Brendan and Micheal as they were the shooters.  The game plan was to let Micheal have the first shot at a bird and for the life of me I can't remember why, but that was the plan.  we put out two hen decoys just 15 yards from the blind and waited for the birds to start talking.  It wasn't long until we heard the first sounds of birds still on their roost and in all that turkey talk was a couple of gobblers that just gave away their position.  It sure sounded as if they were roosted right where they should be and I knew that if they did what I had seen them do in the weeks prior I knew they would come off the adjoining property and head up to the pasture. 

We were still dealing with some drizzling rain and the birds were not as vocal once on the ground but I was able to get just enough gobbles to keep tabs on their positions and I knew the birds were working just inside the wood line across from our setup and heading to the pasture.  It wasn't long before we saw the first bird step out of the woods and into the pasture.  The grass was a little high but not bad, but we did have a hump in between us and the birds so we would lose them in the pasture on occasion but they did put on a show for the boys.  using the binos we could see we had 5 jakes with a couple of hens and one larger bird that looked bigger but still not a mature tom, ten birds in all.  I was working my box call and slate and did my best, which believe me isn't that good, to call them birds across but all we could do was watch as they continued to cross the upper portion of the pasture only to enter the woods.  I watched those boys fill with excitement and anticipation at every gobble, cluck and movement of the birds, only to see all that excitement come crashing down as they hit the woods.  But as I was explaining to them that it is very difficult to call Toms away from hens, I caught a little movement back over to where the birds came of out the woods and sure enough it was a turkey and it looked like a Tom.

As I pointed this bird out to the boys, their excitement grew and I had to keep reminding them to whisper and move very slowly as turkeys have incredible eye sight and hearing.  Now as I was sitting there watching this bird I was hoping for one of those birds that come running right up to the decoy in a flash, but we had the opposite.  I spent 30 minutes working this bird just get him to come about 75 yards across the pasture.  Now put yourself into a 14 year old body and think about that 30 minute wait and you can appreciate what I had to deal with.  Well this gobbler took his sweat time, but man did he put on a display for us and one I will never forget.  We had about 20 minutes of video of this bird before he got to within about 15 yards of the decoy and hung up. Now when he was hung up he wasn't nervous instead he put on a display that was designed to pull those two hen decoys staked out in front of us right to him and they just kept ignoring him so we had a stand off.  Needless to say I was getting impatient and extremely nervous so I told Mike to get a steady bead on him and when he comes out of his display to pick out that magical spot on his neck and let one rip.  Well Mike lined him up and when he came out of his "come here girls dance" I heard the safety click off and my Remington 870 12guage bark and with that the turkey jumped up in the air, spun around and was headed out of dodge.  I had Mike rack another shell and give him another shot but he just kept running away.  I was depressed for just a minute until the boys started talking and I noticed their voices filled with excitement and not depression as they started laughing and teasing each other and recounting what had just happened.  I got them all back on track and settled down and reminded them that there were more turkeys around so this isn't over, but in the back of my mind I thought we were done.




Well we got our laughs and ribbing out of the way while having a snack and letting things calm down and I would throw in a little calling as well.   About 30 minutes after Mike's miss, Brendan says he sees two birds coming into the pasture just to our right and he is pumped because it is now his turn to shoot.  Of course we have the side windows all zipped up so I unzip the side window just a little to get a look and sure enough hear come two jakes working straight into the decoys.  Only Brendan and I can see them and of course Josh and Mike want to see them so Josh pushes up against me with and starts video taping out the side window while I am trying to get my son ready but Brendan was as way ahead of me and ready to roll.  I made a few purrs and those two jakes came walking right into the decoys and as they got to within feet of the decoys they stretched out their necks to check the fake hen just standing there and then turned around and it looked like they were headed out.  Brendan had a bead on them the whole time and was waiting for them to separate a little bit so he didn't shoot both of them.  They separated just enough and Brendan let that Remington 20guage rip and down went his bird and out came a huge whoop of excitement and that is when Brendan took over and directed Micheal to shoot the other jake that had run away and stopped and was just standing there just close enough.  I couldn't see the jake standing there so it was my Son Brendan calling the shots and Mike was listening and this time when the Remington went off Mike connected and the second jake dropped.  We went from a miss to a double on youth day.  It was just plain amazing.  What made it extra special is Josh had everything on video.  Yup that is right a 14 year old video taped the entire trip and did an incredible job to boot.  So Josh got to see something that many turkey hunters never see or experience during the hunt but I think his favorite part was the up close inspection of the turkeys themselves.



It is a day I will never forget and I'm not sure any trip to come will ever top that day.  I was blessed to share a turkey blind with my son and his two teenage friends and I got experience everything through their eyes and it was incredible.  We experienced so many emotions that day that I can't possibly account for all of them and I was proud and impressed at the way the boys handled everything.  From anticipation, excitement,  failure and back to raw excitement.  We had so many good things happen on that hunt but it was extra special listening to Josh recap the days events as he was showing off the video he took to everyone that stopped over that day.

What the boys and I experienced that day, many people can't understand and will never experience anything like it and a piece of me feels sorry for them.  It was an experience of a lifetime for all of us and it is a bond we will always share.......Forever.

New Jersey Spring Turkey Opener

Well my original goal was to spend 5 or 6 days hunting turkey and fishing for shad down in the Delaware Water Gap but as things go something came up and I had to change my plans to a two day trip.  Stinks for sure, but still fun and relaxing, just way too short.  A couple of my friends were lucky enough to spend the entire first week of the season chasing the birds and the daily updates I got from them just seemed to make it hurt more, well except for the rain and cold weather they had at the beginning of the week which made me glad I was inside at my desk.

Jimmy (aka "I have a loaf of bread") and Billy (aka "Busch Pilot") fought through the rain and cold for the first 3 days of the season as they worked the stubborn birds.  One afternoon they had to call it quits due to hunting hours ending just as they were working a longbeard into their position.  Man I hate when that happens.   Busch Pilot was fortunate enough to get a nice Jake into range earlier in the week with about 4 minutes to spare so he decided with the weather forecast what it was he better take the opportunity that presented him and he harvested his bird.  Not the longbeard he was after but definitely a trophy on heavily hunted public land.

Busch Pilots Spring 2010 New Jersey Bird

My friend Jim (aka "Bubba") and I headed out for NJ Thursday afternoon to meet up with the rest of the crew and get a few days of hunting and relaxing in.  Bubba is recovering from surgery so he wasn't planning on hunting, but instead catching up on his sleep and some sightseeing.  We arrived in the Gap Thursday afternoon to find the guys at the river doing some shad fishing.  My dad was down there as were a few of his pals and the only one that was having any type of consistency with the shad was my Dad's friend Paul.  I think the weird thing about Paul's success was that it was somehow tied into his weird choice of tackle or maybe it was his choice of women's waders.  Anyway, it really doesn't matter how he chooses to dress or what he was using for tackle, because he was kicking everyones butt.  Paul was using a Cabela's Wobble Jig with a small plastic tail on it and he did really well with it.  As a matter of fact, the shad in the "Shad fishing the Delaware 4/29/10" blog post was caught on a Pink Wobble jig.

Cabela's Wobbler Jig

Friday I decided to hunt a section of the mountain were Busch Pilot and I had a previous encounter 2 years ago with a big Tom and instead of getting him we almost got run over by two black bears. As i started heading into the woods I heard a gobble, good sign but I couldn't pinpoint the bird but I had a good idea of where he was so I slowly and quietly worked my way into the woods to try and get closer and as I was doing so I heard a hen cackle as she flew down off her roost.  I decided not to try and get closer but to rush a setup so as to not spook her.  Well it started out as if my decision and plan was coming together because that hen stayed put about 80 yards from me just clucking, yelping and cutting and ofcourse that big old tom was talking back and coming her way so I basically let nature take it's course but chimed in with some of my own love calls on occasion. It wasn't long before i started seeing other birds coming from the direction of the gobbler and as both that hen and I continued to call he came strutting into view at 80 yards.  I knew with all the hens around that I would be hard pressed to call him away so I concentrated on the hens.  Well that plan sure looked like it was going to work as I was able to get the hens to come up the little knob I was on and look me over but when the Tom gobbled, they just turned and went back down.  I watched them work their way out the direction I had come in.  The only good part was Busch Pilot was out there and I knew he had to hear them and ofcourse he did because i received a text asking why I haven't shot yet.  Well we continued to work this old bird and he stayed within a couple hundred yards of his roost and never left.  He just hung out strutting back and forth while his girls fed away.  The noon quitting time comes a lot quicker than you think when you have a big old longbeard just hanging out and there is nothing you can do about it.

Saturday started off way different but ended up the same way.  I decided to sneak back into the same area to see if the gobbler I left there yesterday was still around.  It was quiet up until about 7:30 when I heard the first gobble and it was below me and close to the same area we left that Tome the day before.  We never could not get this bird to gobble at us at all but he gobbled 4 times in total between the first one at 7:30 and the last one at 9:15.  He was pretty much doing the same thing that was going on yesterday.  Back and forth along a strut line but uninterested in our calls.  What was interesting is that about 9:30 I hear something crunching through the woods behind these deadfalls and then all of a sudden....there it is....  nope not the gobbler but one big black bear who came right up from where that gobbler was.  The bear stayed for just a little bit and I just couldn't get any pictures or video it thanks to the brush.  The bear started heading out towards Busch Pilot's position and I know how much he loves bears, not really, so being the good friend that i am,  I hit him on the radio so he could pack up and run away.  He let me know that about 10 minutes before I called him that a hen came cruising by him up from where the gobbler was so my thought was that this bear split them up and forced the gobbler the other direction.  I worked my way further out the bench to see if I could raise him, but nothing.  So around 11:15 I decide to start my way back to the car and work the lower benches to see if that gobbler got pushed down some, but no luck.  For two days of turkey hunting I had seen birds and heard gobbles so I can't complain.  No other birds were shot and there was no shooting near us.  Jimmy and his nephew James worked a bird along the fields but it kept putting the slip on them and they had to reposition a couple of times but just couldn't close the deal.  My dad spent Saturday morning working the PA side for birds as that was the PA opener but he too went home empty.

Bubba and I spent the afternoon doing some sightseeing  while the rest of the crew decided to work the shad over again.  There were loads of bird watchers out and about and we actually saw two Baltimore Orioles but couldn't get a picture of them.  The Bear count was down for us this trip as I only saw two, one of which we got a picture of and 5 were seen before I arrived.  Compared to the 14 I saw last year I was bummed.

Delaware Water Gap Black Bear

This one is for my buddy Ray.  He has a passion for barn pictures and has taken many himself.  Hope he enjoys it.

Old Red Barn on Old Mine Rd - Depew

Bubba and I did some exploring into a section of the gap where neither of us had spent much time and we ran across Buttermilk Falls which was just an incredible little falls that offered some cool refreshing air to tame the 90 degree heat we were in.  There is a hiking trail with some stairs to hike to the top but with Bubba's arm still in a sling and the stitches just having been removed we thought it was smarter to stay on flat ground.

 Buttermilk Falls 

Delaware Water Gap - New Jersey

This is the 3rd year of this spring trip and hopefully we have many more to come and it continues to grow as large as our fall trips. I can't think of any better time to visit the gap then in the spring and fall. All in all a great trip, great weather, great friends, family and loads of laughs.

Sharing the Passion

As I stated in my blog welcome that one of my goals with this blog is to share my love and passion for the outdoors and I am proud to announce I've brought two new members into my outdoor passions.  A few weeks back I was doing a little practicing with my fly fishing gear in the company pond and one of my coworkers stopped to watch and started asking questions.  Well it didn't take long before I had him convinced to give this a try.  I handed him my fly rod and with a little instruction I had him casting out the fly and retrieving it along just as one of those cooperative little bluegills decided to make it interesting by hitting the fly.  So what started out as conversation ended up with my coworker catching his first fish on a fly rod.  Now that I had him hooked...get it?... I gave him some information on a upcoming free beginner fly fishing class that our local fly shop was having and suggested he stop by and check it out.  Well he did and ended up leaving the shop fully outfitted and ready to go.  So for the past week or so we've been out at the company pond practicing and getting ready for opening day which is on April 17th.  He is learning fast and enjoying himself and that is what sharing this passion is all about.

My second lucky victim just happens to be my daughter. My daughter already fishes, loves to camp and spend time in the outdoors and has even joined us on some of my hunts, but she decided that she wanted to actually try hunting herself.  So we spent the past month working on the home study Conservation Education Firearms Safety course which is required for her to get her license.  She then attended the 8 hour field day portion of the class where she participated in some field exercises designed to stress firearms handling and safety as well as the shooting portion of the class which allows for hands on experience shooting both a shotgun and .22 rifle.  Now my daughter has shot both of these many times before so shooting, safety and firearms handling isn't new to her.  I am also a certified instructor so she has been drilled in Firearms safety and gun handling from a very early age, but the actual part of hunting will be new to her and she is so excited, well except for the getting up early part.  She completed all the requirements of the course and received her Hunter Safety card in the mail last week so she can now purchase here license and permits.  Her first hunting trip will be on April 17th which is a special youth only hunter training day designed for youth hunters to participate in turkey hunting while being mentored by a licensed adult, which will be me and my hunting partner.  The youth hunting days are a fabulous idea and offer a great opportunity for youth hunters to get out and get experience before the pressure and crowds of an open season kick in.  So in preparation for this day we will be discussing the techniques of turkey hunting, shot placement, safety and patterning her shotgun so she becomes aware of her effective range and the capabilities of her firearm.  We've also done a little scouting and the turkey's have cooperated by being where I expected them and doing what I expect. 

She got a good look at one real nice long beard the other evening and even took some pictures of him and now my daughter has claimed him for herself.  I'm sure she thinks this will be as simple as picking out a pair of shoes, but she will soon see.  I know I can't wait for that morning as I look forward to sitting side by side with my daughter all snuggled up against a tree waiting for the sun to rise and the sound of the first gobble of the morning to rattle our bones.  I think I am more excited then she is.

Welcome to the Passion, now go share yours with someone.

Some links of interest.

National Wild Turkey Foundation
International Hunter Education Association
CT DEP Fish and Wildlife