Below-average temperatures at the beginning of the week did not deter wild turkeys from following their spring routine.
Dispersal is underway with hens beginning to seek out favorable nesting sites. While larger flocks can still be seen, feeding patterns and roost sights will begin to change as emerging vegetation provides new food sources.
Hunters hoping to experience success early in the approaching season should consider scouting some in the weeks to come. Listening in the early morning for gobbles is perhaps the best way to locate turkeys. If one has decent hearing, this often can be done from alongside the road. With minimal foliage in the forest, hunters should refrain from tromping through the woods as it is easy to push turkey out of an area.
While a variety of locator calls are available for getting a gobbler to announce its presence, they are not necessary for those with patience. Listening from a vantage point on a calm morning will provide a hunter with an idea as to how many turkeys are in an area. Knowing where crowing roosters and barking hounds exist in the hunt area can allow a hunter to better understand the range of their hearing abilities.
The youth turkey season will be held Saturday, and the weather forecast appears to be quite favorable. Dressing in layers will allow the mentor and youth to be comfortable at dawn yet able to hunt until noon, if necessary.
As stated earlier, patience is paramount when it comes to hunting turkey. Staying in an area despite a lack of gobbles after fly-down allows you to be there when things change. By design, hens quickly gather around a gobbler in the morning to be bred and interact with the flock. With his harem accounted for and love to be made, there is little reason to gobble once this occurs. As hens begin to sneak away from the gobbler in midmorning, he will begin to gobble again, allowing better chances of calling him in.
Taking a midmorning nap in the woods is a much better option than heading home as the sound of long beard will quickly awaken a sleeping hunter. With only one day for youth hunters to have the woods to themselves, it is important to make plans to utilize every minute of legal shooting time.
A lack of vegetation will force hunters to be conservative with their movements to avoid spooking a vocal bird. Last season, due to property lines, I was forced to set up much farther than I would prefer from gobbling turkeys on several occasions. Without the ability to move, I had no choice but to stay patient and keep calling every 10 to 15 minutes. Twice, I was able to get birds to come more than 500 yards to investigate my calls, although if possible, I prefer to be within a few hundred yards when setting up on a vocal bird.
Ample consideration should be given to the calling location set up as it is difficult to adjust once the gobbler begins to respond. Ample cover, in addition to good camouflage, is necessary to hide a mentor and youth. Using the terrain so that a responding bird is in shotgun range before being able to see the source of the calls will help prevent them from hanging up and strutting beyond the shooter.
While the obvious goal is to tag a tom, spending a day in the woods with youth should not be overlooked as a success in itself.
- The new early opening day of trout season is taking some time to get used to. With opening day coming in two weeks prior to tradition, the in-season stockings have also been occurring earlier than in the past. Checking the stocking list on the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission website revealed several of my favorite streams have already received their second and final stocking.
If you plan to spend some time trout fishing this season, I would encourage you to do so soon as the trout numbers will begin to decline as spring progresses.
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