Miss HOPE and FAITH from Black River

[fnshtr]

That's turkey hunting for ya! They seem to like "rubbing it in". I'm watching 3 gobblers strutting, sitting on my front porch. They are showing up nearly everyday, but come season, who knows?

Good luck, stay after them! Thanks for posting!

[Terry Green]

I did get ahold of Daniel last week as I was out of town...

$500 for future reference...sorry for leaving that out.

[DanielB89]

Not a worry Terry.  Its going out tomorrow.  I just insured it for $800.  


Daniel

[mangonboat]

Monday morning found that same mixed group of turkeys in the same new horse pasture on the other side of the same new wire mesh and board fence from me and Faith...they must feel like they're in a sanctuary. Once they were on that new clover and stuttin', they certainly weren't going to fly over that fence to get to me in a rush. Saturday they made their way out the low end of the pasture then back uphill along the edge of a different pasture and ended up a lot closer to where I started, but it took them 4 hours to cover that ground.

[CRS]

Anticipation is building.  Got a PM with tracking info.  Hope should be in the Black Hills Thursday!

My youngest son hasn't even gone turkey hunting yet.... says he is waiting for Hope. He is all in on this St. Judes fundraiser.

His favorite bow was bought off the St. Judes auction a few years ago.

[mangonboat]

So far Faith and I are being outwitted by "rodeo" toms. Tuesday morning was warm and still and I heard gobblers both north and south of the house, so I headed north down into a cove that was platted for a subdivision a few decades ago  but they must have run of money because they quit after dozing roads , including culverts for the small stream. Toms sometimes use the relatively open areas of the roads to do some strutting. But the tom gobbling to the north turned out to be a lot farther off than I thought, clear across the road at the very bottom of the cove. Tuesday coming home from a meeting after work I stopped to snap a few pics of this nice tom strutting his stuff ...in the parking lot of the YMCA soccer and after-school facility 2 miles from my house, trying to coax two hens to navigate the traffic and cross the road from the golf course, which they finally did while I was stopped to take the pictures.
   
   

This morning I heard birds all around me at first light..but I was walking the dogs before an early day at the office. On the drive down off the ridge, I spied one nice tom strutting in the center of a riding ring on one of the horse farms at the bottom of the cove to the west, very close to where I saw the birds on Saturday, but he was all by himself in that enclosed ring, strutting for all he was worth, while the hens were 20 yards away on the other side of the fence. I wish I had a better camera with me than my phone.
 These toms sure like putting a fence between me and them.      :confused:

[fnshtr]

Lol. They can be right down cruel!

[CRS]

Just got in from a late soccer game and found a box on the counter.

Tore it open and found a bow named Hope. Made the trip to the Black Hills in fine shape.  More details to follow......

[CRS]

   
     

Hope's Spearfish introduction pictures.

Morning started bright and early. First arrow I released drilled the wiffle golf ball I have pinned to my target bale.  Distance, 18 yards.  

Certainly a good omen and a sign of things to come.  Shot the remaining arrows, including a couple of bare shafts.

Showed perfect tuning!  All the arrows in a nice tight group.  I was done.

On to Broadhead flight check status.  Screwed in some 200gr Magnus, Cutthroat and Eclipse. Total arrow weight 510gr.  Perfect for my 29 inch draw, as I should be pulling Hope to 50#.

First two Broadhead were right on top of each other, the remaining were shot at different dots on the target.  Do not need to be ruining any arrows.   :p

All I did was adjust the knocking point to my standard and check the brace (7 1/4).  It works, may play around some, but with a shortened time, I am going to focus on adventures, not tuning, tweaking gack and minutiae.  

Went in and touched up the heads to shaving sharp.Time to go hunting, long story short, heard 4 different gobblers, but the real ladies were too enticing and I could not get them to play. Had to cut the hunt short as I had some fencing to do at the ranch.

After the fencing job was complete, both of my boys and I shot some more arrows out of her.

We all really like the bow, and shoot her very well.  IMO this is critical with any bow.  Putting the arrow where you want it!

We are all looking forward to spending some time hunting with Hope the next couple of weeks.  

[fnshtr]

[CRS]

Here is todays update.  Spent the entire day chasing turkeys.

It was a great day to be out in the woods, although the turkeys did not cooperate.

Here are a couple of model shoot photo ops for Hope.
   

   

Towards the end of the day we found this track.  Here kitty, kitty, kitty.

   

We did finally find a gobbler and hens at the end of the day.  We got all set up and the hens came in with the Tom hanging up.  They finally had enough and off they went.

We thought at least we have a good starting point for the morning.  Then I checked the honey hole closer to home after dark and 4 gobblers were sounding off in their roosts.  An even better place to start in the morning.    

Wife is kind of giving me a pass on Easter festivities.  Going to hunt the four gobblers closer to home at sunrise. Have Easter dinner at 11:00, then up into the Black Hills for an  afternoon hunt.    

We will see what happens,  going to attend my kind of sunrise service.  

Good luck with Hope and Faith guys!

Bisch

[CRS]

Yesterday morning had the birds acting fickle.  Talked with them a little, but were not interested.

They were not super talkative.  Hunted until 0930 them had Easter festivities.

[mangonboat]

Late in posting my Saturday adventure with Faith. Birds gobbling, me sneaking around, same result. Do you sense a pattern, here?
 
 
A nicely bearded tom was just outside the photo beyond the pine tree, keeping an eye on these jakes, any one of which I fantasized would smoke up quite well, thank you.

Okay, I confess: I am hunting turkeys in high fence private areas. Unfortunately, the turkeys are IN said areas, whereas I am OUT. They are more clever than I anticipated.

 I did manage to sneak up on this clump, deep in the cove where the trees hadn't been cut in over 100 years, of heirloom daffodils near the ruins of an old cabin and a family cemetery with seven headstones dating to the 1880's
 

After taking these pictures, I spent the rest of the day filling a large pothole and have a significant case of bursitis from tamping down the asphalt cold patch. I'm good for about three shots, so if I'm not feeling better in a day or two, Faith is going to find somebody who actually knows how to hunt for turkeys that can be shot!

[CRS]

[CRS]

I was working late tonight to free up a three day weekend.  Hopefully to get out turkey hunting with Hope.

Wife was at a concert, oldest son was with a friend, so I call to check on the youngest boy.

He tells me he is doing nothing, then proceeds to tell me about the turkeys he saw driving home from school.

I asked him why he was not out hunting, a light bulb went off as we have a blind fairly close to home in a canyon.

I don't think much of it and go back to work wrapping everything up.  
Text comes in "I am in the blind".
Answer back "ok".

Go back to work, 5 minutes later phone rings.  It my youngest son.

[CRS]

I pick up the phone and he is all excited.  Here is a short story, told short.

He set up the decoy, made one call and here comes a turkey.  No gobbling, just a straight bee line.

Walks between the blind and the decoy.  Ian draws and actually has to stand up a bit to clear the blind. Turkey notices the movement, but is still distracted by the decoy.  Ian releases the arrow, turkey runs off in a turkey death wobble, and he watches it tip over.

Shot distance, 4 yards.

[CRS]

   

   


     

As the boys and I were talking in the front yard while taking pictures.  The subject turned to how cool this whole project is and the kids at St. Judes.    

[fnshtr]

As one popular tradgang poster would say, "how cool is that?", WAY COOL!!!!!

Congrats to you both!
           

[South MS Bowhunter]

Congrats! Your son done good