Second to last hunt day at Lake Sutherland so went in with pretty low expectations. Ended up having a fun hunt despite not coming home with a bird. Zero action initially on the roost from Brown’s. Heard a few gobbles from the Corral and then at sun-up spotted a decent size flock of 5-6 hens and one strutter feeding along the opposite side of the creek in the Corral. Unfortunately, I don’t think the guys over were set up where they had eyes on the birds and the tom wasn’t talking. Sadly, he had his hens and didn’t want anything to do with what I was selling from across the creek. I hoped he’d loose his herum and eventually venture into my zone midday but that never materialized.
Prior to hunt the lake staff warned us about a Jake with no visible beard hanging out with 3 hens by Corral/Browns. Sure enough, around 7am, 3 hens fed up from the creek within 150yrds of my set up and following them is the beardless jake. Pretty odd.. definitely a male turkey; watched him gobble twice but even through the binos just couldn’t make out a beard. I was pretty convinced though he had to be hiding a little something and was hoping he’d come in for a closer look.
It looked like they were gonna feed right into my decoys. But around 80 yards his hens changed course and fed across the creek to the parking area by Corral/Camp Hope. Spent the rest of the morning trying to get him to commit to my set up. They parked it within eye/ear shot just outside of my zone. He would occasionally respond back to my calls with a gobble but just couldn’t get him to leave those hens and cross back over the creek. Last I saw of him was around 11-12pm feeding deeper into Camp Hope and he still had one hen with him. Stuck it out until the afternoon but everything shut down.
Camp hope didn’t show up. No birds taken from Browns, Corral or Bloomdale. Previous hunt (Saturday 4/23) was first hunt of season with no birds taken per lake-staff.
Prior to hunt the lake staff warned us about a Jake with no visible beard hanging out with 3 hens by Corral/Browns. Sure enough, around 7am, 3 hens fed up from the creek within 150yrds of my set up and following them is the beardless jake. Pretty odd.. definitely a male turkey; watched him gobble twice but even through the binos just couldn’t make out a beard. I was pretty convinced though he had to be hiding a little something and was hoping he’d come in for a closer look.
It looked like they were gonna feed right into my decoys. But around 80 yards his hens changed course and fed across the creek to the parking area by Corral/Camp Hope. Spent the rest of the morning trying to get him to commit to my set up. They parked it within eye/ear shot just outside of my zone. He would occasionally respond back to my calls with a gobble but just couldn’t get him to leave those hens and cross back over the creek. Last I saw of him was around 11-12pm feeding deeper into Camp Hope and he still had one hen with him. Stuck it out until the afternoon but everything shut down.
Camp hope didn’t show up. No birds taken from Browns, Corral or Bloomdale. Previous hunt (Saturday 4/23) was first hunt of season with no birds taken per lake-staff.
