The Spring Legion Podcast
Welcome to a year-round discussion on the wild turkey and those who hunt them. Hosted by Hunter Farrior, founder of Spring Legion and author of Ballad of a Turkey Hunter, the weekly podcast is geared for all outdoor communities and dives deeper than the usual tactics and calling tips. Holding true to the brand, topics are built upon respecting the heritage and challenges of hunting, with a never-ending appreciation for all that the spring season provides. Enjoy insight from special guests like Dave Owens of Pinhoti Project, Cuz Strickland of Mossy Oak, our friends at NWTF and Muscadine Bloodline, and so many more widely known for their impact in the turkey hunting community, as well as the deer, duck, and waterfowl realm, who exhibit the obsession of which only a real turkey hunter may truly understand. Thanks for listening.
The Spring Legion Podcast
Every Step Matters | Creating Your Best Chance at a Successful Turkey Hunt
99% wont cut it in the turkey woods, and we have a pair of stories that prove exactly why. After letting our guard down for a matter of minutes, and busting a gobbler we’d hunted for half a day, we returned hours later to create our own “best chance” at flipping the script.
We detail why we walked where we walked, sat where we sat, and which twigs must have been cut to assure that our probability was maxed out to its fullest potential. Was it worth the extra attention to detail? Absolutely it was.
What if the perfect turkey hunting strategy could turn a day of frustration into one of triumph? Join us, Chase and Hunter Farrior, as we share the exhilarating highs and real-life challenges of turkey hunting during the bustling holiday season. Our latest episode is packed with tales of our springtime hunts, the intricacies of gearing up with the right Spring Legion merchandise, and the nostalgic yet inspirational legacy of our granddad that cleverly weaves past and present hunting styles into our current ventures.
As the holiday rush approaches, discover our insider tips on navigating inventory challenges and ensuring you're equipped with the latest gear before Christmas, especially if you're outside the southeastern U.S. We also explore the nuanced art of designing the perfect hunting products, including the careful selection of materials and prints for our eagerly anticipated January arrivals. Our discussion extends beyond merchandise to the importance of equipment upgrades like GoPros and ShotKams, which promise to enhance our filming adventures and storytelling quality.
Embark on a journey through vivid hunting landscapes and strategic maneuvers filled with persistence, adaptability, and a sprinkle of humor. From encountering peculiar crows to tackling expired tags, we share a dynamic mix of successes and setbacks that offer a glimpse into the unpredictable yet rewarding world of turkey hunting. As we wrap up, we express our heartfelt gratitude to our listeners, promising more thrilling stories and gear recommendations in the coming year, with exciting video content slated for release in January.
Save 15% on your next round of Houndstooth Turkey Calls with code SLP25 at checkout. Click Here to shop Houndstooth Turkey Calls
Click Here for NEW Spring Legion Gear for Spring 2025 - available in Original Bottomland and Greenleaf
Check out the SPRING LEGION YouTube Channel to watch the hunts referenced on our show, as they happened and as real as it gets.
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Huge Thanks to the following for making this podcast possible:
North Mountain Gear
Apex Ammunition
Houndstooth Turkey Calls
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For a pursuit in which 99% doesn't always cut it. We've rested our liability in Apex's ammunition since they began making turkey loads in 2017. Their iconic TSS turkey shells are able to pack more shot into traditional payloads, resulting in more pellet scent, more consistent patterns and an increased pattern density. So, in other words, Apex makes sure that the conclusion to those long-fought battles of spring are instant, absolute and ethical all right y'all welcome back to another episode of the spring legy podcast.
Speaker 1:Joining you alongside Chase Farrier, my name is Hunter Farrier and we are going to be talking about some turkey hunting stuff today in December. So we are rolling in, rolling through December actually fairly quickly as we approach the holiday season. So I think we'll have one more good episode before Christmas rolls around. But if not, if I don't hear from us, then I want to wish y'all a Merry Christmas coming up, and it's going to be a quick episode because we actually have a Christmas family function we've got to attend to in the very near future, in about an hour and a half.
Speaker 1:So we're going to be a little quick on today's episode but, as promised, we are going to continue on with the setup side of stuff. Like we mentioned, we have a couple stories that we wanted to sift through on our previous episode that we weren't able to get to all of them. We got to a couple, but some of the more meticulous ways we went about some turkeys this past spring are even more detailed in the stories that will follow here in a few short minutes and we'll get to those in just a second. I wanted to give a couple quick updates.
Speaker 1:My voice is 75% back, so it will be a little less excruciating to listen to me haggle about some turkeys in an odd voice. It will be a little less excruciating to listen to me um haggle about some, some turkeys in a in an odd voice. But, on the contrary, Chase is just starting to go out, so y'all, y'all gonna have to bear with him a little bit. Right, Um, is that time of year is? Um, yeah, the most wonderful time of year for your business is Clareton and Zyrtec and Theraflu and all that stuff.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't deal with springtime allergies as much as I do winter allergies, and it doesn't make a lot of sense to me. But this time every year I'll get a little scratch, you know, a little horse a little.
Speaker 1:you know whatever allergy I trade my spring allergies for whatever in the world that is a thousand times because I got them bad. Yeah, I loathe the state of tennessee because of whatever flower they grow in april. I don't know what it is, and it's it's I mean south kentucky, north tennessee, I didn't have. It's not in georgia that I know of, or alabama or mississippi, but my when I say there's something in.
Speaker 1:Tennessee. That will put me on my knees and I'll have to look it up, but I am deathly allergic to it. Like I mean, can't function. Another story for another day. I want to give you all a couple quick updates as far as spring legion stuff goes before we get into the turkey. Hunting. Storytelling stuff as far as I know those new pants, the new jackets, the new gators final sales um chase can confirm that he's been filling a lot of orders?
Speaker 2:oh yeah, I mean we're still running 14 hour days right now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, trying to get them out it's, um, it's a lot so, but if you're listening to this on monday, the monday that this is released, and you got about a few hours to get an order in for Christmas, we're going to be sending them out here in the next few days, but after today, you know, it really kind of comes down to where you live, right? So if you live in Mississippi, if you live in Alabama, something like that, you'll probably still get it for Christmas if you order the next few days. But if you live up in Washington State, I'm not making any promises.
Speaker 1:You might not be out, but I'm not making any promises after today. So if you want to go ahead and get those, and if you want them for spring you might want to get them for Christmas, present yourself. That's the thing is, some of these things all I see is the computer inventory. So Chase has his eyes on the actual physical inventory. I see the computer stuff. Some sizes might not make it spring. We're going to have stuff by the NWTF convention and stuff I don't know. Last year we got a little thin on some gators. We increased the quantity but the orders have increased.
Speaker 2:It's kind of at scale.
Speaker 1:Y'all be the judge on that and don't say I didn't warn you, but I encourage y'all to. Also, if you're going to get a book, you might want to get it from Amazon. I hate to direct y'all away from the Spring Allegiant website, but we are low on those and it takes a while to get those. Ballad of a Turkey Hunter or End hunter or any given spring morning is what I'm talking about. Um, amazon can probably ship that faster than we can right now. They're going to be unsigned copies but at the same time if we run out, y'all definitely go have to order from there.
Speaker 1:If you want one, because we don't have nothing to ship, you and um. But if you want to do that and then um, if you do want to sign or something like that, y'all, y'all can always swing by their booth at nwtf or any of the other functions we attend on the regular. If you do get one, you will probably be getting one of the last any given spring mornings before hopefully before the red pen edit happens. So a red pen edit is kind of rule of thumb and writing is to write something, especially if you're going to edit it yourself, is to write it, edit it, put it down for six months and then read it again and then make your real edits, and by edits I mean like moving sentences around correct commas, not changing the context or the contents of the actual book and literature, but you get so used to and it's real, this is a real deal.
Speaker 1:I didn't pay mind to it on the first book until I actually did it after about a year of publishing Ballad of a Turkey Hunter. Then I read it and I'm like man, this is not what you know. It is saying what it's supposed to say. But it could definitely be smoother if I moved this second half to the beginning, because you read it so much you almost memorize it when you're going through and just adding commas and taking commas out and then connecting sentences or moving the the bottom sentence to the top or something like that. Um, yeah, so I did that with um. I didn't have the chance actually to uh for any given spring morning until this past june, so it's gone a year and a half, two years or something like that. Um, which I mean a. It was written in a, in a state of emotion and stuff like that being in a memorial to my son, william and stuff like that. So it was kind of almost an odd not wanting to revisit it for a certain period of time in a coping mechanism. And then you know, being able to this past summer was able to have the time and the you know kind of mental ability capability, I guess you'd say to revisit some of that stuff and was able to, and there's a lot, of, a lot of red pen marks on it. So if, uh, if, you found it hard to follow along in some of it, I don't blame you.
Speaker 1:It's not. It's not you, it's um, I could have definitely structured it a little better and um, nothing's going to change in the context of it and um, and there's definitely still going to be a bunch of and nothing's going to change in the context of it, and there's definitely still going to be a bunch of comma splices and some character to it, because I'm no English professor or professional editor, but it would go a little smoother if I would move a sentence or two around. So I'm going to do that and hopefully by January we'll have those new copies available. If you're not sitting next to an older copy, you're not next to an older copy, you're not going to notice the difference, but it'll be a little easier to read. As far as everything else goes, chase what is um inventory looking like on the other stuff uh, the t-shirts are getting a little thin.
Speaker 2:Um, a few of them, yeah, which we don't have, but three or four designs right now, I think. So they're, uh, they're kind of getting. Yeah, I kind of forgot about but three or four designs right now, I think. So they're, uh, they're kind of getting yeah, I kind of forgot about those.
Speaker 1:Yeah, all the camo right we got, yeah, we got.
Speaker 2:So focused on all the camo we kind of forgot to get more, more shirts in time look down, we had zero yeah, I think we're. What are we about to? We're about to get some more on all that right?
Speaker 1:um well, everything like you, gotta remember the suppliers also have holidays and stuff we have holidays, and then the folks we get our T-shirts and hats and stuff from also have holidays.
Speaker 2:You've got to respect that so yeah, probably be the first of the year before we get the new right, yeah, it'll be January, yeah sometime in the first week or two of January. I would assume no-transcript noticed pretty much every order we send out, they're they're throwing some stocking stuff that's. That's a big thing for us. You know, and you know some of those. We still got a bunch of Some of them. We got a few of here and there. Yeah, you're going to be lucky if you get them Right. Hats moving, all right.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And we're actually going to have some camouflage hats this year. We're getting a big round of those. Should be in. I don't know. Probably I doubt they're in before January. They'll probably come in during January, right? Just some mesh back hats and stuff like that. It'll kind of go with the pants and gaiters and jacket and stuff and if all goes well, we'll have some gloves too. Oh yeah, that's going to be added too. I didn't approve that the other time. Yeah, I was like where are the gloves?
Speaker 2:I went to looking for them the other day. I'm like I thought we had talked about getting gloves and we I knew we did, and just I couldn't figure out where they were at and I hadn't seen any orders on them either. So I was like man, something, something's off.
Speaker 1:You know my particular self was I go through about 11 rounds of revisions you know and I want this to.
Speaker 1:You know, increase by a quarter inch on the cuff, make sure they're long enough. And I wanted single material. You actually suggested the single material. A lot of times they'll take a single-sided print, camouflage, you know, spandexy material, whatever's made up, they'll just fold it over. Um, to avoid the increase in price or cost. I guess you'd say for printing on two sides or printing a solid color on one side, because I'm not a fan of white. I don't want to white nowhere. Um, but I wanted you said you mentioned the single material we got a sample made, liked it. I was like I'll spend the extra money to to have it, you know, double printed. So we're doing that. That took a little extra time, but they're gonna be here before turkey season, so that's good, um, but that, and then, um, we got a. I'm trying to think of some things that I'm going to need for Christmas. I know you're in need of a GoPro Bad.
Speaker 2:And you're in need of a ShotKam Bad. You are not lying After editing some of these videos or trying to. Yeah, hunter's filming skills are getting worse by the day instead of better, I think.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I had a few that were pretty rough too, so I can't say we're near as bad as mine and they're not bad, they're just real, they're real, they're real, real you know, some folks are able to film real turkey hunts and actually not be bad at it. Mine are. Mine are just kind of they're real turkey hunts but they're real bad too sometimes so we're able to make some good stuff out of them. It's just you got to be all right with.
Speaker 2:Might have to turn your head sideways a little bit every once in a while, yeah, and.
Speaker 1:I don't think that's going to change. The GoPro did kind of help out a little bit with that, but also, I mean there's a lot of shoulder footage in there or leaves where you dropped your vest, or whatever. I don't know. I don't know what to tell you. It's okay, I might help with that. I don't know, but um yeah um, also I need some. I'm gonna get hopefully, if my wife listened to this, maybe um, it needed some casual clothes I went to go like we're you know taking pictures and stuff like that.
Speaker 1:Your boy has a pair of jeans, you know taking pictures and stuff like that.
Speaker 2:Your boy has a pair of jeans and that's it. Yeah, I'm kind of in the same boat right now.
Speaker 1:I used to have a lot more. I don't know what has happened to it. I mean I really don't. I mean I get so caught up in a lot of stuff going on right now that I look up and my closet is pretty empty.
Speaker 1:But I would suggest now I do have these, I just don't know where they're at. It's the, um, the companion stuff. I didn't know that that was. I mean, obviously I knew that it used to be a thing Like we actually have a hat my granddad had signed by somebody I don't remember who it was. Um, I don't.
Speaker 2:I'd have to go find it. I'll think of it in a minute, but it was.
Speaker 1:I found it not long ago and it was strange how, how similar the you know 2004 version of all the Companion stuff is to that stuff.
Speaker 1:It's hard to tell oh yeah because I wear this Companion style and a lot of folks think it's from like the 90s. I'm like, no, I got this like last year. They're like do-all pants or whatever they call them. It's not the chamois kind of chamois kind of school, it's like the, it's not camo. I don't know how you, what would you consider it? But um, those do-all pants are thick enough to be a sturdy casual pant and um, stupid comfortable.
Speaker 1:But but no, I think like our granddad was like oddly friends with like Chuck Adams and stuff like that and was on like covers of like nra magazine or something you know, just randomly he did a lot of like west hunting with traditional trombones and stuff like that he was.
Speaker 2:He wanted to be an indian.
Speaker 1:Really bad yeah um, that was the funny part about it a lot of native american uh memorabilia in his shop, which his shop will put ours to shame. And I'm a cluttered and Chase is even worse than I am. Yeah, I mean just dude, had like pegboard, like spokes everywhere. We were just hanging like Tomahawks.
Speaker 2:Yeah, tomahawks, arrowheads A couple grenades, you know, just a cool dude you know, yeah, a lot of like elk horns that he found and stuff like that in the Yukon or not Yukon, but like just random things he did. He did a lot of elk hunting and and mule deer hunting and stuff with traditional bows and you know killed a couple bears and stuff oh yeah and that was before traveling handmade everything he's like he's a guy who, like had a canteen.
Speaker 2:You know they have water bottles yeah, he just wanted, he made a canteen of buckskin or you know something like that and had seven degrees.
Speaker 1:Huh, had seven degrees like college degrees. I forgot about that. Made bows for a living pretty much. Yeah, yeah, so bows on like garage sales, right?
Speaker 2:yeah, I don't you know you know, know, we talked about it one time on a podcast and and I still have people come up to me and say, man, whenever you said something about why you wear an Indian headdress, pop off.
Speaker 1:That was that was on rolling thunders, I think.
Speaker 2:I forgot all about that. What?
Speaker 1:I described to him as a, some kind of like a, a cross between Ted Nugent and you know somebody else. I don't remember what it was, but I was trying to get the point across, like it wasn't like a not a good thing, Like I was like he ain't senile, he's just a little out there.
Speaker 2:He's his own dude.
Speaker 1:He didn't care what you thought Comfortable in his own skin and just you know, I'm like a couple times walking in an errand and I'm like you ain't got to wear the headdress. You know you're not really an Indian, but, dude, I mean talk about wisdom and shipping stuff. I mean some stuff. He did some wild stuff and I remember being eight years old getting just hot as can be, just like. What do we do, you know?
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, we were blowing and then it would work.
Speaker 1:And it works what in the world he describes these deers?
Speaker 2:being this big, yada, yada. I'm like there's no way, and then, and then he killed.
Speaker 1:Oh, god, that's a big deer. Yeah, um, so I don't know, but so shout out to him. He had, like he and we have, a lot of his older companion stuff. But all this new stuff I'm a big fan of because they did it looks the same and then they got a way of finding this material stuff like those yeah, they're comfortable.
Speaker 1:Sure, that's um, that's my go-to for the casual stuff oh yeah, but anyway, as far as attention details go and some of the stuff that sounds crazy, until it works, kind of building off of that, we're going to dive into a couple of these, um, a couple of stories trying to set, and the theme I guess would be we're building off of last week's episode. I encourage y'all to listen to that if you haven't yet. Um, it's not going to make or break your understanding of this one, it's just going to be a continuation of it. The um setting the stage, kind of, you know, making a table as far as setups for turkey hunt goes, being where you're, where you're sitting at, kind of why you're there. What you anticipate, you know, and and that's another thing I was thinking on, kind of after the fact of recording last week's episode was the anticipation of what a turkey might do and how confident you are in that and how. I mean you know how much I preach on like you can't make a turkey do nothing. Right, you can't. There's nothing a turkey will never do and there's nothing a turkey will always do. I mean, there's just nothing is ever 100 or 0. Everything is just a bunch of rarelies and probablys. At that point, likelihood is indeed a factor. So you've got to be able to kind of analyze the situation. A turkey will usually go high. A turkey will usually stay in a shot or whatever doesn't want to get in the open.
Speaker 1:We mentioned that last week. But the first one we're going to kind of spill into is um, is a turkey that we actually it gave us a good example of two different things, and the first one we we, which we're hunting kind of ag country at this point, I believe, and um, this was a day or so after maybe the last story we just mentioned with the um, the turkey, and that gully and stuff like that we were talking about, which wasn't a great example of a setup because I had been there before, so it was kind of just sounds like it's pretty simple Get where he got last time, regardless of why or reason. Just listen to the turkey. That's something I got to remind myself sometimes. Listen to whatever they're doing. You know if they do it there's a reason and you can get especially I can, I know kind of too caught up in the why is he doing that, why is he doing that? Maybe he'll do it over here. Just I don't know it don't matter.
Speaker 2:Get where he got.
Speaker 1:You know, obviously he's comfortable getting there.
Speaker 2:No, no, well, don't you know that's not next, next day or two kind of situation. You know that I don't want some people to get confused on that, like if I call a bird and he's hung up on this creek or whatever, right, don't run down to exactly where he was just gobbling from and just walked off from yeah, and start calling there because they ain't coming back right normally the same day they may yeah but, I meant in theory of, like, if he gets on the edge of something, right, there's a reason he didn't get into whatever was on the other side of that edge.
Speaker 2:I just wanted to dive in a little deeper the next time you go in there before you even call.
Speaker 1:get to that edge, get to that edge.
Speaker 2:before you call, don't try to make him do something he didn't do the week before Right. Don't sit on the same thing to you. That's what I'm just trying to hit on.
Speaker 1:Exactly, I'm glad you brought that up because I didn't clarify. But yeah, so pretty much long story short, because we ain't got a lot of time today and we already gave you all rambling about a headdress wearing grandpa, yeah.
Speaker 2:That wasn't on the inventory updates.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but anyway, so we see and we're in that country up there being, and it can be down here too. I mean, there's fields everywhere. There's just more the more north you go, the more kind of area, specific stuff you can use your eyes a little more than you can down here. You can see them from roads and see them from other sides of fields. You know, I like to try to get where there are woods and then you can kind of maneuver yourself and kind of position yourself to where you saw one, and a lot of it has to do with where you see one at a certain time of day.
Speaker 1:Like I just said, there's a reason he's there. You can sit there and google, read up, listen to podcasts on why he might be there, but it sometimes you got to be fat. Like there's a reason he's there, just trust him. You know, getting that, getting that area. So we kind of did that. We see his turkey. I think it's a long, long beard. Correct me if I'm wrong. Um, not mid-morning, still still before mid-morning but not off the race, obviously, yeah, I don't know why we were.
Speaker 1:We were riding or walking or something and see him um. Was it raining that day?
Speaker 2:or no? Yes, I think. Yeah, I think we were just late getting started storm.
Speaker 1:It did rain, but that's not why we're late. We had moved into this area and we had never hunted it. That's what it was, because we're in. We're in one of the state that has like units and stuff so we can hunt. You get a certain amount of tags for a unit or something like that expired those tags somehow or another, or else for some reason, had to go to a different county, a different, it could have been a different state, I don't remember but we had we, we, we stayed at a different spot and we woke up that morning like listened and it wound up being not great at all.
Speaker 2:That's what it was.
Speaker 1:We just threw a dart on the map and tried it and went well, this isn't turkey country, now we know. Didn't waste no time getting back in the truck and was heading to another spot, and we see this wind up, getting permission or something like that. This is adjacent to public land actually. Yeah, we were headed to look at that second block. We wanted to look at. That's what it was. Okay, yeah, took me a minute. Figure that out, right, I'm on. I'm on now.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, so we wind up, we do. We talk to the farmer. He gives us a go-ahead hunt a day or two, um, and then we wind up. So, to set the the illustration up, there's a big field and then there is, um, some uh long strip of hardwoods on the back end of it. It's a pretty big field, um, I don't know how big, I'm not good with acres, but big and um, there's a strip of pines with a ridge on it, on the uh, we'll call it the right side side that we can actually access, right, you know, um, without getting busted wide open everywhere else, but the back and the right side of it. So you got one good corner of woods there, and then in that corner which we find out later on. There is a kind of a break in those woods that goes up and then it comes back down, because we wind up being able to see and hear turkeys on the other side once we got up in there, but a big ridge on that side with the pines, and then it falls down into a hollow. This is all on the right side.
Speaker 1:So get the go ahead from old, mr farmer, and um, you know it, it takes a while to do that so that turkey ain't there no more. We get in there and this and I'm a slipper um, I treat every situation best I can, like a turkey is watching me and this is a very good example of why. Because we slip in there and I'm telling you about 300 yards was slipping. I don't know if we caught or not, I do not remember. Um, I don't think. I would think we didn't. We shouldn't have as we did.
Speaker 1:I don't think we did, um, not knowing where he's at, and we just kind of ease on towards that corner. It's about 300 yards to that corner and he was walking that direction. You know, I about 300 yards to that corner and he was walking that direction. You know, I ain't trying to overanalyze it, he's probably somewhere over there by this point, been an hour and a half, two hours tops. So we're on top of this ridge because then we get up there and we realize there's a hollow on the other side. So he could be in a hollow and see us on top of the ridge. So we kind of get on the middle area of the side that's closest to the field. So you know, we don't bust him out of the hollow. Last thing you want to do is bust him without him putting or doing anything. And you're hunting a goat, you're hunting air, right you're wasting a day.
Speaker 1:You know he's already busted you, he's not coming anything. He's not coming anything tomorrow probably. You know he's. He's associated your calling with a human and stuff like that. So that's why I try not to call just walking. You know blindly. You know locator calls kind of fair game I don't. I'm not that worried about if he gets, if he associates me with the crow, as long as you don't associate me with the turkey. You know off the daggum bat right. It's just it can happen. I've done it before. It's just a lot harder. You just made it hard, um and so um. When I say it took us every bit of how long did I say? I mean it's 300 yards while I'm a good, two hours.
Speaker 2:Hour and a half. Two hours, yeah, two hours maybe Slipping and slipping, slipping.
Speaker 1:Poor Chase is having to listen to me with the whole. Don't step on that stick, don't step on this, you know, wait for the shadow to come back and just you know, watching clouds until they get to the sun. Then we can cross this open spot and keep an eye on the field. Don't see him. And when I say we get 275 yards to this corner and I'm getting a little impatient and I don't usually get impatient, but I'm getting a little impatient, Right, and I took five non-meticulous steps, I mean we had called at this point yes, I do remember calling and nothing was happening.
Speaker 1:I remember there was like a delusional crow, do you remember?
Speaker 2:that. Oh yeah, he was like yeah, he was sick or something, yeah.
Speaker 1:And we were kind of watching him because I'm like dude, look at that crow.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and he was kind of just wobbling on his limb and like very oddly close. I didn't want to or something, but it was weird to see. Though I do remember that now I forgot all about that and I was crap. We're sitting here, might as well make a call, you know, did nothing happen, gave it a little while, kind of like. We did remember the. The first story of last episode was like just trust it, you know he might not gobble, but he might hear you at this point tackle an hour and a half to get ahold of landowner stuff like that. We're looking at three and a half, four hours. Since we last saw him it's been a good while, and this is he wasn't doing anything, he was moving to somewhere else and we've realized now there's turkey habitat on the other side of this little ridge, other fields, you know.
Speaker 2:He could be a mile and a half away.
Speaker 1:We don't know, yeah, he could be a mile and a half away, we don't know, yeah. And so I want to slip up and see what the corner looks like at least.
Speaker 1:and when I say I took one, two, three, yeah, almost stepped on him, he was, I mean, he was just in the thick stuff yeah, he didn't putt nothing enough in a briar, I just hear like a, like a you know turkey waddling, and I look up and I see his head, just you know, doing the through, the through the dark woods, and I'm like well that's why you you do 100, you know 98.5.
Speaker 2:Attention to detail doesn't cut it right, um, but I mean, we did notice something shortly after that, you know, and that was that little bitty, small high spot, right, or whatever. I think it was a high spot it was a.
Speaker 1:It was. It was more of a ball. It wasn't a high spot, it was a bowl in the ridge.
Speaker 2:It made that spot look like a high spot it was really kind of same level as what we were on most of the time. Yeah, but it was kind of where a turkey would draw a line.
Speaker 1:Yeah I mean he was and I don't know. When I saw him, he was in the bowl part and kind of ran up it. I'm like, well, that's an odd spot for a just a crater kind of looking thing, you know, and I was kind of looking over into it and saw him run and I'm like, well, I've just wasted half our morning or a whole morning half an afternoon.
Speaker 2:Sorry, probably one o'clock by now yeah.
Speaker 1:My bad, you know I just ruined this. We go back. Obviously it's over. You know, I tried one quick time to get back over on top of it, get back in the bottom on the other side, and you know it didn't happen, obviously, and I was very frustrated because we had called and I'm like now he knows.
Speaker 1:There's a slim chance he's going to associate that it had been several minutes. But you know, really chance he's going to associate that it had been several minutes. But you know, really hanging on to optimism there, hoping he didn't know that was us calling Mm-hmm. Joker could have been hunted that morning, for all I know.
Speaker 2:I don't know.
Speaker 1:He came from the woods, you know 700 yards away. I don't know what was over there, right, anyway, we back out. We come back that afternoon, so this it wasn't one o'clock, so we got back in there about two and I know there's a little bit of a break in between.
Speaker 2:We just went to the truck.
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah, we went to the truck, regroup, changed clothes, we wound up seeing a turkey on the other side of the road, yep Strutting in the field that, lo and behold, chase kills this turkey down the road, but it this? And then we got to looking at the kind of how, the how in the world we gonna get there, and then uh, and it's a, it's a four-hour process to get to the boys on the side, which is public, right, and I mean through some stuff, I don't.
Speaker 1:I mean I don't know what it is that I mean had a wma deal going right, but a lot came together right there and then we got permission from the dudes the same backyard, right, um, I don't know. I mean I think we wound up seeing him and making sure it was cool if we did hunt that that field, because that was the one closest to his house.
Speaker 2:You know the stuff we were hunting was just his land, yeah, and it's a big field shoot yeah yeah, but anyway.
Speaker 1:So we we look at that and kind of pull up, you know, our phones on x, find a map kind of the logistics to get to where we would have a possible chance, you know, maybe even calling him in the range without getting busted in the wide open and went nah, you know if we got to.
Speaker 1:We will down the road, but not today. So we go back in there. I'm like I don't. You know, this is our best shot right here. Go back in there and just let them calm down. And a lot of times my rule of thumb is if you bust a turkey, you bump them. It could be a hen, whatever. If they start calling again, you're in the clear of call again. You know if they didn't associate you with a call, so we go back in there. And you thought I was meticulous the time before. I mean, it took us even longer to get in there.
Speaker 2:Same and you thought I was meticulous the time before.
Speaker 1:I mean, it took us even longer to get in there Same route and getting there and we sit down and this is where all the table setting comes into play and if it's going to work or it ain't going to work. But we're about to find out. And we took a pair of snips and we cut down every little twig, branch, everything. It's the only tree probably on that whole hill that allowed us to shoot at 360 degrees. So Chase had a gun, I had a gun, we both had tags. Realism is all that matters in the spring turkey woods and the guys over at Houndstooth build their turkey calls with the consistent realism as the number one priority. Cut, stretched and pressed right down the road in Tuscaloosa, alabama, a Houndstooth turkey Call has become a familiar addition to a many a turkey vest across the southeast. Learn more about a variety of friction, locator and mouth calls today at houndstoothgamecallscom and be sure to use our special discount code SLP25 at checkout for 15% off your next round of Houndstooth Turkey Calls.
Speaker 1:It wasn't that far from where I bumped him, honestly we just got down a little bit, able to shoot the edge of the field. If he came up high, we had him. If he came up high behind us, you had him. You know. But chase, chase.
Speaker 1:I try to kind of think of it like a, like a clock, you know. If I can shoot from, you know position my legs or knees or whatever the front of my body facing to where I can shoot, say from 12 to probably going reverse, you know, counterclockwise, from 12 to 8 o'clock. 7 and 6, I'm going to be twisting pretty hard, you know, to get that whole 180. Six, I'm gonna be twisting pretty hard, you know, to get that whole 180. But, um, I'll take that and then if a turkey wants to come a little more right, I can, you know, kind of just scoop my butt and get to at least two, maybe three o'clock, you know. But they, they come up to my right and behind me is off. So I'll put, you know, chase was based almost behind me or he was on a tree where he could at least shoot behind me.
Speaker 2:I put my knees differently.
Speaker 1:And we sat where we were 25 yards from the crest of a ridge and I almost had to clear a spot for a turkey to even get which I? I mean, there's stuff out there, folks that aren't turkey hunters but have not proven but I trust them that turkeys pick up on like snipped limbs. Yes, you know, it's not natural that. You know. Turkeys, oddly, know like what a venomous snake is versus a non venomous. You know, they just know what's natural, what's not natural. Something in the brain, I don't know, I'm I'm pretty firmly, you know, I would much rather bend and break a limb than I would snip it. Um, if I do, I make sure I kind of like snip it to where the, the snip part is, is faced the other way if that makes any sense.
Speaker 2:It's not just a big right glowing white circle shaved off, you know and I sliced, and it may be because it looks like eyes, I don't know. I mean, I don't know the scientific facts behind it.
Speaker 1:I've shot them after snipping them and I've, you know, yeah, had them hang up after snipping them. I don't know why, but um, but kind of regardless. So so make a couple. And I'm not wanting to make shooting lanes honestly I'm not bow hunting turkeys but you got to have a good open shooting lane and um, and really just it took it, took me sitting there and and chase had the clippers in his hand and and you know, kind of got it the base part set up, you know, figured out what, where to even be, and um, and it was where I could, you know, close enough to shoot 30 yards to the edge of the field. If one comes in from there, if it comes in from the front, it's got to go higher, it's got to go low, you know, to see where we're at.
Speaker 1:And the most important thing was being where they would have to go to see you know, if you sit on top of the ridge they can kind of get wherever and see what all the way up there, and that's a, you know, 50, 60 yards worth of inclination. You know you ain't gonna really probably you could, but I'm not, you know, shoot all the way down or all the way up. So I like to get them on the middle right. So now I got a 30 yard shot to my right, so 30 yard shot to my left, I'm good, and they're really. And I kind of got where he really couldn't come right in front of us, because if he gets an open woods and can see all the way to where we're at, it's not gonna. You know he ain't got to do it, he ain't gonna do it. But so, yeah, he's out there.
Speaker 1:And so chase had these snippers and and I'm talking like i'm'm like all right, right here, we need to cut that one, that one, that one. Then we'd have to put something back up to block this and this and that and this and that, and it all went around. These two trees had to be sitting exactly where they were sitting, and they were, and it took a long time. It was one of them like am I overdoing it here? There's some frustrations going on.
Speaker 2:Yeah of them, like I mean, am I, am I overdoing it here? There's some frustrations going on. Yeah, I was at this point I'm getting, I'm getting, yeah, sick of it right, you know I'm a little sick of myself too right, because I don't think we've ate yet at all uh, my one bottle of water of the day is gone, right, and um, yeah, I didn't want to it's getting four o'clock I'm like can we just hurry up and try to kill one or spook?
Speaker 1:one off, can we?
Speaker 2:do something to say that we're you know either winning or losing.
Speaker 1:right now, right, you know.
Speaker 2:No, turkeys get gobbled. We don't know. They're there Right.
Speaker 1:We don't know how bad we bumped him earlier. Yeah.
Speaker 2:It's a long shot. It it's a long shot, but it's like, if we can make it right, this is what we're probably going to have to do. This is kind of the only thing we can do, yeah.
Speaker 1:If we're going to kill this turkey, this is the only spot we're going to be able to sit and kill him, because this is the only few places I believe he will even maybe walk Right. And then we were like all right, sweating, breathing pretty hard, mouthflowers in. I'm like all right, we're done, that's it. Chase is probably about a gun, but me in the back of the head he's faced the other way and, um, minute goes by and I'm just kind of really just trying to catch my breath too. I'm like really analyzing myself like I'm an idiot. You know, this is yeah, this is too much. We could have probably done wound up on the other side of the woods by now and shot that other turkey, but minute goes by and way down in there I'm like he's there now. We went from about 10 to 50 real quick and I'm like I'll deal with that.
Speaker 1:You know, and I hit the call back at him hard, you know, like yeah, I heard you buddy, you know I'm here still.
Speaker 2:He back at it, I'm like all right and he's like, like he's barely an earshot. Right, he's wearing some thick stuff so it's harder to hear hard and that and that's good.
Speaker 1:It's hard to hear, yeah, but it's hard for him to hear us. So it was kind of like, if I'm going to get these calls out to make him to validate his, you know kind of, hey, I'm interested too. You know, I got to do it now because once he kind of comes over this ridge, he's going to know where it's maybe and it sounded like he had gotten closer, but it was still kind of I don't know if he was where he was at in respect to us, I mean obviously in front of us.
Speaker 1:I don't know if he's on the other side of the ridge, if he's in the woods in the field side or whatever, and I let it ride. I'm like he's going to go. He might gobble and that's the thing is. Once he knows where we're kind of at, all these little lanes and hypothetical scenarios and stuff are now all 50-50, 50-50 chance.
Speaker 1:So, you've got to be where you can see all of them, hear all of them, everything. If he don't gobble, you're about to get periscoped. He's about to stick his head up over or around something and look, probably, in your eyes until you look at him long enough to go. Well, there he is and he's gone. Probably what was going to happen Ain't really what happened, though Usually that is what happened. So we're sitting there and he keeps gobbling pretty good, Usually how it goes.
Speaker 2:It ain't how it went this time yeah that just cracking me up.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Never say always or never, but no. So I'm braced for that. I'm grabbing my. You know I'm pretty tight. I'm ready for him to pop up at any minute, wherever. And then he gobbled a time or two and it's getting close, and then I think there was one goblin open. I went all right. Now we know. Now my focus is shift to the left, towards the field which the field kind of hooked around to.
Speaker 1:I forgot about that, yep lo and behold, that opening was actually kind of a that lane I was talking about, that kind of went up where the woods didn't quite meet, that's where he was kind of irrelevant though it didn't really change what we were going to do, right, but um, because it sounded like he was directly in front of us, but in the open I'm like you know I don't make that much sense, because I'm looking at the field edge and don't see a turkey, but he's in the open right.
Speaker 2:So then we kind of realized oh, the field kind of cuts up a little bit right so he's going.
Speaker 1:He's going closer, closer. Now we're about to find out if this stuff's going to work. I don't know of any other spot he can get, but I guarantee you he can find it and bust us, especially if it's the one we already busted. So he comes back around and I see him. He's in the field and he's about 65 yards and he's walking directly through the field. Yeah, so I had to call going with. I'm like brother. I mean, maybe I didn't. I left too much clarity out. I'm not. I'm not on the other side of the field I'm obviously over here.
Speaker 1:You know, maybe I don't know what happened there, but yeah, come back.
Speaker 2:He didn't check up yeah, and I'm like no on his way that, eh, and I'm kind of just cutting at him.
Speaker 1:I'm like, hey, you know, stop Now you're at 85, going the wrong way. He don't check up. I'm like someone hung him on the backside or something. Something bumped him, something's pushing him. He's not scared, but he hears me. He'll stop and look and break into half strut.
Speaker 2:I'm like he hears not death, but then he won't.
Speaker 1:He wouldn't strut, he wouldn't gobble I think, if I know he did strut, he did. Yeah, okay, so he like come, like I.
Speaker 2:I you know, I call it like I was drumming it's not even a half strut, it's like a quarter strut and he just drums right, you know his feathers got just kind of his tail.
Speaker 1:Fan just picks up and kind of goes back down. He takes more steps you know drum in right. I'm like you know. It's pretty odd because he's definitely hearing me, knows where we're at, stopping looking right at us and and walking, quartering away yeah, I do remember it being very an odd scenario yeah I'm like what?
Speaker 1:I don't even know what the thing's going on right now I'm a little that if I what of all the bingo things I just went through that wasn't on my my card, right Obviously, walking directly in the middle of the field, going the other way and responding like he was, and as soon as it clicked that there might be a reason he's getting out of there. One guy was at 45 in front of us and I'm like here we go. Yeah, you know, that's why there's another one and I'm trying to wheel my head around to see and that joker's coming in as two of them.
Speaker 2:Yep.
Speaker 1:I think they had hens in the back, I can't remember if they were in the front or the back.
Speaker 2:I think a hen was kind of walking towards the turkey. That was 85 yards walking away. I remember a hen being in there. There was a hen.
Speaker 1:I don't know if it was long hens this was late late season nesting. You know we're around some nesting stuff and um you'll see them come out, peck around, go back in. That's what they're doing, you know, they're sitting um. One of the old faithful hens we've been seeing is kind of out there and she's kind of not giving us any tips on what's happening and she's kind of also not making much sense of where she's walking towards and stuff and I think he walked past her you know, just gave her no mind.
Speaker 1:But yeah, when that gobble let out right in front of us, I was like here we go, and then it kind of went into the. I couldn't see him. I'm like, well, now we're back at 50-50.
Speaker 1:He might be on this ridge he might be in the open, I don't know, because that was really loud and I kind of wheeled my head around and was able to see that there's two of them coming down that wood line. They come and ride at us. Yeah, and I don't know when you picked up on it, but I think you were still kind of focused on the other one. Like I remember thinking, because we both had tags and there was two turkeys and I don't know if you knew there was two turkeys at that point, I knew you knew there was two turkeys at that point. I knew you knew there was two turkeys, but not two in this other group Total of three.
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, I just thought it was another one coming in and so my focus has shifted now and I'm like, here we go and I see them, I see movement and stuff, and by God, they get to one of them dang lanes and stop. And I'm like, praise Jesus, we cleared this lane, because that's exactly kind of the threshold I thought they might get because just the way the land worked, so we're on kind of a very slight incline in that field and then we kind of got down that slight incline just there to where they would be on the very top and still be 35. And they got to that very top and stopped. I mean, it was like they just drew a picture walked up right in the middle of that lane with his head sticking up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's almost like, but he realized there was a lane, was finally like I can finally see into the woods. It kind of almost allowed him Because he's in the field. Yes, very yeah.
Speaker 1:Three steps in the field.
Speaker 2:Right on the edge, yep, and there ain the tree trunks in the field.
Speaker 1:It's not like a big meadow-y looking buffer kind of stuff, you know he's, you know, stepping over roots also in the field, and that joker gets right there and um, and thank goodness we did all that we could do because it worked. You know it was really dumb at the time, but had we not done that, I mean my next shot would have been four yards.
Speaker 1:You know, I think I mean it took a lot of time to get every single one down, just enough to not really mess it up and not make it too wide open to where he could. You know, then he could stop out in the middle of the field and see it. He walked up the edge but you know he could have stopped 65 yards if had we not done it exactly. You know how we did it and it's a little to you know, a little to the left, easy on a right hand shooter. Um well, no, we didn't kill the other one, though I don't think I know the other one had a rope pulling him. Oh yeah, so I remember. I remember watching that thing bounces.
Speaker 2:He's kind of like trucking across the field, like that's a good turkey right there this one was mean.
Speaker 1:I'll take them all, but I remember that one they ran out of there was.
Speaker 2:He was stout.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he had a rope on him, but you know, could have happened had we not been that meticulous to it, obviously. But I do think had we not, it would have been much less likely to have had a good shot on him. At least it would have presented him too many options to hang up. We're not coming to all. I don't know. You know we would have set up differently, just using the natural landscape for a good setup, we wouldn't have been sitting there. That's the thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we would have been in a totally different spot.
Speaker 1:We had to make it.
Speaker 2:We would have had to If we had forgotten our clippers. Let's just say we forgot our clippers. Or didn't you know? Didn't know we could break a stick. Whatever you know deal, you know we would have either had to pick one or the other Yep, either top of the ridge or the field edge Right. And you know, sometimes you have to do that and 50-50 gamble it.
Speaker 1:If it hit gobbling in the corner, we wouldn't have time to, we'd have to 50-50 it Throw it on red and go. A lot of times they're going to do the opposite. That's smart for them. If we get towards the bottom, they're going to go to the top and look down at you.
Speaker 2:If we get on the top, they're going to go to the bottom and see things from the bottom I think that was even a conversation we might have had was like do we have two cameras? You?
Speaker 1:know? Well, that's what I was saying. One of us will get on one and one of us will get on the other, and then you're earning the safety stuff you know. Whatever he does comes in the middle.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know, and so we like to be where we can talk, right.
Speaker 1:Because I mean, If I ever going to shoot that turkey, you know, I just don't know. Even if I know for a fact you were on the right side of me last time I saw you I'm not going to. Because as much as I move around, you know in the loop and stuff, and as much as I don't know my right from left, when a turkey's in front of me, I mean I can slip.
Speaker 2:I don't trust.
Speaker 1:That's the about the only time I can't. I can make myself not shoot her to Turkey. You know Right, if we can sit one tree apart. You know five, six yards as long as I can see him. Good, yeah, but anyway. But yeah, the moral of the story, I guess, is more so sometimes you've got to make it a scenario and and it can be done if that bird is actually still there or not, and turkeys are going to have the cake, eat it too.
Speaker 1:Yeah, always put that in your mind. If they can get here and see you and hear you and make you do a little work, they're going to do it. They're smart animals. That's why they're still alive at the time. But if you can create a scenario where you can have your cake and eat it too, you can do it to spend the time to do it. Because had we not, we wouldn't. We wouldn't have shot that turkey that day.
Speaker 1:that that moment, yeah, but but also without cutting daggum twig at all. It goes into the story of your grand finale bird and that black dirt that we mentioned right right, which took us a long time to get to, but it's the only thing we could do, that we had one option wasn't no cake, wasn't no, you know, it was, there was one option and a four percent chance it worked.
Speaker 2:If that it point three.
Speaker 1:If we got there. It was good. I mean I was cool with the chances there. I mean I think we it was a honnable turkey but it was, you could tell a I'm not gonna say an older turkey, but he was acting like an older.
Speaker 1:He was very mellow, very, did what he was gonna do and I just kind of had that demeanor you ain't making this one do nothing, yeah. Um, he kind of always had a few hens around him and I watched them leave. More come out like he. He had it going on. He figured it out, you know the hens were going to him yeah without gobbling.
Speaker 2:You're gonna really have to think, or work, or right. He's probably there every day and he's.
Speaker 1:He's in a little bubble safe zone and it that's why. Because it's going to take somebody a five hour trek through some sludge to get to him and he done. You know, I'm good right here.
Speaker 2:I feel like that old farmer said oh, you're gonna try the one in the back oh, he said something like that nature, like I wouldn't try him right, you know, almost like a he did an unrideable bull, you know, kind of joke. He said, you know, I don't know what it was, but I remember him like saying, like um good luck.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we're like, there's no, you know, one back here. You know he's like, you know, if you want to, but right, y'all ain't the first to ask and yeah, he's still there kind of deal.
Speaker 1:Um, I ain't never seen it done, you know y'all better have a big playbook, because uh, he's seen the rest so, but our playbook was just just do the do the, the crap you know, go through the crap, work, you know just get and, and by that I mean we had to walk and we, I mean there was a chance, I mean there was a moment there. We're like do we do you want? I asked you. I'm like you're on the gun now, you're leaving tomorrow, yeah, Do you want?
Speaker 1:to kill it. I'll do it, you know I'll do about anything. Right, it's a long shot, long walk, long crawl, everything but.
Speaker 2:I mean how far?
Speaker 1:I'm not going to say walking, because half of it was squatted crawling, you know getting we had to get so far away from this field because it then it turned to just tall grass, marshy stuff and you could see through that. You know, very easily. We had to connect the woods. Which is what I always do, is you can get from this tree which is in this section of woods and follow these woods wherever they take you, and it'll all connect eventually.
Speaker 1:It might be you know yeah, you gotta walk all the way to mississippi river, but you know it'll, it'll connect eventually and that's what we had to do and it, it. It took a lot and it was some I mean up to our knees and mud and yeah it's swampy marsh, yeah over our heads and cocktails and crap and briars and. Nah, turkey stuff, nothing. Turkey stuff, yeah, but then when we got there, it was turkey stuff. That was the prettiest woods I've ever seen in my life.
Speaker 2:Just that little back strip of that field.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:I mean two acres there. I feel like it wasn't much land, but like Five hours later it's like the curtains pulled back.
Speaker 1:I mean this might be the prettiest spot. I mean I remember taking pictures of it. Yeah, just to like show people.
Speaker 2:I'm like this is it's incredible.
Speaker 1:I've never in my life seen something like this. Yeah, it's like. I mean, it's just wide open underneath, yeah, flat. It was cool, cool, you know and this is late season it felt awesome in there. I mean, it was just like the liveliest place you can imagine I'm like. This is I. I wonder if we're the first footsteps to get back there at this point right right, it feels very, very, very big.
Speaker 1:I mean, you know, somebody got to really want to get in them woods to walk across that field, even the easy route, straight line. Um, they're on a four-wheeler or something. Maybe If they really wanted to look at it, yeah, but I feel like we were stepping on earth that had not been stepped on before I really did too. At a couple of different points.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was really weird and it's all natural Nothing with obviously no trails, no nothing.
Speaker 1:Yeah it's just oof and it was, I mean, obviously the prettiest dirt I was ever seen, and I've never seen dirt like that. It looks like nightcrawler dirt, but I do remember nightcrawlers. You remember that there was worms everywhere? Yeah, I guess so, because I mean we're crawling through and we're getting like stained black because of this and I was like this is just like yeah.
Speaker 2:I mean, I don't know if it's a nightcrawler farm or if that's a thing. I don't know what the black dirt has to do with it. I don't remember seeing the nightcrawlers. I remember seeing them everywhere, which I'm sure the turkeys were eating the crap out of them Maybe, yeah, but yeah, the dirt was just black and it was weird.
Speaker 1:Just rich, I guess. I guess Something I don't know. I've never in my life Seen that and um, it was the consistency of it was, you know yeah.
Speaker 2:It was moist, blue boxes Dry. But it had the little you know. It was like Balled up Kind of you know, just didn't have the little styrofoam specs in it. That's it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah it was weird as stuff. Everything else was the exact same. I mean you can kind of go in the store now of where we got. Yeah, I mean a few minutes.
Speaker 2:All right, I mean that covered a lot of it. Okay, so Well.
Speaker 1:I mean, we had to get to that edge without him seeing us and we accomplished that, so we had tried one or two other options on this turkey oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, trying to bounce between some pockets, trying get one tree in front in between us and stuff didn't work. Obviously you know we were, because we were just like busted a hen or something said nah yeah, we gonna bust, we gotta, we gotta roll, you know.
Speaker 2:We gotta go back, slip back, you know, and we had tried through four different routes we didn't want to do this route.
Speaker 1:I promise we were just trying.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we were like, if maybe if we just run him off, we'll not want to try this rough time.
Speaker 1:We just need to bump him and hurry up and do it as we move on. Pretty much Right, pretty much Eventually became a mindset. But you were leaving the next day, your season's over when that sun goes down.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm done for the year. At this point we had to get where we got there.
Speaker 1:And once we got there, I was like all right now, where's he at? And we couldn't find him. That was the craziest thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so you know we go through all that stuff. No calling Marsh. No, we have not called once. We haven't been able to see the field in two hours probably, and we get a little lost or maybe longer Turn around, very much longer. Yes, I mean they had taken us four hours to get there. We probably started at 10 am.
Speaker 1:I don't know when we saw him, 4 pm maybe.
Speaker 2:It was 3 or 4 in the afternoon, anyways. So yeah, we get up to the edge of the same field, because you know, that's just what we got to do Take a break, mainly. Yeah, just relax a second.
Speaker 1:We're where he wants to be no-transcript. In the morning, in the middle of the day, in the evening. That's his spot. We'll go directly to his spot, though we didn't go straight to that corner that he tended to be in.
Speaker 2:We went to where we could call him from that corner. Yes, so we had seen him go to a court the the left or right corner, I don't remember which one I ended up working from, right before we started he started going there and was like now we gotta move, yep, and get back to where he'd been his hangout spot, because I think there was a hen out there with him, or something pretty, that's what I mean like there's like multiple hands coming to go and come.
Speaker 1:Like you can notice, like different, they're different hands oh yeah, they're coming. I don't want to bump them and then you know.
Speaker 2:Then you gotta worry with that, but I remember we, we finally get up there and we, you know, kind of break the threshold there. Yeah, the wood line, get it, get right where we can see that you know there's light at the end of the tunnel right pretty much, yeah, and we've been crawling for an hour and a half at this point through pretty woods, but hard to crawl through, right. You know, whatever you'll say and, um, I remember I'm, you know I'm like I don't see him, you know, kind of telling her like you know I can see a little bit.
Speaker 2:I don't want to keep easing into this field to where I'm in the field.
Speaker 1:Pins and needles like, yeah, do not. He may be, yeah, don't blow. To keep easing into this field, to where I'm in the field, all pins and needles like do not blow it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, don't blow this at this point. And all of a sudden I kind of drop. And Hunter's like oh crap, you know Hunter's behind me, you know five or six feet and he's like you know what, and I'm like hen is right. I mean and I had looked at her three times I don't know if it was the dirt or what- but a hen just appears. I remember that, 15 yards from us.
Speaker 1:And I'm like crap and we're coming from the opposite side. We thought he was.
Speaker 2:Right. So now we're considering did the bird move to the?
Speaker 1:opposite corner A lot of stuff could have happened.
Speaker 2:Did we spook? You know, if I wouldn't have seen that hen, I would have been a lot better off at that point.
Speaker 1:Just through a wrench didn't help.
Speaker 2:A wrench, yes, and I'm like god, you know what do we do now, you know, and she she didn't see us, thank goodness walked 15 yards from us and then headed to the corner that he was in, so that kind of tipped us off of like there's a good belly crawl, like in some about eight inch grass and my head's turned sideways trying to come, trying to lay in it.
Speaker 1:You know I've got my vest off and everything I'm just trying to, you know, yeah yeah, you did or I did I don't remember who I think I did because you were kind of set, not set up, but propped up like because I was behind. I was like I won't get behind you. Yeah, you know, and I'm gonna kind of I mean shimmy, because if, if I get stuck there, you know and look up and he's 30 yards.
Speaker 2:I can just not move at all, yeah, and you'll see him, you know.
Speaker 1:But if you get stuck there, you've got to somehow get back up, get your gun and stuff you know Right, so I'll just like just inch, inch, inch, inch.
Speaker 1:And I'm like my cheeks are just black dirt at this point and I'm trying to say as low as possible. I'm like he's gotta be over there, yeah, because I've kind of scratched off the, the whole other side that he just came from, like he ain't, he definitely ain't out there. He's either behind us in these woods or he's on this side. There's no other place he could be. Should be, should be, yeah, and so I get out there.
Speaker 2:I'm like there you know, he's, he's in that corner, it was just we couldn't see him right, we just hadn't eased into the field, right, you know, to see the corners, we could just see, that's all I needed. You know, he exists right he is here and I see it now he's back and gave you the range, kind of like right which I think at that point you know that hen was headed to him still, yeah, and he blew up in a strut or something. You know kind of acted.
Speaker 1:Let her get him a little little fired up, yeah he ain't loafing, he ain't out there just preening and stuff. He's courting Ian at this point.
Speaker 2:Right, but she ends up just kind of going and kind of saying what's up, man? And then keeps on trucking kind of towards where we had came from and we're like I swear, if this pen just walks through here this nonchalantly and she's going to take him right where we were.
Speaker 1:Says come on boy and let's go, and he walks her literally.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we could have sat against the tire and shot him if he went with that hen. But I saw him turn and start going and I let out a yelp. I honestly had to yelp loud, oh yeah loud, which was crazy because like something with the acoustics here you can't hear it was the muddy soft, you know, absorbed everything.
Speaker 2:Absorbed everything and I yelp, you know one time and I can finally see I got a hole where like a leaf is closing that hole of where I can see this turkey. I mean, he's out there. How far did you say he was 250. 250, yeah, and so I cut on it one. You know, good time, hard yelp, and I see him kind of like he heard it. Was that?
Speaker 1:another hand.
Speaker 2:You know I really don't want to go towards the truck. You know, yeah, that directs he. He really you could tell he didn't really want to follow that. I didn't want to either no, yeah you know, and so thankfully he kind of perked up a little bit, turned right around the hen walks off and then he goes to the corner and disappears and boy.
Speaker 2:That's a well what do we do now? And when is he going now and when is he going to pop up? Right, is he going to pop up? I ain't got a gun If he comes in, if he got in the woods to slip up behind us.
Speaker 1:We were really in a bind, yeah. So then my job's just from. I've got a camera Right In my hand. I ain't saying I'm filming, I'm filming a trick shot. Yeah, he, yeah, um he's doing his best.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I got the daggone stick in my. I'm raising it up, like you know.
Speaker 1:I'm like I'm gonna be a periscope kind of. You know, have it up there. I'm like if he does come out I'm gonna get it. You know, I'm not, I might not see with my eyes, but this camera's gonna see it. Um, shoulder got tired so I'll put that down after a while, just filming a bunch of sky probably, um, but so my eyes are now focused in the woods. I'm like I've got, like I'm listening for every twig everything, because this is silent dirt.
Speaker 1:I mean this is like, oh yeah, you know, no leaves on the ground or nothing. Right, it's weird. Um yeah, zero leaves on the ground. That's the craziest part. Yes, I'm thinking. Maybe water, probably they were in water and the water left, or something I don't know, I have no idea, but it blew our mind a lot.
Speaker 2:Still have no idea, still concerned about it.
Speaker 1:But just silent, silent dirt behind us All the way through the woods Goes out in the field. Same color Black dirt Anyways. But I'm focused, I'm focused, I'm focused, I'm focused and.
Speaker 2:I don't know what.
Speaker 1:I mean a good 40 minutes goes by. I think you call again.
Speaker 2:Yes, so I called again and I thought I heard him at some point, or no, this is what it was. So when he started shifting back towards the woods, I call again there, because he had gotten, you know, 50 yards closer towards the wood line and I could see him again finally.
Speaker 1:You know he went behind.
Speaker 2:I got his attention he turned and then I'm like, okay, he's kind of going the other direction, towards that corner, more than I would. I kind of want him to skirt up this side.
Speaker 1:Is he?
Speaker 2:coming to us or leaving the hill. Because, it could be two different scenarios there and so I'm like I'm going to hit him one more good time and I've got binoculars up and I finally, you know, tweak my body where I can watch his head enough, and I pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop you know one good loud mouth call cut yelp, you know, and I see his head go and I said he's gobbling, we couldn't hear him, and I mean he's 185, 200 yards at this point and I'm like there's no way we can't hear this turkey gobble which scares me all at the same time.
Speaker 1:You know like how many other turkeys around here have we been not hearing gobble, solid gobble yeah.
Speaker 2:But like just the sound barrier absorbed it so much. But then he gets towards the edge of the field and then that's when we got concerned. You know, is he in the field, is he not? And he eased up the whole way, it seems. And at this point I'm getting a little risky with it. Yeah, you got to. I'm on my knees, I'm poking up, I'm popping down, I'm poking up, popping down. You know, uncomfortable.
Speaker 1:I'm comfortable doing it with the cover we got and all that, and I think I end up like crouching down, while on my knees you're in an odd spot.
Speaker 2:I'm like in a ball somewhere. Yeah, I actually do have the camera on you, so you were able to see it, but I had to do some weird acrobatic move to get my head.
Speaker 1:I may have crawled back in the field and was like I'm either gonna win or lose.
Speaker 2:right here, yep, and I see him and he's out there like 60 yards head down walking it didn't tell me that yeah. And so I dump back in.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm still straining my eyes into these dark woods and yeah.
Speaker 2:And there's a little cut, 20 yards from me, 17 yards from me, not even that and I lose him behind it and he gobbled one time that I kind of heard. Yeah, I don't think you heard it, but I like told you he's gobbled.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I remember you telling me I was like he's still out there. But he's way out there, yeah.
Speaker 2:Or we thought he was way out there, and then when I saw him I was like oh crap, he's youars, he's going to be. I mean, he popped up at not far. I don't think it felt like two feet, but it was I'm sitting here watching and watching, like where he's still kicking and boom. Yeah, and Hunter's. Yeah, I'm a little harder to watch body language from behind than Hunter is. I've kind of filmed Hunter enough.
Speaker 2:I kind of know what he's saying with his body Hunter probably struggles with that with me because I do everything different all the time. But yeah, when his eyeballs cleared a branch, I was like that's good enough and shot him.
Speaker 1:I whipped him around like you. Good, what happened.
Speaker 2:You okay. Yeah, I got him. I'm like that's good enough and shot him.
Speaker 1:I whipped him around like you good, what happened? You okay, yeah, I got him. I'm like okay, all right.
Speaker 2:And then he commenced to whooping my tail which I'm sure you all have seen that video.
Speaker 1:That was funny.
Speaker 2:But yeah, that was it for me this year.
Speaker 1:Moral of the story. You know, sometimes you've got to make it happen. Sometimes you've got to accept what the terrain gives you and what that turkey's giving you. And if you will do it, it can happen.
Speaker 2:Sometimes it'll work.
Speaker 1:It ain't always, you know, propped up by a tree and roping them on in.
Speaker 1:You're going to have to get out there and do it and and, if you can find a spot, make it make sense or or get to where a turkey would would be you know, don't question him too too much, just understand he's comfortable there, give it time, get within the vicinity and then direct it from there, pretty much so, um, kind of a a really rounded kind of storytelling sesh there but, as promised, wanted to let y'all know we were going to get to those. Those are very, two very memorable hunts. Hopefully we're going to have some videos on those come.
Speaker 1:January so that's kind of my plan is after Christmas, between Christmas and January, as soon as I get this red pen edited and it gives us for pre-morning kind of uploaded and done um, that's the thing. Go through the red pen mark at all. Then you got to go through the whole manuscript and change it with typing and I didn't take keyboard. So then I'm gonna get on the edit in the videos and stuff like that should be coming out in january, um, but until then we're gonna have at least one more hopefully episode of the podcast before christmas and we are going to have one every week until June. So every.
Speaker 1:Monday. So y'all spread the word. We appreciate those who already have um, no, we're not random giveaways here and there for the folks who are giving us a hand and and, uh, letting folks know about the podcast and stuff like that. So greatly, greatly appreciate it. Hope y'all have a very Merry Christmas and stay safe during these holidays, and we'll catch you next week.
Speaker 1:Thanks again for listening to the Spring Legion podcast. If you followed along on the Spring Legion YouTube channel these past few seasons, you've probably watched us hunt turkeys in a variety of North Mountain Gears leafy jackets. You should also know by now that we wouldn't be wearing one if they didn't absolutely work. Available in a number of camo patterns, with or without a hood, and either a full zip or half-zip option, North Mountain Gear has combined all-day comfort with the groundbreaking leafy concealment that's actually quiet. You can check out their entire line of leafy suits today at northmountaingearcom.
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