April 2009 Updates page 5
8 April
Youth Turkey
hey John...opening day of youth turkey season started off pretty frustrating. High winds made it nearly impossible for me to hear distant gobbles and there weren't any birds gobbling nearby our first setup. Yance with his young ears heard three birds gobble a total of six times but he thought that all three were "way off". We hunted that particular spot for the first 2 1/2 hours with only two young jakes to show for the effort. We moved to the edge of a wooded hollow about 400 yards away and setup again. An hour later with no gobbles or birds from that location we moved again, this time about 1/4 mile to a small pasture above a timbered creek bottom. I might mention that on past hunts we have seen, worked, passed up shots on, and tagged birds from each of these locations. We spent nearly 2 hours at this last spot before giving it up and heading back to the truck for lunch and a nap. We went back out about 3:30 and spent the majority of our time easing along the field edges, glassing and trying to locate some birds, any birds. About 5:00 we spotted a lone gobbler walking along a field edge. Once we figured out the general direction he was moving, we were able to use the terrain to get out ahead of the bird and setup about 150 yards in front of and along the same timbered edge, with the sun at our backs and a small timbered gully between us. It was a good setup with a slight swale in the pasture out front which would hide us from the gobbler until he was very nearly in range. Wind was still blowing hard and I had to call very loud and aggressively before finally getting a response. His next gobble a few minutes later told us he was on our side of the gully, on the edge of the pasture and coming in. He gobbled twice more on his own as he closed the distance and I called just a bit to keep him on track. He came in sight less than 5 minutes later, walking straight into the decoys in a full strut. Yance took the 14-yard shot just a moment later. In some of the pics you might notice Yance is wearing unusual clothing for turkey hunting...he was too hot in his camo and had on his "jamies"...first of my kids to ever kill a turkey wearing his pajamas. Matt
Thank you Matt and congratulations to Yance on a hard hunt. Not lost on those who read your update the number of setups it took.
Our Side
This is one of those issues at the higher end of conservation that could have a significant impact for hunters if surviving governmental bureaucracy starting with congress and later if successful with the USDA/FSA/NRCS that has been long known for making the simple hard to get done.
The issue is how to package the conservation measures in the climate change bill being written in the House of Representatives.
There are conservation groups actively involved at influencing how these conservation measures are being written with special interest hunting groups absent. The actively involved groups have had mixed past history of benefits and consequences for hunters. The lead conservation groups are: Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, Wildlife Management Institute and The Wildlife Society. The legislation commonly called the Waxman-Markey Draft is buried in debate and news reports concerning energy and commerce. With as detailed of a search as we cared to do found interest within The Nature Conservancy and many climate change oriented sources. It does not seem any special interest group seeks issue with deer, turkey, waterfowl or upland bird conservation within this draft legislation. It may have come to the point within the world of hunting that the more well known special interest hunting and conservation organizations are becoming irrelevant and that hunters when willing to spend dollars on organizational membership should look beyond what are now the obvious or more hunter popular groups.
