Written By Robert S. Steenbeke-----, 1A Hunting in Texas Guide Service, Inc.
Super Dave Valtierra, Palmer Bordelon and I were hunting for gobblers on a private ranch near Leming, Texas. The hunting conditions were everything I would NOT wish for when pursuing Spring turkey. Gobblers are most responsive when it’s cool and the humidity is low (they are wearing down jackets after all), but it was almost 80 degrees, about 90% humidity. Toms come to a call quickest when there are few or no hens around them (normally the hens go to the gobbler, so they are reluctant to go to the hen), but because of no rain for months, the hens gave up trying to nest and we still had several of them around the roost area with which we would have to compete. However, it was the last day of the season, so there was no putting this hunt off. I’m glad we did not.
Despite the negatives stacked against us, a gobbler sounded off as we were gathering our gear from the truck in the predawn. A guess was made as to which way he may head after fly down, and off we went to set up in his expected path.
Shortly after setting up in the most likely ambush location, two other gobblers let their presence be known, and unfortunately, so did a hen.
I would normally have lit up the calling right then, trying to sound sooooo inviting that the gobblers would come to me instead of the real thing, or to get the hen to try and join up with what sounded like a turkey party, dragging the toms in with her. This time, I couldn’t do that. We had to wait on camera light to get this on video. Before good light came, the hen flew down and the gobblers followed her straight to a big field. Hearing no other gobblers anywhere around there, we followed the crowd.
After setting up as close as we dared to get to the edge of the field, I attempted to break the two big toms we could see away from the hen for whom they were displaying. I started off slow, but got no response. I kept increasing the intensity of my calling until they were gobbling regularly and the hen started coming our way, gobblers in tow. It was time to shut up and let them come.
While we were waiting, three Jakes snuck in on our left side and busted us. Rather than give up and let them leave, sounding the alarm call as they went, I got on them hard with three different calls. They commenced to gobbling their heads off, the ones in the field starting gobbling too, and gobblers started talking and coming from two other directions as well. So did another hen. A beautiful, mature gobbler with 12-1/4 inch beard and 1-1/8 inch spurs was the one that volunteered to get shot. The biggest bird of Palmer’s life-----so far!!!!
Thanks Robert for the great commentary of the Turkey Hunt in South Texas. Call Robert S. Steenbeke and he can put you on a great hunt too. In fact he says, if it crawls, fly’s or swims, he can hunt it down !!!-----, 1A Hunting in Texas Guide Service, Inc.--- www.hunting-in-texas.com -- Phone: 210-872-2771
"All in all, it was a most excellent hunt, it had excitement from the starting bell and finished with a big Tom as the trophy.
Thanks for your time today and…I’ll See You In The Outdoors !!!"
Dave
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