On this episode, Tony breaks down how to scout roosts, food sources, and travel routes so that no matter where you hunt turkeys, you'll always have a chance once the season opens.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundations podcast, your guide
to the fundamentals of better deer hunting, presented by first Light,
creating proven versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind.
First Light Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host
Tony Peterson.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Hey everyone, welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundation's podcast.
I'm your host Tony Peterson, and today's episode is all
about scouting turkeys and how if you do it right,
it can make turkey hunting almost almost too easy. This
is an extra drop. In fact, you might get a
couple of these this week since we are celebrating turkeys
here at meat Eater, which you can check out by
(00:41):
heading over to the meadeater dot com. While you're there,
you might want to pick up a new decoy from
Dave Smith, or may be some calls from Phelps, or
you might want to vote in our turkey calling contest. Now,
I don't really care if I win, even though I
kind of think I should, But I do really want
to beat Mark Kenyon, so I'll take every vote you
guys can give me. All right, Well, I'll be talking
(01:01):
hunting pressure white tails tomorrow in our regularly scheduled episode
today is all about scouting turkeys, particularly early season turkeys,
and how it can make your limited time in the
field to spring but super productive. This is almost a
must if you bowhunt birds or you take newbies and
kids out, but it's also just a good idea for
anyone who just likes to run and gun with a shotgun.
(01:22):
So listen up, because it's time to talk turkeys. It
wasn't that long ago that I thought scouting turkeys was
pretty stupid. Well, you know what, that's not true. I
didn't really think about it at all. Growing up. We
didn't really intentionally scout turkeys, but we would go out
look for birds on places we could hunt before the season.
(01:44):
If we saw Tom's in a certain field, we were
pretty likely to set up there, So I guess we
scouted without acknowledging it. But we were also just running
and gunning with shotguns. So even the limited scouting time
that we did spend, you know, it really didn't play
into a lot of our hunts, because as soon as
that first gobble setounded off from somewhere, all bets were off.
It wasn't until I really got into bow hunting turkeys
(02:06):
that I discovered the value in scouting turkeys with intention
much more like we approached the whole deer thing. Then,
when my daughter started hunting when they were eight, I
really ramped things up because I knew they would have
limited time for the blind and limited patients when we
were in the blind, I wanted more than anything to
make sure that they had productive hunts with lots of action.
(02:28):
It's kind of like if you choose to take kids
on a fishing trip to someplace where the panfish are
thick and the large mouth are everywhere, versus trying to
toss oversized bucktails for pressured muskies. Now, if you want
them to catch the fishing bug, you don't want there
to be hours and hours of nothing. But you know,
monotony bow hunting birds and bringing little girls into the
(02:48):
Turkey woods shaped how I scout turkeys, and now it's
one of my favorite things to do. This is probably
at least partially due to the fact that the prime
scouting time is right now where in my neck of
the woods, the winter has been long and it's really
nice to get out, but also because I know it
just works really well. In fact, it's almost like cheating
(03:09):
if you have the time to really dial in the birds. This,
in my experience, is especially true for early season birds.
And while I know some Southern folks are already hunting,
a lot of people aren't. And even if you are,
there is something to be said about scouting while you hunt,
to form a loose plan in case you don't immediately
tag out. So let me say this, You might not
(03:30):
even need to do this. One of the greatest things
about some turkey hunting is that it's just a mystery
from start to finish. A few years ago I filmed
the show with Sam Soholt in Nebraska where we showed
up on a late season public land hunt where we
had lots of land roam and very few birds to target.
It was hard, really hard, but it was also a
hunt filled entirely with mystery. We didn't really know where
(03:52):
the birds would be, what they'd be feeding on, and
where they'd be most callable. The random tracks in the
sandy roads helped as well the open ground that allowed
for some good visibility, but mostly it was just a
blank slate kind of hunt and we got our asses kicked,
but man, it was fun. Now, if that's mostly your style,
you might not want a scout, but you probably should anyway.
(04:13):
And here's why. Knowing generally where birds might be throughout
the day is a good thing. When you're out there
at two in the afternoon and having heard a goblin
four hours now, I know the thought of running and
gunning all day long until you run into that suicidal
two year old is awesome. I also know that a
full day of running and gunning when the birds aren't
suicidal can be a lot to handle. Turkey onna can
(04:35):
be so easy, but can also feel damn near impossible,
and when it does, it's kind of like a steel
toed boot to the knackers, because well, it's supposed to
be fun. So let me start with something I like
to scout for a lot, which is rus. I've hunted
places in Minnesota, Nebraska, and Texas and a few other
states where there were just generational roofs. There were always
(04:57):
birds sleeping in those spots, and it's pretty amazing when
you find one. The piles of turkey poot below those
trees are incredible, and just knowing where some birds will
start and end their day is a huge advantage. But
generational roosts are kind of like big buck honey holes.
They don't exist on every property, and they aren't a
(05:18):
guarantee all season long. When you do find them, it's
usually several trees near some great flyoff point. But mostly
the roosting spots I find when I'm scouting are less generational,
but maybe more important. Turkeys roost in certain spots for
certain reasons. Sometimes, like with those generational roots, it's because
it's the only location around that allows them to get
(05:39):
on a big limb out of the wind and not
have to fly straight up to get there. In other places,
it's the right tree in the right spot for the
right conditions. Turkeys do not like roosting where the wind
can get to them all night long. Remember that, because
if you start out running and gunning on a windy morning,
especially in the early season where it might be cold,
the birds are not going to be just anywhere. They'll
(06:02):
be tucked in and roosted somewhere out of the wind.
This is one of the most predictable things about turkey behavior,
and knowing how to use it is a huge advantage
to us hunters. What I like to think about when
I find a roost or even a single tree that
shows some usage is not what a lot of people
typically think about sure, I like being close to a
roost when the sun rises, because well, I don't know
(06:24):
everybody does. But Russ trees are often tough to get
super close to, and while birds like to sleep in
them for safety and comfort, they might fly three hundred
yards off the limb in the morning to go somewhere
to catch the sun alone. Gobbler is a different story,
but good roos often don't just host one sleepy turkey
per night, and where the hens fly to, the gobblers
(06:45):
usually follow. I like rus for morning hunting, but not
nearly as much as I like them for evening hunts.
On a really nice day, birds often fly up after
shooting light has ended, but they will often stage up
close to that tree before that. When you glass turkeys
a lot, which is something I do quite a bit,
you see them stage up in a major way, often
(07:07):
quite a ways away from the actual roost. They'll strut
and feed and do turkey stuff until someone, usually a hen,
decides it's bedtime, and then all of a sudden, the
whole flock's demeanor will change. They'll all follow her lead,
and when that happens, you might as well pack up
your calls. Because the game is over for the day,
but before that moment, the birds are not only highly predictable,
(07:27):
but highly callable. Now, I'm filling in a lot of
blanks here because I can't actually ask turkeys why they
do this, But it seems like early season birds, even
if they are in smaller flocks, seem like they are
really looking for the right hen before bedtime. They are
just prone to running in And I have far more
predictable results hunting afternoon and evening birds than I do
(07:48):
birds at first light. It's like they're just primed to look. Then.
They might have had to listen to a bunch of
hens chattering all day long while those same hens ignored them.
A new lady squawking away might just be all they
need to hear. I don't know. Maybe it's partially that,
but maybe they've just put in the work strutting and
putting on a show all day and suddenly seeing your
(08:10):
jake decoy in a breeding posture just pisses them off.
I don't know. What I do know is if you're
in a state where you can hunt till sunset, scouting
can put you on amazing turkey action as the afternoon
gives way to evening, find the roost, find the staging area,
and get ready. This is such a good move for
bowhunting and for taking kids that don't want to get
(08:32):
up at three point thirty in the morning. But there's
more to scouting turkeys than russ take feeding areas. We
tend to think of fields as the ticket for turkeys.
Why wouldn't we They are highly visible, and it seems
like the solution to the problem is to get on
the edge of a field, put some decoys out, call
them in. This can absolutely work, because it does all
the time, but I don't do that for early season
(08:54):
birds when I know they are likely to be glued
to hens. I want to know where all of the
birds will naturally go. Again, glassing is a huge bonus
if you can do it. Where turkeys actually enter the
field and where they exit is huge, But so are
the spots along their feeding roads. I have a place
(09:23):
to hunt here in Minnesota that has one big field
on it, and the birds might be anywhere in that
field all winter long, but they tend to feed on
the stuff closest to the woods first. As the winter
wears on, they end up feeding closer and closer and
closer to the highway that serves as the western boundary.
This means that by the time the season is open,
the birds are often super visible, but they spend the
(09:45):
bulk of their time in a place that isn't really huntable,
So I have to know how they are going to
get there and where they are likely to go when
they leave. I also want to know what ambush spots
they are likely to feed by during their routes, because
they won't just sit in one location in the field.
Watching them is huge here, and it can help you
put your blind in the right spot and help you
(10:08):
understand when you should probably be there. This is one
of the things that I love about scouting food sources
for turkeys. They might use one cut cornfield all day,
or just in the morning before the bugs really get moving. Now.
Trail cameras are crazy good at helping you dial down
stuff like this on food sources too. But even if
you can't glass and you can't run cameras, you can
(10:28):
just walk the field and look for the tracks. I
love finding the spots that are not only beaten down
with turkey tracks and the telltale signs of wings dragging
as they strut, but also show me where they clearly
came into the field or they clearly walked out of it.
If I'm going to put a blind anywhere, it's going
to be near one of those spots. It's no different
(10:49):
from setting a deer stand up over a single trail
or on a spot where multiple trails converge. You're just
playing the odds now. Of course, turkey food sources go
way beyond the obvious fields. In the Upper Midwest. On
mild winters, we often carry over red oak acorns until
late in the winter and sometimes through the spring. Turkeys
will eat the crap out of them when there isn't
(11:10):
much else to eat. And if you can find a
spot like this, you have found a spot where birds
are killable, but maybe only for a short window until
things green up and the multi legged and multi wing
food sources show up. Now I've talked about this a
few times on here, but the thing that blew me
away when I started scouting late March birds up here
in central Minnesota was how much time they spend in
(11:32):
swamps scratching up whatever they're scratching up. I still really
kind of don't know there are some green bowlby type
of flants I find while I'm watching birds. But I
also think they might be just rooting around for snails
or maybe even leeches or something. I don't really know.
I guess the main point is I have a lot
of faith in their willingness to get their feet wet
(11:52):
to eat something. It has put me on quite a
few early season birds with my daughters. Now, without glassing them,
I'd have never figured that out. I don't think they
just don't leave a lot of sign in the water
to get my drift. So the question i'd ask you,
wherever you live is do you know about anything like
that with turkeys in your neighborhood? And if not, how
(12:13):
could you figure it out? Those here today gone to
moral food sources can be the absolute ticket to great hunts,
but not if you don't know about them. This, to
me is kind of like how you get to be
a hell of a lot better at hunting deer. Anyone
can kill a buck on a soybean field, but not
everyone can kill a buck on a soft mass pattern
that will only exist for a few days or a
(12:35):
few weeks. I know we generally don't take turkey hunting
as seriously as deer hunting, but learning about nature in
a way that others won't is always a net benefit
to those of us who prefer wild game on our grills.
Rouss and food are always worth looking for, but the
thing that I probably kill more birds on now than
any other feature of the woods is just travel routes. Now.
(12:59):
Turkeys sometimes stay around and do nothing, but that's mostly
when they are wet or cold and waiting for some sunlight. Otherwise,
they are like six month old lab puppies. They just
seem to need to be doing something. What that something
is is often just walking from one place to another
in search of food. That's it. Hens that aren't nesting
(13:19):
do this all day long, and when they are nesting
they still do this quite a bit. It's just their nature.
This is where boots on the ground scouting, along with
trail cameras can be onreal for figuring out exactly where
and when to hunt certain field roads or logging roads,
or anywhere that turkeys might consistently walk. Finding a bunch
of tom tracks and gopher mounds along a two track
(13:41):
is great, but there is nothing like dropping a trail
camera off about two feet off the ground, pointed up
a two track like that and then waiting. If you
give this a couple of weeks before you hunt, you'll
be able to tease out the patterns of your local birds.
Big time flocked up birds are insanely patternable this way,
but you'll also see jakes and toms that seem like
they are kind of randomly traveling. But if you pay
(14:04):
attention to the timing of their travels over enough days,
you often see that it's not really random. Even cruising toms,
which might appear to be totally unpredictable, they usually aren't.
A couple of days of data might not show this,
but a couple of weeks usually will. This has been
one of the best ways for me to put my
daughters on birds after school, because they're just windows of
(14:26):
time where you might have like two hours where the
birds are just going to come through. Now, you might
get that clockwork bird that shows up almost the same
time every day, but I find that it's more common
for me to plan a hunt around a window of
time like ten to noon or three to five in
the afternoon. Not only is this just a really good
way to dial in birds, but it's also really fun
(14:47):
to head out with the full belief that you'll have
tom swing through while you're sitting there. It helps with
the second guessing and the wanderlust that comes with impatience.
If you don't have hundreds or thousands of acres to rome,
you might not want to cover every inch of your
hunting ground. In that case, having the confidence to sit
tight and wait out some birds that should be closing
in is super important. Plus and I can't stress this enough.
(15:11):
If you are where turkeys expect turkeys to be, those
turkeys become more callable. Even the birds that might not
have planned to swing through that little logging road often
will if they hear calling from a place they absolutely
aren't surprised by the presence of what they believe to
be live birds. I also like this strategy for hunting
with my daughters because if they start to get a
(15:32):
little fidgety, I can pull up my Moultrie app and
show them all of the birds that have recently traveled through.
It's just a nice little confidence booster. But filing through
those images of strutters and cruisers in the exact spot
you're sitting just really helps out to tamp down the
doubts in the second guessing. So even if you don't
want to, or you don't think you need to scout turkeys,
(15:54):
you probably should, or at least you should consider it.
After all, what else do you have to do right now?
You should also come back throughout the week because I'm
going to drop some more turkey knowledge on you real soon.
That's it for this show. I'm Tony Peterson. This has
been the Wired to Hunt Foundations podcast, which is brought
to you by first Light. And speaking of first Light,
(16:15):
if you want some free shipping on that, maybe some
Dave Smith decoys, maybe an FHF Bino harness, and of
course some Phelps turkey calls, you can head over to
the medeater dot com. Check out our Turkey weeks see
what we have going on there, vicariously live through us
on some of the turkey hunting content that we're putting
up right now. Lots of articles, lots of videos, podcasts
(16:39):
like this one. Or you can check out our turkey
calling contest there and vote for who you think is
the best turkey caller at meat Eater. Hint it's not
Mark Kenyon. As always, thank you so much for listening
and for all your support. Truly appreciate it.
Welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundations podcast, your guide
to the fundamentals of better deer hunting, presented by first Light,
creating proven versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind.
First Light Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host
Tony Peterson.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Hey everyone, welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundation's podcast.
I'm your host Tony Peterson, and today's episode is all
about scouting turkeys and how if you do it right,
it can make turkey hunting almost almost too easy. This
is an extra drop. In fact, you might get a
couple of these this week since we are celebrating turkeys
here at meat Eater, which you can check out by
(00:41):
heading over to the meadeater dot com. While you're there,
you might want to pick up a new decoy from
Dave Smith, or may be some calls from Phelps, or
you might want to vote in our turkey calling contest. Now,
I don't really care if I win, even though I
kind of think I should, But I do really want
to beat Mark Kenyon, so I'll take every vote you
guys can give me. All right, Well, I'll be talking
(01:01):
hunting pressure white tails tomorrow in our regularly scheduled episode
today is all about scouting turkeys, particularly early season turkeys,
and how it can make your limited time in the
field to spring but super productive. This is almost a
must if you bowhunt birds or you take newbies and
kids out, but it's also just a good idea for
anyone who just likes to run and gun with a shotgun.
(01:22):
So listen up, because it's time to talk turkeys. It
wasn't that long ago that I thought scouting turkeys was
pretty stupid. Well, you know what, that's not true. I
didn't really think about it at all. Growing up. We
didn't really intentionally scout turkeys, but we would go out
look for birds on places we could hunt before the season.
(01:44):
If we saw Tom's in a certain field, we were
pretty likely to set up there, So I guess we
scouted without acknowledging it. But we were also just running
and gunning with shotguns. So even the limited scouting time
that we did spend, you know, it really didn't play
into a lot of our hunts, because as soon as
that first gobble setounded off from somewhere, all bets were off.
It wasn't until I really got into bow hunting turkeys
(02:06):
that I discovered the value in scouting turkeys with intention
much more like we approached the whole deer thing. Then,
when my daughter started hunting when they were eight, I
really ramped things up because I knew they would have
limited time for the blind and limited patients when we
were in the blind, I wanted more than anything to
make sure that they had productive hunts with lots of action.
(02:28):
It's kind of like if you choose to take kids
on a fishing trip to someplace where the panfish are
thick and the large mouth are everywhere, versus trying to
toss oversized bucktails for pressured muskies. Now, if you want
them to catch the fishing bug, you don't want there
to be hours and hours of nothing. But you know,
monotony bow hunting birds and bringing little girls into the
(02:48):
Turkey woods shaped how I scout turkeys, and now it's
one of my favorite things to do. This is probably
at least partially due to the fact that the prime
scouting time is right now where in my neck of
the woods, the winter has been long and it's really
nice to get out, but also because I know it
just works really well. In fact, it's almost like cheating
(03:09):
if you have the time to really dial in the birds. This,
in my experience, is especially true for early season birds.
And while I know some Southern folks are already hunting,
a lot of people aren't. And even if you are,
there is something to be said about scouting while you hunt,
to form a loose plan in case you don't immediately
tag out. So let me say this, You might not
(03:30):
even need to do this. One of the greatest things
about some turkey hunting is that it's just a mystery
from start to finish. A few years ago I filmed
the show with Sam Soholt in Nebraska where we showed
up on a late season public land hunt where we
had lots of land roam and very few birds to target.
It was hard, really hard, but it was also a
hunt filled entirely with mystery. We didn't really know where
(03:52):
the birds would be, what they'd be feeding on, and
where they'd be most callable. The random tracks in the
sandy roads helped as well the open ground that allowed
for some good visibility, but mostly it was just a
blank slate kind of hunt and we got our asses kicked,
but man, it was fun. Now, if that's mostly your style,
you might not want a scout, but you probably should anyway.
(04:13):
And here's why. Knowing generally where birds might be throughout
the day is a good thing. When you're out there
at two in the afternoon and having heard a goblin
four hours now, I know the thought of running and
gunning all day long until you run into that suicidal
two year old is awesome. I also know that a
full day of running and gunning when the birds aren't
suicidal can be a lot to handle. Turkey onna can
(04:35):
be so easy, but can also feel damn near impossible,
and when it does, it's kind of like a steel
toed boot to the knackers, because well, it's supposed to
be fun. So let me start with something I like
to scout for a lot, which is rus. I've hunted
places in Minnesota, Nebraska, and Texas and a few other
states where there were just generational roofs. There were always
(04:57):
birds sleeping in those spots, and it's pretty amazing when
you find one. The piles of turkey poot below those
trees are incredible, and just knowing where some birds will
start and end their day is a huge advantage. But
generational roosts are kind of like big buck honey holes.
They don't exist on every property, and they aren't a
(05:18):
guarantee all season long. When you do find them, it's
usually several trees near some great flyoff point. But mostly
the roosting spots I find when I'm scouting are less generational,
but maybe more important. Turkeys roost in certain spots for
certain reasons. Sometimes, like with those generational roots, it's because
it's the only location around that allows them to get
(05:39):
on a big limb out of the wind and not
have to fly straight up to get there. In other places,
it's the right tree in the right spot for the
right conditions. Turkeys do not like roosting where the wind
can get to them all night long. Remember that, because
if you start out running and gunning on a windy morning,
especially in the early season where it might be cold,
the birds are not going to be just anywhere. They'll
(06:02):
be tucked in and roosted somewhere out of the wind.
This is one of the most predictable things about turkey behavior,
and knowing how to use it is a huge advantage
to us hunters. What I like to think about when
I find a roost or even a single tree that
shows some usage is not what a lot of people
typically think about sure, I like being close to a
roost when the sun rises, because well, I don't know
(06:24):
everybody does. But Russ trees are often tough to get
super close to, and while birds like to sleep in
them for safety and comfort, they might fly three hundred
yards off the limb in the morning to go somewhere
to catch the sun alone. Gobbler is a different story,
but good roos often don't just host one sleepy turkey
per night, and where the hens fly to, the gobblers
(06:45):
usually follow. I like rus for morning hunting, but not
nearly as much as I like them for evening hunts.
On a really nice day, birds often fly up after
shooting light has ended, but they will often stage up
close to that tree before that. When you glass turkeys
a lot, which is something I do quite a bit,
you see them stage up in a major way, often
(07:07):
quite a ways away from the actual roost. They'll strut
and feed and do turkey stuff until someone, usually a hen,
decides it's bedtime, and then all of a sudden, the
whole flock's demeanor will change. They'll all follow her lead,
and when that happens, you might as well pack up
your calls. Because the game is over for the day,
but before that moment, the birds are not only highly predictable,
(07:27):
but highly callable. Now, I'm filling in a lot of
blanks here because I can't actually ask turkeys why they
do this, But it seems like early season birds, even
if they are in smaller flocks, seem like they are
really looking for the right hen before bedtime. They are
just prone to running in And I have far more
predictable results hunting afternoon and evening birds than I do
(07:48):
birds at first light. It's like they're just primed to look. Then.
They might have had to listen to a bunch of
hens chattering all day long while those same hens ignored them.
A new lady squawking away might just be all they
need to hear. I don't know. Maybe it's partially that,
but maybe they've just put in the work strutting and
putting on a show all day and suddenly seeing your
(08:10):
jake decoy in a breeding posture just pisses them off.
I don't know. What I do know is if you're
in a state where you can hunt till sunset, scouting
can put you on amazing turkey action as the afternoon
gives way to evening, find the roost, find the staging area,
and get ready. This is such a good move for
bowhunting and for taking kids that don't want to get
(08:32):
up at three point thirty in the morning. But there's
more to scouting turkeys than russ take feeding areas. We
tend to think of fields as the ticket for turkeys.
Why wouldn't we They are highly visible, and it seems
like the solution to the problem is to get on
the edge of a field, put some decoys out, call
them in. This can absolutely work, because it does all
the time, but I don't do that for early season
(08:54):
birds when I know they are likely to be glued
to hens. I want to know where all of the
birds will naturally go. Again, glassing is a huge bonus
if you can do it. Where turkeys actually enter the
field and where they exit is huge, But so are
the spots along their feeding roads. I have a place
(09:23):
to hunt here in Minnesota that has one big field
on it, and the birds might be anywhere in that
field all winter long, but they tend to feed on
the stuff closest to the woods first. As the winter
wears on, they end up feeding closer and closer and
closer to the highway that serves as the western boundary.
This means that by the time the season is open,
the birds are often super visible, but they spend the
(09:45):
bulk of their time in a place that isn't really huntable,
So I have to know how they are going to
get there and where they are likely to go when
they leave. I also want to know what ambush spots
they are likely to feed by during their routes, because
they won't just sit in one location in the field.
Watching them is huge here, and it can help you
put your blind in the right spot and help you
(10:08):
understand when you should probably be there. This is one
of the things that I love about scouting food sources
for turkeys. They might use one cut cornfield all day,
or just in the morning before the bugs really get moving. Now.
Trail cameras are crazy good at helping you dial down
stuff like this on food sources too. But even if
you can't glass and you can't run cameras, you can
(10:28):
just walk the field and look for the tracks. I
love finding the spots that are not only beaten down
with turkey tracks and the telltale signs of wings dragging
as they strut, but also show me where they clearly
came into the field or they clearly walked out of it.
If I'm going to put a blind anywhere, it's going
to be near one of those spots. It's no different
(10:49):
from setting a deer stand up over a single trail
or on a spot where multiple trails converge. You're just
playing the odds now. Of course, turkey food sources go
way beyond the obvious fields. In the Upper Midwest. On
mild winters, we often carry over red oak acorns until
late in the winter and sometimes through the spring. Turkeys
will eat the crap out of them when there isn't
(11:10):
much else to eat. And if you can find a
spot like this, you have found a spot where birds
are killable, but maybe only for a short window until
things green up and the multi legged and multi wing
food sources show up. Now I've talked about this a
few times on here, but the thing that blew me
away when I started scouting late March birds up here
in central Minnesota was how much time they spend in
(11:32):
swamps scratching up whatever they're scratching up. I still really
kind of don't know there are some green bowlby type
of flants I find while I'm watching birds. But I
also think they might be just rooting around for snails
or maybe even leeches or something. I don't really know.
I guess the main point is I have a lot
of faith in their willingness to get their feet wet
(11:52):
to eat something. It has put me on quite a
few early season birds with my daughters. Now, without glassing them,
I'd have never figured that out. I don't think they
just don't leave a lot of sign in the water
to get my drift. So the question i'd ask you,
wherever you live is do you know about anything like
that with turkeys in your neighborhood? And if not, how
(12:13):
could you figure it out? Those here today gone to
moral food sources can be the absolute ticket to great hunts,
but not if you don't know about them. This, to
me is kind of like how you get to be
a hell of a lot better at hunting deer. Anyone
can kill a buck on a soybean field, but not
everyone can kill a buck on a soft mass pattern
that will only exist for a few days or a
(12:35):
few weeks. I know we generally don't take turkey hunting
as seriously as deer hunting, but learning about nature in
a way that others won't is always a net benefit
to those of us who prefer wild game on our grills.
Rouss and food are always worth looking for, but the
thing that I probably kill more birds on now than
any other feature of the woods is just travel routes. Now.
(12:59):
Turkeys sometimes stay around and do nothing, but that's mostly
when they are wet or cold and waiting for some sunlight. Otherwise,
they are like six month old lab puppies. They just
seem to need to be doing something. What that something
is is often just walking from one place to another
in search of food. That's it. Hens that aren't nesting
(13:19):
do this all day long, and when they are nesting
they still do this quite a bit. It's just their nature.
This is where boots on the ground scouting, along with
trail cameras can be onreal for figuring out exactly where
and when to hunt certain field roads or logging roads,
or anywhere that turkeys might consistently walk. Finding a bunch
of tom tracks and gopher mounds along a two track
(13:41):
is great, but there is nothing like dropping a trail
camera off about two feet off the ground, pointed up
a two track like that and then waiting. If you
give this a couple of weeks before you hunt, you'll
be able to tease out the patterns of your local birds.
Big time flocked up birds are insanely patternable this way,
but you'll also see jakes and toms that seem like
they are kind of randomly traveling. But if you pay
(14:04):
attention to the timing of their travels over enough days,
you often see that it's not really random. Even cruising toms,
which might appear to be totally unpredictable, they usually aren't.
A couple of days of data might not show this,
but a couple of weeks usually will. This has been
one of the best ways for me to put my
daughters on birds after school, because they're just windows of
(14:26):
time where you might have like two hours where the
birds are just going to come through. Now, you might
get that clockwork bird that shows up almost the same
time every day, but I find that it's more common
for me to plan a hunt around a window of
time like ten to noon or three to five in
the afternoon. Not only is this just a really good
way to dial in birds, but it's also really fun
(14:47):
to head out with the full belief that you'll have
tom swing through while you're sitting there. It helps with
the second guessing and the wanderlust that comes with impatience.
If you don't have hundreds or thousands of acres to rome,
you might not want to cover every inch of your
hunting ground. In that case, having the confidence to sit
tight and wait out some birds that should be closing
in is super important. Plus and I can't stress this enough.
(15:11):
If you are where turkeys expect turkeys to be, those
turkeys become more callable. Even the birds that might not
have planned to swing through that little logging road often
will if they hear calling from a place they absolutely
aren't surprised by the presence of what they believe to
be live birds. I also like this strategy for hunting
with my daughters because if they start to get a
(15:32):
little fidgety, I can pull up my Moultrie app and
show them all of the birds that have recently traveled through.
It's just a nice little confidence booster. But filing through
those images of strutters and cruisers in the exact spot
you're sitting just really helps out to tamp down the
doubts in the second guessing. So even if you don't
want to, or you don't think you need to scout turkeys,
(15:54):
you probably should, or at least you should consider it.
After all, what else do you have to do right now?
You should also come back throughout the week because I'm
going to drop some more turkey knowledge on you real soon.
That's it for this show. I'm Tony Peterson. This has
been the Wired to Hunt Foundations podcast, which is brought
to you by first Light. And speaking of first Light,
(16:15):
if you want some free shipping on that, maybe some
Dave Smith decoys, maybe an FHF Bino harness, and of
course some Phelps turkey calls, you can head over to
the medeater dot com. Check out our Turkey weeks see
what we have going on there, vicariously live through us
on some of the turkey hunting content that we're putting
up right now. Lots of articles, lots of videos, podcasts
(16:39):
like this one. Or you can check out our turkey
calling contest there and vote for who you think is
the best turkey caller at meat Eater. Hint it's not
Mark Kenyon. As always, thank you so much for listening
and for all your support. Truly appreciate it.
Host
Mark Kenyon
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