With the Ontario wild turkey season just over a week old, I wanted to recount how things have gone thus far.
Opening day found me traipsing in nearly an hour before legal shooting time to slide in near a time proven roost location I had seen birds move into the night before while scouting. A creek runs through the bottom of a steep ravine, both sides of which are forested for a few hundred meters in both directions. Surrounding this forest are large expanses of agricultural land.
The first gobble sounded at 5:15 AM and confirmed the birds had roosted where I thought they had. The next 30 minutes was a veritable symphony of gobbling with multiple birds (sounded like 6 - 8 longbeards) lighting up the creek over a stretch of a few hundred yards. It appeared there was a longbeard roosted directly in front of me at about 70 meters, a second group just beyond, and a third group about 250 meters away. Just inside the forest edge, I was facing a broad bench of large deciduous trees the birds frequently pitch down on to assemble before marching toward the fields to feed. As a Plan B I had put up a strutting tom decoy and breeding hen decoy about 20 meters behind me in the agricultural field.
First bird out of the trees was a jake, who had been entirely silent on the roost. He pitched down and quickly worked off into the forest, not to be seen again. Around 6:00 AM I could hear the birds had all pitched down, but not in my direction. They were still on my side of the creek though. I first saw the battleship body of a dominant tom who had been roosted closest to me as he worked off to the east, about 150 meters from my position. Close behind was a group of four longbeards and they were moving in my direction, intent on finding the source of my hen calls. Once they rounded the edge of the woods and spotted my decoy setup, they all raced at full speed to my setup. Problem One was that I had expected the birds to pitch in front of me and was now desperately trying to pivot around. A fallen cedar tree had been an outstanding backstop to set up against, but now screened my decoy setup. Problem Two was that the birds were moving so quickly that I didn't feel comfortable with the shot as they raced through my shooting lane at 20 meters. Over the next few moments the four longbeards gobbled, spurred, and generally wreaking havoc literally 20 meters behind me. Finally one of the longbeards took a few steps in my direction and just entered my shooting lane. Twisted into an awkward pretzel, I put the Aimpoint red dot on his head and pulled the trigger. Down he went at 11 meters (18.7 lb longbeard) - his buddies immediately raced over to spur him. Tag One filled at 6:38 AM opening morning.
My brother in law (my most frequent hunting partner) and his 9 year son were planning to join me around 8:00 AM. I kept still, hoping the birds would work off naturally and remain in the area when he and his son arrived. At 8:00 AM they arrived and began the several hundred meter approach to where I was sitting. They had noticed a group of birds hundreds of meters away in the field and had to take an alternative route to remain hidden. As they were moving, I saw the 3 remaining longbeards marching back down the field. It became apparent the birds were literally headed to where my brother in law and his son would emerge from the forest. I texted him that longbeards were "inbound imminently" and they scrambled to "army crawl" into position just inside the forest edge. As the birds closed, my 9 year old nephew used his Gobblestalker push call and the birds gobbled explosively. Watching from my hidden spot about 200 meters away, I knew a shot was imminent. Sure enough, the 3 birds kept moving directly toward their position. The shot roared and the lead bird hit the dirt (19.8 lb longbeard) - a double of sorts before 9:00 AM opening day!
This was my brother in law's first harvest with his son present - and a moment made even better given his son helped call the bird in.
I've been out four mornings since, focusing on trying to get a longbeard on the big timber of public lands nearby. These are lower population density areas of thousands of acres and I've struck out so far - but still four weeks to go.
