Taking my nephew tomorrow, hoping to get his first bird. Looking like a hard frost tomorrow morning. How much do you guys think it will affect the birds tomorrow?
What he said. Good luck!Turkeys will be doing what turkeys do, some of my best hunts have been 20 degree mornings , some of my worst have been clear and 60 degrees! Just get out there and get after em!! Good luck
X2. In my experience, the first morning of a cold front will often shut them up. But when we have a high pressure system with sunny days and cool mornings for a few days in a row, those mid-30s, light frost sunrises are magical.well it was cold has heck this morning and heard a lot of gobbling this morning while in the tree. In my experience the temp doesnt really make a huge difference and would even say those cold crisp clear mornings I generally hear more activity. I have found those warm, humid, muggy mornings to be much much worse then the cold ones.
Anyone have any recommendations on decoy placement?
Thanks LBL Man, I am thinking maybe I should not use them at all and see what happens.Let me preface this by first saying I have no "ethics" issue with your using turkey decoys.
Just want to share a few of my thoughts that came from experience using them.
Having experimented with decoys for many years in times past, if I were starting out teaching a new hunter about turkey hunting, would probably just not take the decoys.
Am assuming you plan to stay put in a single location?
Even if "staying put, single location",
I can overall come up with more decoy negatives than positives.
One liability in particular many novices miss is that you are often seen
either placing or retrieving (or sometimes re-setting one the wind messed up, etc.).
If a roosted bird sees you, that bird is typically not going to gobble, and will then fly down away from you. Ditto if a nearby roosted bird hears you make "unnatural" sounds, such as are sometimes made by decoys rubbing up against something, or decoy stakes rattling against each other, etc.
Another negative is that decoys repel about as often as they attract, when seen by a distant bird.
A decoy will often cause a distant bird to "hang up", come no closer, when it sees the decoy.
For a less experienced turkey hunter I'm guiding, I will sometimes use a sitting hen decoy, but is typically placed in such a spot/manner that the only turkey seeing it should be under 30 yds, i.e. already within good range. I do not want any turkeys seeing it from afar, as it is only something to draw an in-range Tom's attention in hopes of a better shot placement opportunity.
My "sitting" hen has no legs (no stake) and I often hide it in some low weeds whereby only it's head is visible. It's only real purpose is to maybe give a less experienced hunter at least a few more seconds for a cleaner head/neck shot. Often, when an in-range Tom sees it, his head will go up like a periscope, and he may go into strut rather than just walking.
If we arrive any later than 35 minutes before sunrise, even if we had planned to place that sitting hen decoy, we don't use it because I believe the risk of being seen by a roosted bird negates any benefit of that sitting hen.
When I'm hunting by myself, I don't want the hassle (and/or liabilities) of any decoy.
Was a light frost in Wayne Co this morning & they hammered from 5:59 to 8:00. I listened at 13 different spots & heard birds every time. Tomorrow should be great as well.Taking my nephew tomorrow, hoping to get his first bird. Looking like a hard frost tomorrow morning. How much do you guys think it will affect the birds tomorrow?
We have a 8:15am cutoff due to baseball. Hopefully enough time!
in the same boat but a 9am cut off for a swim meet in Brentwood he has to go to.