Kansas Doves

9/1/14

The Kansas 2014 dove season opened up on 9/1 and Nick, Landon, Jeff and I were ready to get the show started. Nick and I scouted several public fields on Saturday and there were a lot of birds in the area, so we had high expectations going into opening morning. We thought arriving two hours early was going to give us a leg up on other hunters, but we weren't the only ones with that idea. There were close to 20 guys already at the field we'd elected to hunt first. The scouting trip paid off though because most of the guys were on the opposite end of the field that we wanted to hunt. We got to the area we wanted and staked out our spots....by the time legal shooting arrived there had to close to 50 hunters around the field. 

The shooting started early and often as birds started buzzing around from all directions. Nicky has on point and limited out after about an hour. I was having a pretty good morning on the trigger also and limited out shortly after that. Landon and Jeff took a little longer and burned up a few more shells, but we ended the morning with 47 doves total. We headed back out that evening and Landon and Jeff finished off their 15 bird limits. It was a great start to the 2014 fall season, now bring on the whitetail...we have several good deer showing up on the farms so it should be an interesting fall!

Youth getting it done in Kansas

We had our annual Kansas Turkey Camp weekend April 3rd - April 6th this year. We had three youth hunters in camp along with six adult hunters. Logan and Scott arrived in KC Thursday afternoon and we headed over to Topeka to scout for the following morning. Logan, Scott and I headed to an area on the west side of the public ground where we'd seen multiple birds earlier in the week. The area consisted of a big hill with a creek at the bottom that opened up into a tall broom grass field. We got in early and set up the blind and decoys while it was pitch black....I knew there was a rise grass field that we wanted the decoys on, but in the predawn darkness I missed the mark by about 5yrds and placed the decoys below the rise.

Even with the high winds and spitting rain the birds on the roost were wound up and sounding off on the regular. Logan had never really heard a lot of gobbling, so he was pretty excited. We could actually see several birds roosted in the trees from our location. At fly down a group of jakes pitched right into the plowed field behind us. They proceeded to fight and cause a ruckus for over an hour before moving off to the north.

 

 Once the group of jakes moved off I slid out of the blind and crawled to the decoys, so I could move them on top of the rise in the grass field. On my way back to the blind a jake pitched over me and landed on the back side of the rise in the field. I crawled into the blind got seated and made a few soft calls on the VECtor slate call. A couple minutes later we had a red head sneaking through the grass into the decoys. We got the camera fired up in time to get the kill on video...Logan brought the heat!

 

 

 After Logan recovered his bird we settled back into the blind to finish out the morning hunt. The wind continued to pick up and I was making a calling sequence  every 20-30 minutes. Around 10am I told Scott I heard a turkey "putt" in the grass, but I wasn't 100% sure. Right about that time Logan spotted another red head sneaking up behind the decoys. This gobbler had come in silent on the back side of the rise, so we couldn't see him until he was on top of the spread. Logan gave me time to fire the camera back up, just before he torched his 2nd bird of the morning....and with that Little Man was tagged out a couple hours into his Kansas season! 

Friday evening Brian and his daughter MaKenna rolled into town for Kenna's first ever turkey hunt. We elected to hunt a big bottom field Saturday morning that had been holding several stutters all week during our scouting trips. We got in early and had the blind setup and it didn't take long for the first bird of the morning to fire up on the roost....and he was close! We had birds roosted all along the ridge behind us, but only three toms actually pitched into the field. Kenna got a good show for her first sit, but none of the boys would leave their solo girlfriend and come play with us. After a couple hours of slow action Kenna had all she could take, so we packed up and headed in for lunch. 

 

Saturday afternoon's sit was pretty slow across the board, but Sunday morning was a different story all together. Brian and Kenna headed into one of our most productive areas and had birds roosted all over their setup. Shortly after fly down they had several hens out in the field when three strutters showed up on the scene. Brian made some soft calls and the trio couldn't resist...the march was on. Kenna smoked the first bird and his buddies stuck around, so Brian got another shell chambered and the Little Huntress laid down a Kansas Double Tap! MaKenna was tagged out with her first and second gobbler ever....one was an awesome looking rio-eastern hybrid also! 

 

Two Times on Kansas Turkeys

After a lot of scouting, burning gas and anticipation the 2014 Kansas Turkey season is finally here! Nick, Jeff and I all headed out to different public areas we'd located birds on the previous weekend. I slid into a new area that was loaded with birds when we scouted it and I wasn't disappointed as the early morning tree talking started....there where turkeys roosted all over my setup!

The majority of birds pitched into my field about 450yrds south of me; at my best count there were 72 birds total, including 18 strutters.  The big flock was causing all kinds of racket calling, fighting, chasing and breeding for the first half hour before birds started filtering off. There was one very vocal hen in the group, so I started cutting her off and mimicking her call....she wasn't happy about it. It didn't take long and the hen as running down the field right into my decoys, where she proceeded to bump, peck and purr at the Avian hen for about fifteen minutes. Ol' girls calling caught the attention of a group of jakes and they wasted no time marching right up to the DSD jake/breeder hen pair and flexing their muscle; kind of.

After another 10-15 minutes of the lone hen and jakes being in the decoys the dominant group of three strutters at the other end of the field took notice. One of them came out of strut, ran up on top of a field terrace and stuck his head up as high as possible. The second he spotted the action 600yrds away the race was on. Him and his two running mates were charging down the field and the group of jakes noticed immediately; as they worked off to my right. The toms angled slightly to my left and went into strut about 40yrds out. The hen was still close by, so I started softly purring on the VECtor slate and within seconds the lead bird was on the march. He entered my left shooting window broadside and headed straight towards the DSD jake. I let him get about 2' away from the decoy before I released the arrow.....my first spring archery gobbler was down! His two buddies didn't know what was happening and the group of jakes saw the leader going down as an oppurtunity.....for the next several minutes the boys put on a wicked show fighting each other.

That afternoon Nick and I headed back into the same area to try and lay a double down. About an hour into our sit Nick pulled out a new pot call to show. I made two quick yelps on it and BOOM........gobble, gobble, gobble right behind us! Within seconds Nick spotted three toms entering the field about 40yrds left of our blind. They came straight in, but locked up about 3yrds before Nick had a clear shot. They were acting very timid and actually backed away from the decoys and hung out about 35yrds away. I told Nick "this ain't right, there is another dominant bird around" right them all three heads shot up and the toms ran to the timber; only to be met by two other long beards, The new guys in town ran the first three birds off about 70yrds before turning tail and marching back to our DSD jake in full strut. Nick and I were ready and both at full draw; he had the first shot. I heard his arrow hit the front bird and tom #2 came out of strut and turned his back to us.....lights out! My arrow hit home hard and ol' boy flopped about 20' before giving it up. Nick's bird was still on his feet and making a huge semi-circle out in the field....after locating the arrow it was evident Nick shot forward, missing the vitals. Although we missed out on our intended double up, I did have my second spring archery bird ever in the books and I'm officially tagged out in Kansas for the 2014 season!

Fish On....MO Spoonbill Snagging

3/15/14

The opening day of Missouri's 2014 Spoonbill snagging season was upon us, so the crew headed down to LOZ for the annual opening weekend Snagapolooza! Everyone was on the water by 9am on opening morning and it only took about eight minutes before our boat hooked up the first fish; actually two fish. Nick and I hit our first double hook-up ever; something we've talked about but never accomplished until then. 

The action was steady all day and we ended up boating 13 spoonies on day one, which was a personal best for me. If it hadn't have been for John catching a big male just minutes before the BIG FISH weigh-in, Nick and I would have swept the top three spots. As it was we finished 1st & 3rd and John's fish came in 2nd.

 

Pete's 2nd Fish of the day

 Rusty's 1st fish of the day...

 

Nick with a big female

 

Pete with the BIG FISH...weighed 63lbs at weigh-in time!!!

 

Nick's 3rd place fish

  

 

 

 

 

Rusty and I hooked into the 2nd double hook-up ever....two in one day is crazy!

 

 

 

 

 

John's 2nd place fish....

BIG FISH WINNERS
1st - Pete 63lbs
2nd- John 61lbs
3rd - Nick 59lbs

MO's 2013 Youth Season....Part II

1-3-2014

Missouri's second youth season finally arrived. I invited Pete, Scott, and Logan up to my buddy’s farm in NW Missouri for the weekend. This was my oldest daughter MaKenna’s first deer hunt as a shooter and Logan was on a doe mission. Kenna, Pete, and I arrived at the farm around 1:30pm and hurried up to get our gear unloaded. Pete needed to find a spot and get up set up for the evening hunt and Kenna and I were going to do some scouting for the next day’s hunt. Pete and I found a great spot with tons of fresh tracks in a bean field. Well the afternoon came and went with lots of sightings but no shots. Scott and Logan arrived around 6:30pm and we made a plan for Saturday morning. 

Pete's View from the blind 1/3/14

1-4-2014
After waking up and getting our gear sorted out for the morning's hunt, we were all off to the shooting houses. Kenna and I wen into the center blind overlooking a food plot and Scott, Pete, and Logan headed to the far east shooting house overlooking a huge crp field with cut corn about 1/2 mi.e south of them. The Eisentrager boys morning starting out with good deer movement. Shortly before 8:00am Kenna and I heard a shot from the direction of their blind and followed shortly thereafter with a text saying that Logan just shot a doe! Kenna was happy for Logan however her face showed her disappointment because we hadn’t seen any deer yet. Not long after I looked up and saw eleven does pop out into the food plot. Unfortunately they caught our movement and Kenna couldn’t get on them before they bugged out. About 30 minutes later I look over to the ridge and see thirteen more does and one small buck moving across the ridge. We went into scramble mode and got Kenna all set up. I knew it was a long shot but I gave Kenna the green light to let one rip. Unfortunately she missed, but she was so excited that she got to see deer and take a shot. At that point Kenna was ready to see Logan’s deer, so we packed up and headed that way. After a bit of a hectic track job Logan had his doe and we celebration started. We even got Kenna in a picture with Logan....a boy!

With Logan’s doe down all the attention turned on getting Kenna on her first deer. Pete and Logan grabbed the Double Bull & Hoyt and headed out to a different bean field for a night of bow hunting.   Kenna and I spotted a bunch of deer the evening before using a back corner of the cut bean field.

With the temps dropping and snow on the way Kenna, Scott, and I headed to a field of standing beans that was covered in deer tracks. We knew with the weather changing that the deer were going to move  and after seeing a bunch of deer on the drive over and while walking in, we were all excited and ready for the evening to unfold. Shortly after getting set up Kenna decided it was nap time. As I was sitting there enjoying the time I looked up and noticed a doe pop out followed by three more. It was scramble mode again waking little miss sunshine up and getting her on the gun. The does went straight to filling their bellies and never even looked our direction, so we got Kenna settled and on the shooting sticks. Kenna was just getting ready to pull the trigger when I spotted another deer coming into the field. It was a nice 1.5year old buck and I told Kenna to get on him. The buck read the script perfectly and walked into the field and turned broadside. Kenna settled the cross hairs and the let the .243 bark! The buck dropped immediately but got back up and took off heading for cover. Scott and I both knew it was a good hit and it took everything I had to hold back the tears of excitement I had. Since we had to give the buck time to die we loaded another round in the TC just in case a doe showed herself and Kenna could try to double up. Another doe did come out, but it spotted us and took off before Kenna could get a shot.

By now the snow was really coming down and it was time to get Kenna’s deer. The impact site was covered in blood, so we knew it wouldn't be a tough tracking job. Kenna took up the trail and the buck only made it about 90 yards before piling up! We were all on cloud nine and even Scott and Pete got a giant hugs from the little huntress!! I was so proud of her and is by far the best hunting trip I have ever had!

1-5-2014

MaKenna deciding the snow and 3 degree weather was just too rough to hunt in Sunday morning, so we called it a weekend and headed back home after a pancake breakfast. We had one heck of a youth weekend and I can’t wait for next year. We've already got plans to make this and annual trip.  

2013 Mo Gun Season – Sticker 8 Finale!!!!

In early October I ran my cameras at the KC property and it turned out to be a good card pull.  I came across a nice 8 pointer with 2" kicker on his right G2. He immediately jumped out at me as a shooter.

The Friday evening before the MO Youth season. I took my oldest daughter Makenna on her second  bow hunt and with the new shooting house completed we decided to set up there for the evening. It was a beautiful, cool, clear fall evening and about 90 minutes before dark deer started pouring into the food plot. As luck would have it Sticker 8 decided to show himself. He was chasing does all over the field just begging to be shot that night, but I had already filled my early season buck tag so all we could do was sit back and watch the show.

Opening weekend of the 2013 MO firearms season came and went with no shots fired. I had the Sticker 8 on my mind as I headed to the KC property for a quick morning hunt. I decided to hunt the middle timber stand straight east of the shooting house. Right out of the gates I had two does come in from the direction of the food plot. They fed around a bit then headed south. About 20 minutes later I notice movement to the north. A doe was heading right to me, but she kept stopping and checking her back trail. She angled south and about the time I lost sight of her in the timber I caught another flash  of movement to the north.It was a good buck coming my way so I got myself positioned for a shot. As soon as the buck got into better view I immediately realized that it was Sticker 8 and he was headed straight for me. I tried to keep clam as he closed the distance until he finally made it into 12 yards. I let out a “Meerrrpp” to stop him settled the cross hairs the let the Tikka bark!!! After the shot he took off and I immediately saw blood dumping out of him. He was hit hard and I knew he wouldn’t make it far. In disbelief of what had just happened I text Pete and Scott to tell them that Sticker 8 was a dead deer!

After giving him plenty of time, I got down and started the recovery. The track job was short and sweet and the Sticker 8 was finally down! This is the third mature buck taken off the farm this year and hopefully won't be the last!!!