Redneck Dove Shoot!

I drove out to the duck camp with the boys and Chrissy.  The plan was to spend the night at the cabin, check on water levels and let the boys run around shooting their BB guns and just be boys.  As I was unloading the car I couldn't help but notice the almost continuous flight of Starlings.  The Starlings where trading between the cattail sloughs and a cut corn field.  Their flight path was taking the majority of the birds directly over the cabin. 

Since Starlings aren't a protected bird in MN I loaded up the Browning with #8 game load and "got after em".  The wind was blowing about 25 mph so it made for some fun and challenging shooting.  This was my redneck Argentina dove hunt! When the smoke finally cleared we had laid down 25 Starling and 1 Pigeon.  Oshie did a hell of a job retrieving all of the downed birds.  It made for a fun afternoon.

The water level is looking good for this fall.  The water level is down from last fall which is a good thing.  There is a ton of breeding geese pairs on the property which should lead to a great early season shoot.  Things are already looking up for the fall.

Lil' Momma...Dropped the Hammer

 

4/28/12

Shana and I headed down to Cole County, MO last weekend to hunt with our good friend Seth Trinklein on some of his properties. Shana has been out turkey hunting a couple times in past and even though we've been close, we haven't closed the deal yet. 

Seth had been scouting birds most of the week and had a group of four hens, four jakes, and big tom patterned. They had been crossing a creek into a cut corn field every morning he'd been scouting, so that was going to be our jumping off point for the morning hunt. 

We arrived at the farm early and packed in two blinds to the area Seth thought the birds were crossing the creek; we'd later realize he'd done too good of job scouting and we literally setup on the path the birds were using.

Within minutes of getting settled in the blinds our tom fired up gobbling on the roost and he continued  his shenanigans until well after 7:30am, before pitching down. He probably gobbled close to 100 times on the roost, which was awesome to listen to. In the mean time we were kept entertained by a coyote, several hens; two of which pitched from across the creek right over our blinds into the decoys and other various wildlife. Around 8am Shana laid her head down to take a little break and within minutes we heard a "putt" directly across the creek behind us. I heard the birds walking in the creek water and I told Shana to get the gun up "now". As soon as she had the Nelli shoulder I saw the first red head pop up out of the creek about 4 yards to our left and he was followed in short order by three more jakes between 4-7 yards away. Because we were so close to their crossing path we think they got a little spooked about the decoys being right in their face when they topped the creek bank. The birds where acting a little nervous and started angling out around the decoys in a bunched up group. I could tell Shana was getting pretty wound up because her breathing had changed significantly and I could see the gun barrel doing little circles as she tracked the group. Shana did an awesome job staying on the birds and not taking an unethical shot when they were bunched up together. At what I thought was about 35yrds out Seth and my hen calls finally got one of the little buggers to stop and look the decoys over and Shana capitalized on his mistake. In short order she fired off a shot and the jake took a load of lead to the face and chest; rolling him over in a hurry!!! 

Both of the blinds exploded with excitement, high fives, and war cries as Seth and I bailed out to make sure the bird was down for good; which he was. After we calmed down a bit Seth ranged the blinds and we were standing 46.5 yards away. Not only did Shana lay the wood to here first turkey, but she did it at almost 50 yards!

After some hero photos we packed up and headed back to the Trinklein's house to clean up and get ready for an all day fish fry. I got back on the horse and cleaned the bird (with boots on this time) and I'm pleased to announce no bodily injury was inflicted. 

Seth and I headed out on Sunday morning for a while and saw a lot of action right off the bat, but the birds worked off towards the middle of big field. Shortly after 8am some severe storms rolled in and once the lightening started we called it quits. Regardless we had accomplished what we set out to do...get Shana on her first turkey. I can't thank the Trinklein's enough for inviting us out to hunt...it's a weekend neither of us will soon forget!

I'm headed back down to hunt with Seth this weekend and hopefully fill at least one of my MO tags...although Shana's bird was more than enough to make this an awesome spring turkey season!!!

Tagged out in Missouri!!

4/27/2012

Tag #2 was unfilled and it was burning a hole in pocket, so it was time for a decision. Head to the Oak Grove farm and kill the bird that gave Pete and I the slip the previous weekend or head to Appleton City and hunt my families farms where Pete and I have killed a ton of birds over the years. As much as I wanted to kill that Oak Grove bird my gut was telling me to head South, so that's exactly what I did.

Knowing my neighbor Randy was going to be hunting on public land I decided to give him the invite. It's always more fun having a killing mate along! We woke up bright and early and made the hour and a half trip south. We headed straight for the Yellow Barn farm which has always been a little honey-hole for Pete and I.

The game plan was to wait for some gobbling and head that way to set up and like clock work the gobbling started immediately off to the west. Our first set up was a bust and we couldn't get the birds to work right off the roost, which is pretty typical for this set up. The birds were heading straight for the killing hole like they always do, but it's impossible to setup on with their roost trees so close. It's an inside corner of a big field, but Pete and I have killed a lot of birds within 40 yards of this spot about an hour after fly down.

As we put our sneak attack on and got closer I glassed the three birds and realized that all three were jakes. We snuck up into position and I told my neighbor Randy that I really didn't want to shoot a jake, but I gave him the green light to unload. Randy put his stealth mode on and let the Mossberg eat! I watched the bird kind of drop and walk off. We checked out the area, but the shot wasn't lethal and after a thorough search we had to move on.

Randy was pretty bummed out but I told him we had several spots to try and lots of birds to work so keep your head up. We ended up setting up on 3 different birds, but for whatever reason just couldn't bring them in. I guess my smooth talking wasn't so smooth!!

With Missouri having a 1:00p.m. closing time I knew time was running out so I decided we needed to check one more spot for birds. We rolled up and I quickly saw 2 long beards hanging out right next to the creek bank and we immediately took off after them. After the 1/4 mile sneak through the creek we crawled up the 15' creek bank. Randy and I went back and forth on when he could see the birds and when I could and we quickly realized that there was just too much brush in the way for us both to shoot together. Since Randy had the first shot of the day I was up to bat. I took aim at the closest bird and cut loose. Ol' bird dropped like a rock. The second bird ran and stopped long enough for Randy to get a shot off but at 48 yards I think it was just a touch out of range for his short barreled turkey gun and it was a swing and a miss!

Weight:  23 Pounds

Beard:   9.5"

Spurs:   1"

After my celebration I get a text from Pete that his Lil' Momma got a kill of her own...the story will be coming soon.

With Big Pete still having two unfilled MO tags left it's time to concentrate on him getting on a Missouri bird or two. Let's get it done brother!!

I have to give another big shout out to Scott Ashburn of Scott's Custom Turkey Calls! These calls are all custom and are top notch and sound awesome!

Phone:   816-572-1927

E-mail:  mastvet@sbcglobal.net

Tagged out in Kansas

Rob and Lisa headed into Nick's place Wednesday night 4/11/12 after Greg and I headed back to Missouri from our successful first day. They were seeing a ton of birds still and Lisa and Nick had both tagged out before I got back to Topeka on Friday evening. 

Saturday 4/14/12 found Nick and I set up on several birds they'd scouted the day before. The birds were there, but didn't cooperate and quickly went the wrong direction with their hens. We worked several birds throughout the afternoon and got real close to two toms, but we couldn't close the deal. So over lunch we decided to setup in the same field we started the day in a try and catch up with the toms coming back to roost. We had a major front scheduled to arrive in the early evening, so Nick and I hauled in the blind and were in place at 3:30pm. The weather change was quick and before long we were sitting in a constant drizzle and very windy conditions. With zero sign of the turkeys returning to roost we climbed out of the blind around 7:15pm to check the field behind our setup. Sure enough there was a hen with a strutter in tow working the field edge. I went into sneak mode and started trying to close in on them. The hen picked me off early and bugged out, but the tom kept strutting and working towards where the hen entered the treeline at the opposite end of the field. I covered as much real estate as I could before running out of cover, but the tom was still a good ways out. I shouldered the 20 gauge and got the tom in the scope and cracked off my shot. The bird rolled and then regained his footing and flew away over the trees never to be seen again. 

We had some wicked storms roll through over night and the turkeys weren't cooperating Sunday morning. Nick and I had several hens and geese work through our spread in the morning, but no toms showed themselves. After a couple hours we decided to take the fight to them. Around 9:30am we got a text that Rob had just tagged out on two jakes with one shot, so we met up with them to celebrate and say our good-byes. 

After Rob and Lisa took off Nick and I decided to make one more pass through the Corp ground. We eased up on the field I hunted Wednesday morning and there were nine birds strutting with several hens about 3/4 of a mile off the road. We devised a game plan and headed down the west treeline. After about 20 minutes we'd got within 100 yards of the group, but the two biggest toms had worked the other way with some hens, so we were left with 7 jakes and a couple hens to work with. I told Nick that we'd come this far, so if I could sneak up the rest of the way I was going to kill one of them. Nick stayed put and I bailed off into the creek so I could cover more ground quicker than in the timber. I quickly made it to the spot I thought the birds would be and eased up out of the creek. The birds were about 40 yards away directly in front of me and right on the edge of the timber and field. I could have easily killed one then, but with the high winds I decided to push my luck and continued to close in on them. I got to 20yrds and the birds were still on the edge so I pushed my luck a little more and continued to inch forward. At about 7 yards I called it good and eased up to the back of a tree. Nick was calling to the birds and the biggest jake was in full strut right in front of me. After a couple seconds of watching the close range show I flipped the safety off and dished the strutter up a face full of lead! It was probably one of my best sneaks ever and having Nick watch the show just made it sweeter! In 5 days of hunting Kansas we had filled 9 out of 10 tags...all on public ground! I can't wait for the 2013 season!

Unfortunately I had a serious error in judgement when I returned home that afternoon and ended up cutting myself pretty badly while cleaning my bird. I was sitting on a cooler in the garage with the bird between my feet while wearing flip-flops. One slip of the knife, a trip to the ER, and 12 stitches in my left big toe later...I was going to be missing my first Missouri Turkey opener in 13years!

   

2012 Mo Turkey Gun Opener

The 2012 Missouri Spring Turkey opener was upon us. Pete has been lucky enough to have been hunting out in Kansas with our buddy Nick and was able to tag out there on 4/15/12. Our plan for the opener was to head out to of friend's small 80 acre farm in Oak Grove, Mo.


4/15/2012 
The day before the Mo opener found me out bright and early on a windy cloudy morning on a little scouting adventure. I arrived at the farm a bit late, but lucky for me the birds were pretty quiet until about 7:00am when they finally decided to wake up. Two toms were roosted in the northwest corner tucked away in a small 4 acre field which was almost the perfect location. The only bad thing is that there were a bunch of hens with them. Bring on opening morning!!

Around 10:30pm Sunday night I got a text from Pete saying that his big toe that he had to get 12 stitches in due to the Kansas bird getting even with him was killing him and he wasn’t going to make it. I told him he was basically acting like a little "School Girl" and to suck it up!

4/16/2012
Opening morning had finally arrived. I made the short drive to the farm and was fired up to get after them. My plan of sneaking into their bedroom worked for the most part and I ended up setting up 60 yards away from the roosted birds. The first birds that pitched down into my decoys were two hens. The gobblers were gobbling like crazy and my trigger finger was about to run out of patience waiting for the boys to pitch down. Unfortunately one of the hens decided to start working away from me and by the time she got just out of gun range the two gobblers decided to pitch down right to her. I worked them for almost an hour before finally they worked off to the main 40 acre field in the center of the farm.

At this point I knew that I needed to make a move. I found the flock in the middle of the field and the toms were strutting around nine hens and after glassing them for a few minutes trying to figure out how to set up on them I noticed that there was just enough of a hump in the field that I could try and make a sneak attack on them. I dropped my pack and started belly crawling. It was tough on a fat boy but after crawling 125 yards I finally made it into position. I slowly rose up and as luck would have it the hens were 30 yards and closing and the gobblers were strutting around 15 yards behind them.

They finally made a move towards me and when they got to about 35 yards I rose up again and let the Benelli bark....Kaaabbboooommmm!! Ole boy couldn’t handle a face full of pellets and tipped right over. Of course the less dominant bird decided to let his buddy feel his thunder and pounced on him for a couple of minutes before finally deciding to follow the hens out of the field. Awesome end to the Mo opener!!!

With me having 1 tag left and Pete with 2...it's time to get Big Pete healed up and on a Missouri Gobbler!!

Kansas Triple Play

4/11/12 - Nick Bales, Greg Cole, and me met up in Topeka, KS for the opening day of the Kansas spring turkey shotgun season. Nick and Greg had bow hunted some Corp of Engineers ground the previous weekend and were covered up in birds. We all picked a different area of the Corp ground to hunt for the morning and we'd planned to meet up around 11a.m..

I was pretty much going into my spot blind and I wasn't exactly sure where to head to first, so elected to hike in about 1.5 miles to an area that had open crop fields, timber, and big turn in the creek. At about 6:15am I was very happy with my decision, because 12-13 toms started to fire up on the roost with in 150 yards of my position. I worked inside 70yards of the first bird and got my decoys setup and settled in for the morning. The gobbling on the roost was amazing and around 6:45am they really fired up. The toms were hammering at each other and a mess of hens were also joining into the chorus of turkey talk. The first bird to pitch down was a long-beard and he immediately went into full strut and started heading my direction. He didn't make it 10yards before a group of 8-9 jakes pitched down between him and my decoys and proceeded to run the big tom off. The jakes stayed in and around my setup for the better part of an hour. I had several hens feeding in and around the spread also, but no big guys. It was an awesome first morning show and first hunt in Kansas!

Greg and Nick were both having a pretty sweet morning themselves. Greg was only about a mile east of me and he had several birds hammering on the roost also. He had 4 toms, a jake, and several hens pitch into the field he was set up on and around 7:30am one of the toms finally broke off and came into Greg's decoy. He didn't waste any time and quickly dropped the hammer on his first KS tom! Nick was about 2 miles south of us and was hunting a field they had seen birds in the weekend before, only he had some company today because some guy had a blind setup about 30 yards from Nick's hiding spot. The first bird into the field was a triple bearded jake and after strutting around for a few minutes Nick had seen enough and he smoked that dude. By the sounds of it the guy in the blind didn't know he was there and had a few choice words...I'm sure he probably needed a change of undies also.

The boys picked me up around 11:15a.m. and we headed into town for some gas. On the way in we were seeing toms all over the place, so after a quick fill up we headed back towards the Corp ground. On the way I spotted two toms sitting on the top of a knoll, but on Corp ground. We had drive about 2 miles to get around to them and when we drove by the knoll the birds were gone, but the spot they were in was actually a little island with roads on both sides of it. As we drove past Greg and I both spotted the toms on the back side of the knoll, but there were now 5 toms in the group. We didn't have much time to make a decision, so I had Nick drop me off in the ditch about 80yards down the road. There was a pretty good bank that allowed me to sneak up on the group quickly. Once I was inside of 30yards I'd run out of real estate to move. I could hear and see the birds in front of me, but the cover they were in was thick and I was going to have to do something else in order to get a shot off. I decided I'd just slowly stand up and see what happened. To my surprise there were now 7 birds in the group and they all stuck their little heads up when I stood up, but they didn't move. Instead they just stood in a big group trying to figure out what I was. As soon as the first bird separated from the group I smoked him! The other 6 toms all exploded out of the timber like flushing pheasants while my bird did the death flop. When I finally reached him I noticed that out of the 7 toms I'd just killed the only jake in the group, but what do you do...

It was an awesome day with good friends and a lot of turkeys. I'll be headed back to Kansas on Saturday to try and punch my second tag, then it's on to the MO opener on the 16th....gobble, gobble!!!

March Mushroom Madness

3/31/12 - With the unseasonably warm weather we've been having this spring the shrooms have been popping early. My good friend Nick Bales found around 200 shrooms in the middle of last week, so Saturday morning I left KC around 6:30am headed to Toto-land in search of some fungi. Landon, Todd, Nick, and I got to Nick's first honey hole around 9am and by 9:10am I'd found the first shrooms of the day and it only got better from there. The little buggers were thick and we only had to move 10-20yrds to find another good group of them. We'd planned to hit a couple of different spots, but when the getting is this good...there was no reason to go elsewhere. By noon we were pretty hot, thirsty and our bags were overflowing with 276 shrooms, so we shut it down for the day. I'm planning to make it back out there this week for a night and then hit up some of my Callaway Co. spots this weekend...thanks again Nick! My belly thanks you!

Paddlefishing MO...2012 Opening Weekend

 

Our usual crew of misfits headed back down to Lake of the Ozarks last Thursday to kickoff the 2012 Missouri Spoonbill season. We invited a fellow MissouriWhitetails.com member Nick (Bowhuntks) down for his first spoonbill action and it didn't take us long to get the action started. 

Brian, Big Nick, Little Nick, and myself were on the water by 1:45pm Thursday and within the first 30 minutes Brian had already landed two nice mid-50lbs fish. Big Nick didn't have to wait much longer before he hooked into his first spoonbill ever, which was pushing the 60lbs mark.

 

After coming out of the gates hot the action slowed down for the remainder of the day. We did bang out a couple of small chippers and I landed a decent 35lbs fish late in the day. 

 

 Friday morning we awoke to temperatures in the low 70s and blue skies...what we didn't plan for was the 87 degree temperatures and scorching sun all day...it was a little hot and we may have gotten slightly sunburned!

 The action Friday was pretty slow right out of the gates as we ran up to the 66MM, but Little Nick got on the board around 11am when he landed his first fish of the weekend. 

We headed in for lunch and sunscreen around 1pm and were back on the water by 2:30pm and ready for some action. I changed into my "Mullets" t-shirt for good luck and as we were leaving the cove I informed the boys that the "Mullets" shirt was a spoonbill magnet and we'd always caught fish when I had it on. About 10 minutes later line started ripping off my reel and after a good fight I landed the biggest fish of the weekend when this +70lbs sow came into the boat....go MULLETS!!!

After heading in Friday evening for dinner Big Nick decided to wet a crappie line, but he wasn't expecting to pull a 30lbs blue cat out...but he wasn't complaining either!

Saturday morning our group came our swinging and between four boats we landed eleven fish in the first 90 minutes of fishing. I hooked into this fatty 65lbs sow right out of the gates!

We got run off the lake a couple times because of the thunderstorms that were rolling through, but we managed to make it back out on the water for the last couple hours of fishing...and it was worth it! We all landed good fish, but the trip was capped off when Big Nick's reel started screaming around 5pm and he landed his second fish of the trip and the 2nd biggest when this 68lbs sow came aboard. I put the icing on the cake ten minutes later when I pulled the 3rd biggest fish aboard; a nice 66lbs sow. 

The Killing Crew...after tying up the last two keepers!

Big Nick had to drive to Wisconsin and back Sunday, so him and I headed home late Saturday night but not before we took some group photos...it was a great weekend as usual and we're looking forward to getting another late season trip in....FISH ON BITCHES!!!

1st Shed of 2012

On 1/28/12 I headed over to a KC area MDC property that is loaded with deer. I arrived at first light and within the first hour I'd spotted 22 deer and 11 turkeys. About a mile off the road there is roughly 10 acres of standing beans that was covered up with deer. There were 11 different bucks still packing their headgear in the beans. I didn't locate any sheds that day, but planned to hit it up the property again later in the week.

On 1/31/12 I went back to property for another run through. I was scanning a cut bean field with the binos when I spotted this beauty about 90yrds out in the field. The wax ring was still fresh, so it hadn't dropped too long ago. It measured 67 6/8"...now I need to find the match to it. Hoping there is a lot more of these to come in the next month or so!!!

2012 MO Youth Hunt....Logan's 1st Deer hunt

Scott and Logan made the trip down from Minnesota Friday afternoon for Logan's first deer hunt as the shooter. Logan has been tagging along on hunting trips with his dad and I since he was 2 years old and has been talking about shooting his first deer and coyote for about as long. Saturday, January 7th kicked off the second portion on the Missouri youth deer season and the three of us were tucked into ground blind near The Graveyard set on our Macon Co. farm. 

We didn't have any deer movement in the area to speak of, but the nine turkeys and numerous squirrels and birds kept us plenty entertained during the sit. Logan was all eyes and ears hoping a deer would materialize, but it didn't happen. Scott did manage to catch up on some much needed sleep though....

Saturday afternoon good friend and fellow MissouriWhitetails.com member Rob Gerling met up with us and we headed up to Millard, MO to hunt his lease property Saturday evening. The land owner had seen 10-11 does and a big buck working up his south fence line pretty regularly during the past couple of weeks. We got the Double Bull brushed in about 90yrds up the south fence and went into town for lunch. Logan, Scott, and Rob were settled into the blind by 3pm, but not before Rob had to take care of a little business....

Logan and the .06 waiting on Rob...

Once again the deer did not cooperate for Wee-man, but there was plenty of MarioKart and Yahtzee getting dominated in that blind from the sounds of it. They did have a giant owl attempt to join then in the blind...or at least they thought it was going to; Logan was pretty impressed with that! I headed up to the northwest side of the property to scout/bow hunt and had 7 does work through the area along with 17 turkeys I busted out of the field on my way in. Not sure we would have got a shot at the deer if Logan was with, but at least he would have seen some action...so goes hunting I guess.

Sunday morning all four of us headed to good friends and also fellow MWT.com members Randy and Jenny Walker's farm northeast of Atlanta, MO. They were gracious enough to allow us to bring Logan to their farm for the day, and what a day it turned out to be. I can't thank The Walker's enough for the generosity they showed Logan, he thought he was the King for a day!

Logan, Scott, and I slipped back into a shooting house over looking standing beans that were tucked in right next a 20 acre bedding area the Walker's had done some TSI work in the previous year. There were 5 does in the beans out in front of the shooting house when we entered the field. They moved off to the north as we approached, but not in too much of a hurry. It was way to early to shoot, but the bright moon allowed Logan to see them as they trotted out of the field and he was excited to see some deer.

After getting Logan settled into the Captain's shooting chair we sat back and waited for shooting light. Logan was busy playing Angry Birds around 7:20am when I caught movement about 55-60yards out in front of us. A yote was slipping through the beans headed east, but had no idea we were there. Scott got the .06 up on the window and Logan took over from there. Scott whistled once to stop the dog, but it only sat still for a brief second before moving on. Logan followed it for another 10yards in the scope before I whistled and second time. This time the dirty dog locked up and Logan didn't waste anytime laying the wood to it! The yote didn't even move and the with all the excitement and the look on Logo's face you'd have thought we killed a 160" buck!!!! It was a memory none of us will ever forget.

A little reenactment of the shot...

 

Logan after his first kill...

A couple of trophy pictures of his first yote...

Randy and Rob had planned to call yotes around the farm during the morning using an e-caller. We'd heard the caller fire up and a few shots throughout the morning, but hadn't received any updates from the boys. So after taking pictures of Logan and his big kill, we headed up to the house for an awesome breakfast that Jenny had prepared. Logan wasn't very impressed with the dragging process, but he was a trooper and drug his prized yote a good portion of the way back...or so he says he did!

Randy and Rob got back to the house around 10am and they had a pretty good morning calling dogs also. One set produced three dogs that came in bounding over the CRP grass looking for the pup in distress they were hearing. Another set produced more dogs responding to the call. Randy took the first shot and hit the yote back and at about 150yrds or so on the run Rob straight skull capped it!!! Great shooting Chief!

The 2 yote killers...

 

Sunday afternoon we all walked Randy's trap line then Scott and Logan chased a few tree rats around before taking a little siesta. That evening Logan, Scott, and I headed back to the shooting overlooking the beans. The conditions were perfect, but the deer refused to cooperate again. We had a lot of fun joking around with each other and watching the other wildlife. As shooting light came to a close we sat back and enjoyed a great moon rising over the trees.

 

All in all it was a great weekend shared with family and friends. Logan is already excited about coming back down to MO for the November portion of the youth season this fall, and to collect on his bill from Randy and Rob; he said to "pay up boys, lessons ain't cheap"

I wanted to thank Rob and the Walkers again for giving up their time and allowing us to hunt their properties, it was beyond generous and greatly appreciated! You made Logan's weekend one him, his dad, and I won't soon forget...THANKS!!!!