The sleepless night

[WillowRidgeCalls]

I agree with you, I very seldomly use a decoy in the fall, and never in the woods. This island is located in a marsh and the DNR allows the farmers to cut and bale the grass around it to use for bedding. It was cut not very long ago so it's only about 4" high and nice and green, but full of grasshoppers. I hunted the woods until about 9am then moved down to the end of the island to watch the grass and see if any birds came looking for grasshoppers. The other guy I had walked in with at 5am, and he knew I was there and where I was setting up at, so he hunted the other end of the island, but this guy didn't show up until about 8am. He could hear my calling and figure he'd get himself a turkey, he was about 70 yards from me and the decoy, which was 25 yards out in the open grass. The decoy is and old feather flecks decoy that I carry in my vest to have one along if there is a place to use one. You would think if the bird wasn't moving any, and you could hear calling coming from that area, you would wonder what was going on, but this clown didn't. The woods on this island is fairly open so seeing what moves in it isn't any problem, and there is a ridge that runs through it, that you can see all the grass around it. I carry a blaze orange hat with me to wave at someone coming in to let them know I'm there so they can see you. I grabbed that hat and waved it and stood up. When he saw that hat he took off running, I put it on and took off after him. He had a scoped rifle, so you would think he'd noticed it was a decoy and not a turkey? So it leads me to wonder what his intentions were or if he is that much of a hazzard in the woods?

[TurkeyTom]

I had an interesting first day. Had a guy open up on my jake decoy with a 22, when he hit it, it spun around on the stake and the guy took off running with me behind him. .

thats terrible! glad you were still at least able to see some birds though despite all that. I too had some opening day blues. was trying to coax a tom out of the corn and when he finally started to get worked up a bowhunter came down the edge of the field at 9am yapping real loud on his cell phone so that was the end of that :/ sunday coyote hunters set up their blind 30ft from mine and had their distress recording going off for the longest time with about a box full of .357's spent. they didnt even get one haha. luckily i have some farmers who are going to let me hunt their land. cant thank them enough!

best of luck to you the rest of the fall!

[TurkeyTom]

It seems the roost areas I found are not used every day. both mornings there were no birds in the roost I was sitting on. I know they are still using them because there is plenty of fresh sign around

Mine are the same way! always finding feathers but they always elude me. im starting to think one of them is a midday roost.. it still gets my blood pumpin when i know they're there good luck gettin that gobbler!