00:00:02 Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your home for deer hunting news, stories and strategies, and now your host, Mark Kenyon. Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. I'm your host, Mark Kenyon. This is episode number two eleven and to in the show, Spencer, Dan and I are celebrating spring turkey hunting season by sharing a few of our latest turkey exploits and answering listeners submitted turkey hunting questions. All right, welcome to another episode of the Wired to Hunt podcast, brought to you by Sick of Gear. And today on the show, we're doing our what's kind of become like our annual Turkey episode and joining me we got my buddy Dan Johnson and Spencer new Hearth. Thanks guys for making this happen. We're recording late today because Dan, You've got a sick kid again. Feel like this happens every week. Kids, the kids. What are you doing with these kids that they're constantly in the infirmary? Uh, you gotta work them. I mean that's how you build up their tolerance. Like you know, clean out the garage and start you know, start the yard work and you know, vacuum and do all the chores that I don't want to do. That's why, kid, That's why people have kids. Okay, and so it's the fact that they're slightly overworked that they're under the weather. Now, yeah, it could be that's their fault. They're not conditioned for it. You're such a great role model from his parents. How not to raise kids is the book that I would Yeah, yeah, man, I was on baby duty tonight because my wife was playing on a volleyball tournament. So I had to bathe him and change him and feed him and put him down all my own and I managed. Yeah, I managed to do it with no major emergencies or issues. So I'm giving myself a pad in the back. Um, Spencer, still no kids for you, huh No, no surprises yet, still no kids. If one show would all that would be the case. So yeah, yeah, hey, speaking of uh well, not really speaking of anything, but before we get into anything of real substance, I was just reminded. I don't know why this reminded me of this, um, but I wanted to make sure we we did a little bit of like housekeeping before we dove into turkeys. Um, because Tuesday May in Detroit, I'm gonna be at a back country Hunters and Anglers camp fire storytelling event. Um. So these things have been uh starting to pop up across the country. There was a really big one at the b h A Rendezvous in Boise, Idaho two weeks ago, at the Big Rendezvous event. Um. But we've got one in Detroit at the Philson Store in Detroit, and I'm gonna be one of the storytellers there spinning the yarn of some sort. I'm not what story or what stories I'm gonna tell, but people should definitely come. Uh. It is going to be, like I said, Tuesday, the first forty tickets sold are going to be invited to like a v I P meet and greet with the storytellers such as myself and others. Um. That's gonna be at the Philson Store from five thirty to six thirty, and then after that the main event is going to be at the Detroit Bus Company, which I don't know if that's a brewery or if that's a theater or it's some kind of venue, but it's called Detroit Bus Company. It's in Corktown. It's from seven to nine o'clock Tuesday, May fifteen. So if you live in Michigan or Ohio, over or Ontario or somewhere close to Detroit, you should definitely come out for the b h A storytelling event. Um, I'll be there. Ronnie Bam who has been on the Meat Eater podcast and he runs a hunting dog podcast. He's gonna be telling a story. Tom McGraw is on the national board for b h A. He's gonna be there. Um a whole still of other folks, so it should be good. Um, you might be sick of my stories now though, I guess if you listen to this podcast, But just in case you're not, that's my promo for the day. Um turkeys, though, I wanted to start our episode with two things. I want to talk about a bunch of stories turkey ding stories because I know that Dan you've got some new stories, and Spencer you've got some new stories. I've got a little of a preview story when it comes to turkeys. We've got a bunch of questions from listeners about turkeys that people sent in tonight that I want us to tackle. Um. But I also want to share a few turkey fun facts and a couple of good quotes. Um, have either one of you guys read the book The Tenth Legion by Tom Kelly. I'm not no, have you either of you heard of it? Nope? No, Okay, Well, it's kind of like the holy text of turkey hunting. I've been recommended this book over and over by so many people. It's kind of this legendary book. If there's any book on turkey hunting that people should read, this is the one that people always tell me, you gotta read this one. So I finally started reading. I haven't finished it yet, but I'm getting into it and I'm really enjoying it so far. Um, So I want to read a couple of quotes from that that kind of set the stage for why turkey hunting is worth having a podcast about here today. So here's here's the first quote. This is the author talking about turkey, and he said, the first turkey that ever came to me on the ground did it a long time ago. I sat there with my handshaking and my breath short and my heart hammering so hard. I couldn't understand why he could not hear it. The last turkey that came to me last spring had exactly the same effect. And the day that this does not happen to me is the day that I quit. That's quote number one. Now here's the second thing he says about turkey hunting. And there he's talking about how turkeys can sometimes get their hooks India. And I'm saying this metaphorically, and that you can become just addicted to turkey hunting, as I think all three of us are. But there's also highs and lows. And I think that it's gonna actually apply to deer hunting to um. So I'm curious to hear if this resonates with you guys. But here, here he is talking about those that are obsessed with turkey hunting. Quote. He will experience moments of tragedy of such a depth and feeling as to preclude them from having been written by anyone but Euripides. And he will exult in periods of piercing rapture previously understood only by willing Christian martyrs being eaten by willing lions. He will operate primarily in a climate not of desire, but of compulsion. This is painfully evident in my own case. I do not hunt turkeys because I want to. I hunt them because I have to. I would really, I would really rather not do it, but I am helpless in the grip of this compulsion. I feel like that perfectly describes me as a deer hunter. Uh, moments of great tragedy. Uh, not really a desire, just a compulsion. Can't help. But doing it, I'm obsessed with it is just fully gripping. Does that speak to it? All day? And yeah? For white tails, Uh, not so much. For turkeys maybe maybe oh seven years ago, ten years ago, when my wife wasn't hunting with me, I was that guy who would go out from morning until night basically and just move around, set up, move, set up, move, set up, move, run and gun all day long for turkeys. And now, if I was to hunt turkeys like that last quote, my wife would not be joining me ever, because I just wear out. You've slowed with age. No, I have a partner now who doesn't who doesn't hunt the same way that I hunt, and I like hunting with her, So I have to change my approach to it to accommodate her needs. You know what I mean? This is an opportunity for me to get my wife involved in hunting, and so I'm going to change it now. When my wife's not there with me. I'm I'm like, I'm still moving right. But because now I have a sidekick with me when it comes to turkey hunting, I change it a little bit because you can't take someone who is not as passionate about something and just dive in and go hard. She likes the turkey hunt, but she's not like we are. When it comes to that, I hear you and that's that's cool, That's that's it's it's been fun to be able to hear about you talking about getting her into it and how she's been going it over the years. Um, I can. I can totally get that. And what about you, Spencer, do you still have the fire or are you taking your wife out? Or where do you stand when it comes to the turkey hunting obsession? Uh? I would say for myself, it's like less about the turkeys and more about what spring means. Um, it's like months of cabin fever and then this is something that breaks that. And especially this year, we had a blizzard that was just like ten days ago. Um, so to go out like a couple of mornings ago and it was fifty and there were birds chirping, and like you can hear the creeks rushing with water. Um, that's way way more special to me than like the the kill or the reward or the chase of a turkey that's kind of byproduct. Um, that stuff is super fun. But if I like had to choose in a another world where the turkey rut and the deer runds at the same time, UM, I don't think I would ever choose turkey hunting over deer hunting. But I know I wouldn't. But because it's in the spring and everything else that goes along with it, yeah, I'm really passionate about it. Then Yeah, no, I agree with that. That is definitely one of the coolest things about turkey hunting is is that it just I feel like turkey hunting Harold's spring, Like this spring is officially started when you start hearing the turkey's gobble and you can get out there and like you said, hearing the world wake up around you in the morning. That's just a good feeling. But man, there is something about gobbling turkeys that just gets you fired up. And that the fact that you can talk kind of that you can engage with with those critters and go back and forth that his just like that's super addicting to me, Like I I get. I know we've talked about this in the past, Dan, how even though we aren't pulling the trigger lots of times, it's fun just to be out there to be part of it, like just to take other people, to kind of call for other people, get him out there, just to be part of the hunt. Um. I love just being part of the whole process. Um. So, man, I'm really glad it started. My season just opened here yesterday, um and I didn't go out. And actually, I have to save my tag for the last weekend of this season because I'm doing a hunt with some folks coming down and I want to save my tag for that. So I'm kind of just scouting and I'm gonna take my nephew out and try to get him a bird. And I'm just gonna go out some mornings just sit out there and just listen to birds and practice my calling and stuff. Um And and that's almost just as much fun, just like being in it is what I love. So Spencer, you said that you had a snowstorm recently then you got out there. You want to kick us off with your turkey of the of the year story. Well, it came on probably I think it was my Fiit hunt. It was with my bow. Um. And so this fifth hunt was a morning hunt out there before sunrise, trying to find the roost, getting close and killing a bird off the roost. And so far I've been unsuccessful doing that, and I am quite an impatient turkey hunter. Um, if if I can't get one in that first like two hours, I have a super super hard time sitting in the blind. Beyond that, like I have a hard enough time doing an all days sit during the rut for deer. So it's like pulling teeth for me to see noon on my phone and still being a ground blind. So at that point I'm typically running and gunning with with my bow. And so this fifth hunt, it finally worked out. The morning was unsuccessful. I had some ja coming to my decoys, but but I passed because like I said earlier, I'm not like super super into the kill and and just getting a turkey. I can I can go without that if it means passing on a jake or waiting for a better opportunity. And so, uh, that afternoon, doing some running and gunning, I caught a flock um going up a hill and I talked into some seaters and that the timing was like perfect. As soon as I talked in the saters, it was probably thirty seconds later the hen came through a shooting lane and following her was the tom that I ended up shooting. It was no calling involved. It was kind of what a lot of my haunts end up being that it's it's more of an ambush than like your typical bring them to you set up. And uh, that was it. That was my archery tag this season. Are you just trying to get in front of them? Uh? It varies on the setup. I saw these two key's leaving a field edge and heading up this hill that I was quite familiar with, and so uh with that, Yeah, I just ran to the top of the hill and tucked in some seaters, had a pretty good idea of where they were going, and it worked out there nice. So when you're drawing on a turkey in that kind of situation with your boat, did you did you wait for him to have his head down or look in the direction or do you just draw and shoot and not worry about him catching your moving or were you masked well enough in those seaters. How did you get the shout off? Well, luckily I had the hand come through first. Until once the hand came through, I knew the others wouldn't be far behind. So head had been the other way around that it was Tom first hand. Second, I wouldn't have killed one. Um. So the hand came through, re drew and the Tom was right there. So it was just perfect timing for it all to work out like that. Uh No, they were just walking through it. They didn't know why I was there, Like I said, it was just pure ambush. Nice was um? What was the what? What? What's the talk has been like so far? You said, this is your fifth hunt, So five hunts so far, a lot of gobbling so far and not a lot what's the what's the kind of action been like on that front? So the flocks have definitely um breaking up or they're breaking up at this point. But it wasn't but like a week ago when I was still seeing birds that were, you know, twenty of them together at a time, and mid day finding flocks that were staying out of the snow and staying out of the rain, and you'd find dozens of them, you know, tucked under the cedars and stuff like that. But now that we have some consistent weather and nice weather. UM, I'm finding a lot of times that have been you know, gobbling midday and they're coming out of the roost fired up, and usually it seems like there's a lull like right after they come out of the roost. They might go you know, thirty or forty minutes and you don't hear them gobbling too much. But the last couple of days, as I've been doing some more scouting and stuff, it's been way more active than you know, we saw a week ago when we had lows and the teens and snow and stuff like that. I love that sound how I was doing. UM. I was talking to a bunch of people when I was at p h A at the rendezvous about this. UM, I'm curious what you guys would say. How would you describe, going back to the talk of the gobbles, how would you describe that moment when you hear the first gobble of the day, Because I feel like for me that's always special. UM, how would you describe what you're feeling at that moment, Spencer when you hear that first one fire off? Ah, Typically some relief that I know I'm within a earshot of one. I would say that's always my first reaction, like a good I know they're roosting over there um. But beyond that, it's it's just exciting. I love love their aggression, Like a pheasant goes off and then they get right back at him, or you hear an owl and they get right back at him, or someone starts to pick up and they're getting at him. I love that part of it that. I love how furious they get about every other noise. I've always wondered, like why why they do that? Like what's the what's the evolutionary benefit for turkeys? The gobble like on any loud noise like that. I'm I'm sure someone I'm sure there's some kind of biologist they can speak to that. Have you guys ever heard anything for for why they do that. I heard it's they call those a shock gobble, is what I've heard, And I think it is because they are so fired up. You know, as far as you know, it's it's breeding season that anything they're they're they're ready to gobble. So if like it's it's just weird, And I don't like you said, I don't know any scientific facts about it, but um, it's just like they're so amped up this time of year that anything really sets him off. Yeah, what about what about you for that first gobble of the day, day, and what's going through your head? Well, it just lets me know, just like kind of what Spencer said about, Okay, now I know I'm in the right spot or or and it lets me know like it's game time now, right, I gotta put my coffee down, I gotta pick up my call, and it's you know, it's time to get serious and and locate them. And then that next one goes off and then okay, so if this one doesn't work, this one's talking back to me. And then just they they all kind of every time there's a gobble, it's almost like another piece of the strategy has been put into place, and and it just during that period of time that first one lets me know, Okay, you know it's uh time to time to get serious. Yeah. Yeah, I have that same feeling too, Like I get in my head, I feel like my little voice says like all right, this game time, and then I think last times like literally a smile that creeps onto my face when that starts happening. Oh yeah, oh yeah, yeah. So so I heard you had a crazy hunt. Dan, you gotta tell us what happened to you this weekend. Well, I'm gonna start on Friday morning, right, And for a lot of people, you know, especially the guys up north North Bioa that are hunting, you know, turkey hunting in the snow. I've seen plenty of pictures of guys posing with their turkeys with a fan spread in about you know, two inches three inches of snow. But when I stepped out of the truck, I picked up my buddy. Um I stepped out of the truck, it was twenty two degrees uh. And this was not a turkey This was not a blind hunt. We were just kind of walking this field edge and set up in this fence row. And it was the coldest turkey hunt I've ever been on. Typically, you know, I'm used to hunting forty maybe forty low forties in the mornings to you know, maybe the fifties in the mornings and then that kind of warms up gradually throughout the day. But it was freezing cold. So I had all my uh late season deer hunting stuff on and and the sun came up and they just they started to gobble like crazy, and it was it was money. It was like, I can't believe this is gonna happen on the very first day. And I didn't. I didn't even at this point have my turkey tags purchased. I was specifically going to call for my buddy, and I really hoped that one was gonna come his way. Um. We we listened to him gobble. They hit the ground and I hunt and live kind of by an airport, and a plane went over right over where we were hunting, and it shut every bird off. We could hear birch goblin, you know, like a long ways away, nothing within, you know, any of the properties that we could hunt on. The birds shut off. We tried calling. I saw one pitch down and he never worked. Or one turkey. I couldn't tell if it was you know, Hen or Tom, but it pitched down into the field. I couldn't see where it went. We got up, We went back to behind his house. He owns a little bit of property set up in a blind started calling, had some more birds talking to us. Nothing ever came in and uh, then I had to go to kindergarten round up. Kindergarten round up. I remember you mentioned the other day on your podcast. I think, yeah, yeah, how did I go? Oh, kindergarten round up? You know they it's basically a introduction to kindergarten for a preschooler. My daughter was jacked up about it because one of her preschool friends is in the same class as her, and she's just really fired up about going to kindergarten and learning all the cool stuff that kindergarten, you know, gets gets to kindergarteners get to learn about. So then we packed the whole family in the car. We head south to my my white Tail Farms, I guess you want to call him. This is typically where we we set up. We went and me and my wife drove into this cattle pasture that we've started off with the last three years. Um, the first year we started hunting in this spot, she got a turkey right off the roost one morning. The next year, things didn't work out, UM, and she was pregnant, so you know she it was a little bit more difficult for her. And then UM, this year we I went right up on the timber. I didn't I wasn't I didn't put the blind in the pasture. I put the blind right against the fence line that separates the pasture from this big section of timber um. And again we get in there early. Uh we get chased by some cattle a little bit, which is freaky if you guys have never been chased by cattle or horses. And all you hear is the coming at you louder louder and louder and louder, and you can't see where they're at because it's pitch black. And then you catch, you catch their eyes, and then you gotta go, oh hey, you know, to get them. You know they're chickens. So they turned around run away. But anyway, you know right away, my my wife is so tired because she's still breastfeeding throughout the night in our little asshole, doesn't sleep very well, and uh so she she falls asleep. And then it was funny because I was looking at her right when that first gobble that we talked about when and her eyes just slowly open and got real big, and she's like, Okay, it's time to do this. And I started calling and they started responding, calling, responding, and then I could hear him fly down and then they shut off and that was that was it for that. The rest of that day, Um, we bounced around to two more spots, did some calling, and it was like an off switch got hit and there was a ton of birds gobbling throughout the that morning. But as soon as they flew down, it was over. They I have a feeling that they were hend up pretty bad. And and what I saw driving from the road around the section was you would see a couple of times out strutting in the field and they were right there with all these hands. They weren't leaving their side. So UM, and I'm not the best caller ever when it comes to turkey calls, and so you know, so instead of going out later that night, I basically just hung around played with the kids. It was such a beautiful day out, you know, as one of those days where you can feel the warmth. Finally spring has, you know, made it here. So I basically just yeah, hung outside and played. Man. It was just it was really fun. Um had a good meal with them, had a good meal with the fam, my mom and stepdad and UM just hung out. Went to bed that night. The middle of the night, my son wakes up and he is breathing really really weird. He's going like, I'm like, oh no, not pneumonia again, because he had pneumonia. And I'm just like, oh my god, you know, not not trying to act selfishly, but I was like, oh my god, it's over right. I'm gonna have to I'm gonna have to hang out here with him, you know, that's what a dad does. So we gave him some tile and all. He settled down. His breathing kind of went back to normal, his temperature went away, and I was just like, man, this is weird. So I went back to sleep. My alarm went off, so I went over to my wife, who was sleeping. I was like, so, what do you want me to do? I if we have to go back home, I still have to go out and get the blind because I don't want to leave it up over, you know, until who knows when I'm going to be back, and with all the theft problems that I've been having on the property, I don't want to leave it up there for potentially a month. So my wife's like, just go hunt and then if as soon as you know, whenever whatever happens, pack it up and then we'll go. Well, I get a text, so so anyway, I I leave, I go and I go to the blind. I get a text. My son's up and he's doing fine. Right, so there's no problem. Well, the turkeys weren't going as crazy as they were the the day before, the morning before, but they were more responsive. So I would call, they would answer. I would call, they were answered, and they were roughly in the same spot. So typically they are across this this valley. They roosted up on these big oak trees and then they pitched down to the bottom and they work their way up to this cattle pasture. And I was calling, responding, calling, responding. I heard him fly down. Call a little bit, respond, call a little bit. Respond. It quieted down just for a minute, and all this happened, you know, like ten minutes, right. And this is my absolute favorite part of turkey hunting is when you can hear them strut before you can see them or before they gobble, so you're you're hearing that mm hmmmm. And he gobbled that for the first time. I don't know if he saw me walk in, and that's why he didn't gobble out of the roost. But this bird came from a completely different direction, and he hammered at about fifty yards and it's one of those where you get these this team goal up your you know, up your back, you're really fired up. I'm in a blind and I froze, like he can see me through the blind, you know what I mean, Like if I move now, he's gonna he's gonna see me. But I was in a blind, So so he called once and I couldn't see him, right, I'm slowly slowly leaning my head out of the blind, and so I don't see him. I don't see him any he but I can still hear the boom and then you can hear him strut and drag his tips of his wings in the leaves right making that noise. It's just and it's not windy, so it's perfect. You know he's there, but you can't see him. So I get out. I put my gun down, I get out my slate call that I've had for like ten or fifteen years. Man, it's one of the first slate calls ever bought. And it was just a He goes again, and he's like thirty yards from the blind this time, and I I look out and I can see his head in his end um and he's in full strut. He comes out of full strut and he's trying to make his way through the fence to my decoys that are out in the cattle pasture. So he finally found him, and and I'm like, I am not set up for this because my window was into the timber with the blind and so I had to go to the side. I had to open the blind. Um it's like a big t zipper, so the zipper runs up and then out and then that it all folds down. So I had to go up to the top and open like four inches over and four inches down. And I took the twenty gage and I stuck it out the window, and he made his way through the through the fence, and he took maybe five steps and boom. And I don't like if I was to spine a deer right and just hit his off button, I would never laugh at it. For some reason, I don't. But when you shoot a turkey and you shoot him good and you know they're dead, there's a little part of me that laughs. And I know this sounds bad, but he just went and this like no flopping, like just no flopping I hit him with the full load and he shut off. And I was just like I I was on cloud nine, Like if I had tap dance shoes on, i'd be I would have been tap dancing in the timber, you know. I was like singing songs and I was just like I just I don't know. It turned. It turned everything that was bad in life good at that moment. And I don't know it was. It was. It was a good beard man, twenty six pounds, the longest longest spurs I've ever had on a turkey at an inch in three sixteenth and he had a ten inch beard, which is above average for what I typically shoot. So uh, great great bird. And when I was going to clean him out, he had a spur from another bird wedged in his one of his breasts that was broken off. That is crazy. I saw you post that. That's awesome. Yeah. I wish I would have taken a picture of it because it looked like it had been there for a month. So there was it was about oh a penny maybe a nickel size fester, and I was digging in it because I'm like, what is that? And I pulled this hard thing out of it. I got a needle nose plier pulled this hard thing out of it, kind of shook it off, and it was the tip of another spur, and I was like, I've never seen that before. I've seen birds who have been shot and then they get that fester and you pretty much can't even use the breast. So I just cut that little piece off and threw it, threw it away and and saved the rest of the meat. But man, just you know, there's this song by a band called the Nappy Roots, and it's called like good Day and it's gonna be a good day and all my problem is gonna go away. And that song was just played in my head, and I don't know, it was a good days. The turk hunt's alve out right there. Man. Then they did the thing like they did the thing for me. I just wanted to do that thing. That's cool. Are you gonna get to bill to go out anymore and take your wife out, try your hair bird or anything. Man. I went out and I took her to I went back home. So I shot my bird at six thirty five, six is right. So I the after I shot this bird, and I took two minutes to celebrate its life, you know, and think, you know, like, man, this is awesome. I get to do with this. I shut down my celebration, I shut down my blind I got I pulled my truck back that there, packed everything up, went back to the house, got my wife because my son was feeling better at this point. We went out to the second place that we always go and when she shuts the door and we had to the tailgate to load the gun and pack up, we heard a gobble and I'm like, this bird is right where we are gonna go. That's gonna be money. She's gonna you know, she's gonna get a bird today too. So we went. We walked over there, set up and it was the same bird man that was hend up the day before. And we called and he gobbled. We called and he gobbled, and he didn't get any closer, and finally he shut off, and uh we we bounced around to a couple more spots. But then ultimately this was on a Sunday, so we had to, uh we had to go back and uh get the kids and head back home because the three day vacation was over. Anymore weekends you can go, no, because we we get second season shotguns. So I think tomorrow is the last day. And I work, and she works, and the kids, who knows they're gonna be feeling better at all? So are My turkey season every year is three days. I I give myself three days to get it done because, like, like you guys know, I man, my elk hunting and my white tail hunting this year are taking priorities along with whatever other family vacations that we take. Um, so no, it's it's three days for us, short and sweeten, you got it done. Yep, absolutely, And it's so much fun. Man. It's like, like like we all said earlier, I take deer hunting really serious, but I'll punish myself if I make a mistake in the deer woods. But if I make a mistake in the turkey woods, man, I don't care. I like I I honestly don't even care if I kill a bird. I'm just out there, like Spencer said, just to have a good time. Yeah, I agree, it's it's so much lower pressure but a ton of fun. Um and and and I don't hunt turkeys, like you said, not nearly as obsessively, not nearly as much. But sometimes I wish, you know, some guys that take it really seriously, like this guy Tom Kelly, who wrote those quotes I mentioned earlier. You know, guys hunt all spring, like two months straight, all sorts of states. That would be a ton of fun. Like sometimes I wish I could just take like two or three weeks and just go from state to state to state and just chase birds, because I'm sure be high action. I mean, you're just it's different than deer hunting. Lots of times you might deer hunt for a rut week or whatever, and or of that week might be you know, nothing monotonous, you know, just being patient, waiting it out for something to happen. While turkey hunting, it's almost always, not always, but almost always action. Um it's a it's a good time. I've never done it, but I certainly tried to extend my turkey season as much as I can. I only get one tag in Michigan, but I usually try to go to Ohio for at least a day or two and then and then every year anyone I can convince to to let me go with them and call for them or something, I do that. So so this year, like I said, I'm taking a bunch of different people. So I'm gonna try to get a salad. Like four weeks the turkey hunting in this year, not not obviously hunting every day, but getting out different several days a week, going out with different people and stuff. And like I said, I haven't got to actually go yet. Um, but I did have a cool turkey experience the other day. UM. On Sunday, I took my son on his first turkey hunt quote unquote turkey hunt. UM. I bundled them up firstly in the morning. He woke up Sunday morning and I opened the door and let the dogs out, and it was nice and warm out and I stood out there waiting for the dog to take a dump, and I heard a turkey gobble off the distance. I was like, oh, it's on. So I went and grabbed Everett. There was jacket on, grabbed a call and went out into the backyard and went to the end of the yard, back at the edge of the cornfield, and I just started yelping. And then I was like, good a little. I had three different gobblers going crazy, and because I was like all right, so I just held Everett on one side and he's looking at me with these big eyes, like, what is this noise my dad's making? And and I called these gobblers over towards the house and had one of them actually come over the hill into view. And obviously ever had no idea what was going on, but it was pretty cool to me actually being out there with my son for the very first time, um with Tyrakese goblin. So that was a proud dad moment. And uh. And then the next day I did go to this property that I'm a new property that I'm gonna be hunting in a couple of weeks with some folks, and um, got out there, like I woke up at four in the morning in my house, It's a two hour drive this property. So I barreled out there four in the morning, got there like just a daybreak, snuck out to this little high point in the It's kind of where three different fences fence roles all come together and you can see into three different fence or sorry, you can see into three different fields from this high point. And so I sat there for the morning, did just a couple of yelps just to try to get some stuff to talk to hear where they might be roosted, and heard a few birds roosted off in one direction, not quite when I was I was hoping. I was thinking this place would be loaded with them, um, but I heard just one or two off in one corner. But after like the first hour, maybe half hour hour, one bird came out into the field, one nice big gobbler, and then I saw like three four or five hens over there, and then three jakes came out over there. And then while I was watching them, I turned to look the other direction, to the one of his other fields. I see two gobblers come off the opposite hill over there, and they start walking my direction, and then they come through and then they disappear. And then that initial gobbler walks all the way up towards me. And I had just called, like I said, a few yelps kind of right when I got there in the morning. He came all the way to like within like thirty yards of me and walked past, and I just watched him do his thing. And you know how they get when they think there should be hens somewhere nearby, but they can't see it. He's stopped and he'd stick his neck up and just spinning his turn his head in all directions, looking looking looking nothing. That he'd walk ten yards and stopped, put his head back up. Look look look. Um. That was kind of fun because usually in that kind of situation I would be shooting that bird, um, so that would be end and ended. But in this case, it's kind of like passing on a buck. I just got to watch him do his thing up close, which was fun and uh. And then two more gobblers came tearing over from the third field over my direction, so I saw like six different gobblers from that spot in the first hour and a half or two hours a day. And then I spent the rest of the day scouting for white tails, and over the course of my walkings and ramblings, I bumped into two other groups of three gobblers strutting around with hens and stuff. So that was fun just to see him and hear him and get to get my blood pumped and primed for the rest of the season. So that was my start to turkey hunt. And then this weekend I'm gonna take my nephew up, so hopefully we'll have a good turkey story to come from that. Um. It's exciting stuff. I love it. And now I think would be a good time for a quick word from our partners at white Tail Properties. This week with white Tail Properties, we are joined by Tim Woods, a land specialist out of central Ohio, and Tim is going to be telling us about how to better understand what the deer hunting neighborhood is like around a potential property. Well, I guess, you know, I guess there's there's a couple different ways to look at it. If you're a nonresident looking to buy out of states. Um, you've got to trust your trust, your agent, you know us with white Tail Properties, UM, this is what we do. UM. You know, it's the fact that you know, I'm here in Ohio. I've got my territory. Um. You know, I've got a fairly large territory. But I'm pretty well grounded. And what pockets of areas are good, you know, I mean great word Ohio. Not everywhere in Ohio is good or even the given states that you're looking for. So you've got a trust, you trust your agents, um, and and let them do the legwork for you. UM. And don't be scared to walk properties, talk to neighbors, UM. And you know, look at bragging boards and so forth, and that you know, social media is a great way a lot of people. You know, a lot of people like to talk about their big deer. So you can get out there and uh kind of scratch the surface a little bit and see, um what a what a particular area is like, how much pressure it gets, how many hunters are there. But I would say that the biggest thing would be the trust your agent, um when it comes to you know, a high quality area. Um, you know, there's always gonna be those areas where you have big landowners and very little hunting pressure and guys that are killing high caliber deer. So you know, again back to just trust your agent and uh let them do the legwork for you and uh, you know, put some boots on the ground, walk some properties and go from there. If you'd like to learn more and to see the properties that Tim currently has listed for sale, visit wait to old properties dot com backslash woods. That's w O O d S. I pulled some fun facts related turkeys that I want to drop on you guys. Yeah, I I haven't done a ton of you know, when it comes to white tails and stuff. I read everything, right, we read all sorts of research and literature on on white tails and all these articles and stuff. I don't do a whole time turkey reading. Um, but there's some interesting stuff. So get this. Did you guys know that you can tell a bird's sex and age from his droppings? Did you guys know that about about turkeys? I did not know that. No, enlighten me. Yeah. So male turkey droppings are j shaped and female turkey droppings are spiral shaped. So you go out there and you look for the poopy jay's and you know that's a gobbler. And then the larger the diameter of the turd, the older the bird. So remember that. Now. Have have you heard guys say that about like what deer crab looks like or what buck crap looks like versus doe crab. I've heard. I've heard different kind of theories on that. I've heard like the bigger, clumpier ones or bucks versus your smaller, very separated palets would be doves. Um. Have you heard something similar? Well, I think we've all kind of heard that, like grandfather wisdom that yeah, this this is what dear or this is what buck crap looks like. It's the big stuff and this is doe crab the little stuff. But in reality, I think what it is um that when you're seeing like the stuff that looks like it was made by a rabbit, that means that they're eating um like grains and harder things like that, um, walnuts, and whereas if it's like smoother uh kind of piles than they've been feeding on, like fruits or grass things things that are softer for their diet. So I've I've heard a lot of that before, but I believe the real answer is that, no, you can't tell a buck from adough, but you can tell what they've been eating. Interesting, that makes sense. I've never paid much attention to it, but it's if that's true. If if you could wrap your head around that, that would be an interesting thing to look at because you could determine what the deer focused on right now is the food source then to a degree, so you could see based off droppings if you should be focusing on something like soft mass like apple trees or something like grains um. That would be an interesting thing to to consider. Yeah, I try to try to take that into account because so much of what I hunt is agriculture, soybeans, corn field and stuff like that, So it's not like uncommon for me to find the stuff that's in piles. But that gets me thin, getting like, Okay, where was this deer at because he's obviously not spending all of his feed time like on a field edge. So uh, and I'm not I shouldn't say this is absolutely the answer, but I believe that that's what it is. Never never tell you a story, Dan about my uncle's dad and the dear turd story. I have not I'd love to hear it. That so so he this, so this, this is how the story goes. At least. Um, this guy, we'll call him Bob, was taking a friend of his out deer hunting for the first time. And um, as Bob walked along, he'd point at deer poop and he'd say, well, that's that's old deer poop, and the guy would look at it and say okay, and they keep walking. He point to another set of palaces. Oh, there's something that's a little bit fresher, And then they kept walking on and they kept going and going and going, and finally, all along Bob had been carrying some like chocolate covered raisins in his pocket, and so he'd been pointing at real turds all this whole time, and his friend was getting more and more curious about it, and finally he dropped him right in the ground in front of him when his friend wasn't looking, and he reaches down he grabs him. He says, no, these these are fresh dear turds, really really fresh dear turds. And the buddy looks at him. He's like, man, how do you know this? How do you know these are fresh? And he's like, well, the way you can tell for sure, you taste him. He pops one in his mouth. He's like, yeah, oh yeah, this is this was just a couple of hours ago. The buddies looking at him like, dude, you are nuts. I always like that. I was like, man, that's a good way to fool buddy. Oh that's not okay. How about this one? Did you guys know and this? I did not know this. I I'll just say wild turkeys their head gobbler's heads actually changed colors with their level of excitement or emotion. So I always just assumed that, like a blue headed turkey was just always a blue head turkey, and a red headed goblers. The red headed gobbler and summer white summer, red summer blue summer pinkish, and I just thought that was like east individual turkey or sometimes older turkeys had a certain coloring. Is that just me being ignorant? Or do you guys not realize that that's the same bird can be all the different colors based on his excitement. I did know that, yeah, and I've seen it happen. And like the coloration is a bit of wisdom that you want to use if you're trying to reap turkeys. They say that, uh, if you're trying to find the ideal reaping situation, and reaping is if you don't know where, you basically hide behind a fan and use that to you know, cut the distance between you and the gobbler and bring the gobbler to you anyway, They stay the ideal reaping tom is one with a white head, because that's like maximum aggression, one with maximum attitude. Who's most likely to appro to you hiding behind a tail fan. That's so cool. I don't know how I missed that in my in my years of turkey hunting, but that for some reason makes turkeys even cooler to me, that they've got like chameleon heads or like mood ring heads. Maybe it is a better way to say it. Have you ever I tell you what? I tell you what I I was sitting on a ridge one day I fell asleep, um one of those scenarios. I called for a little bit. It was mid day, fell asleep. I woke up and down this little creek system, I see out of field a tom with a decent beard, and he had a red head. He was, you know, not fired up at all, and he was, you know, eating down eating, And then I started calling and he perked up, and you know, he went from that skinny little body to he started puffing up, and his head went from kind of this red to a blue and then he started coming in and then he started getting in full strut. And then I watched it change from blue to this pure white color, and it was it was one of the coolest things I had ever seen. And just the light hitting it and watching his head change colors was I know. That's that's where I learned learned from. I don't know how I've never seen it or never noticed. I'm sure it's happened, but I guess I've never been paying attention enough to the head. Now what happens? So when you shoot the bird. Is it stuck at whatever color it was, or does it revert to something else. I've never paid attention to that. Either you'll see a change, like I've I've shot ones with red heads and then you know, I'll brest him out, but not take pictures for you know, until hours later, and by that point they'll they'll have a blue head. Quite often I've seen him, you know, like keep the red head or maybe it's a different shade of red. But I think after they're dead, you'll see a change there that makes sense. Have you have you raped a turkey in before, Spencer? I have not. Um I I would love to try it because like that is my style of being aggressive. I don't care if I mess up on a turkey, like like Dan said earlier, who cares just a turkey? But uh, that's something I'll definitely consider. And we have like the wide open topography here that would uh you know, work well for that, so it'll happen. Yeah, that would be. I've never tried it, and I know it's not legal in all places, I don't think so if you're listening, you have to make sure to check up on your regulations around that. But it looks like a super cool way to just to literally crawl across the field towards the gobble or towards the gobbler, holding that fan up in front of you, trying to cut the distance. And I've heard like they can. Then they get super aggressive too, so lots of times they just come charging in at it. And then the last second you've got to drop that fan and pull up with your gun or whatever, try to get a show out when he's five yards away from you or whatever coming at you. I mean, talk about high intensity turkey hunting that I'd love to try that. Yeah, that'd be cool. Okay, what would you guys call a group of turkeys? What would be the proper term for a group of turkeys? Dan, what do you think? I'm just gonna go with what every other game bird, a flock spencer? Uh, I would go with the same thing. So I do think that is one of the terms that can be used as a whole slow. I found a whole bunch of different ones, but two that I saw that I had not heard before. You can call, supposedly one of the official terms for a group of turkeys is a gang or a rafter, a rafter of turkeys. I also called them. At once. I was turkey hunting with my wife and a whole bunch of jake's came in and like, in the heat of the moment, I don't know, I've never even was this word in my entire life ever before, but this group of three jakes came like barreling in towards us. I'm like, oh man, there's a whole passle of them coming in. And so now I always refer to a group of turkeys as a passle of turkeys. So write that one down. I'll pass. How fast How fast do you think a turkey can move on foot? What's the high? Twenty two point five miles per hour? Is that right? It was like the same speed as Usain Bolt I saw twenty four But that's essentially the same thing. That's crazy, isn't it. Yeah? I wanted to say that, like during Usain Bolts hunter meter dash record time, and I don't remember what year twelve might have banned or whatever, that like his top speed is the same as like a turkey's top speed. That's that's a great, great line for an announcer during the Olympics or something. No, no, what about to flight my guests would be forty fifty five miles per hour flight? Is that is the top? That's crazy because I read somewhere that the way a Turkey is built and how physics works, like they shouldn't even be able to take off with their body weight. Yeah, it doesn't look like it. They have like one of the lowest wing load scores. I think it's called wing load. It's it's like the ratio of uh, you know, your wings to your body weight, and uh, there's is so far off the chart that it's, like you said, hard to fathom that that they can take flight. They are the most un great, un graceful looking animal ever when they take flight, I'd say, I mean, they can be so cool looking when they're strutting around, and then when they try to take off and fly somewhere, sometimes they get going, it's it's it's not quite as impressive um or or they fly out of the tree. It's like, especially during deer season, when you'll hear him fly up at night, or you'll hear him fly down, it's like someone's just throwing cannonballs out of a tree. Yeah. Yeah, do you guys ever try to simulate that noise? One of the things I used to try when I was kind of calling the turkeys on the roost is I would try to simulate the sound of the fly down of hens. So I'd like take my hat or something and I hit it against my my thigh or something to make like that noise as like they're flying down. Um. I don't know if it's ever really helped my calling sequence in the morning. But have you guys ever tried that at all? Uh? I have tried it. I like the added realism, but as far as like that being the difference between you getting a gobbler and you're set up and I can't right, I don't know, but I don't think it hurts either. They're not gonna hear them be like that that, what's that asshole doing? What's okay? So so on that note, I want to jump to some listener questions because I want to get some of these answered and then maybe hot back to a couple of stories. But Jacob on Twitter asked us this. He said, how on the living hell do you kill one of these damn things? Because I have no freaking clue. So let's give us a lot to talk about. But if you have one like your one best turkey hunting tip for someone who has no freaking clue, Spencer, what would it be, uh, find the dumb ones? And you know, that can be a number of factors, like time of year right now, like I said, the turkeys are breaking off, and so they're getting a lot more aggressive and you know, not making the best decisions all the time, and so that makes them dumber. Trying to find birds that are on pressure, maybe flocks that are living in Mrs Jenkins backyard that are eating out of a bird feeder but roosting in a past year, you know, a quarter mile away, those ones that have never been bothered, and so those would be obviously the dumber ones. And and then as far as like species too, I think the guys who are uh you know, the slam holders and the people who hunt all over the country say that Easterns are the most difficult to get into range and the hardest to to you know, match their vocalizations. Who are like a Merriam's is the easiest to you know, talk to and fool and so another you know, not as far as finding a dumb one, Miriam's would likely give you better odds than an Eastern I've I've heard that too. How much how much of that is just pressure related? You know, the Eastern turkeys are getting hunted by so many more guys. Do they it's that? Or do you think there's actually some kind of genetic difference? Have you heard? I know, I know there's a genetic difference, but I mean a genetic difference and why they're more susceptible to hunting. I would say that's definitely part of it. Like you think about what stereotypical Miriam's habitat is, like, like you could spot these things, you know, from a mile away, whereas an Eastern is probably in really dense timber and so it's just more difficult to I don't know, identify where that birds at and get them into range, uh than it would be the type of terrain that a Miriam's lives in. You know, Dan, what about you? You're one best tip for the guy that has no freaking clue Just I don't know. Um, this is a This is the reason I'm successful at turkey hunting, or I was this year, is because I knew where they've been roosting historically. So if you get the opportunity, go out and do some more pre morning scouting. If I can even say that, my system is starting to shut down because I'm overly tired because we're recording so late. But what I'm trying to say is go out before your season starts early in the morning, walk around, call a little bit, locate them, and then just leave. And then when it's time to do hunting season, you know it's you got a couple of options right off the bat that you can start off with, and those are going to be your your best options. Yeah, that's kind of what I would say to I mean, I taught myself to turkey hunt with like no I had no idea. I didn't hadn't gone out with anyone who knew what they're doing. Um it just read some magazine articles and watched like a YouTube video or something about how to call and stuff. I just kind of figured it out. And I think the most important stuff is Number one, just find some gobblers, so do what you just said. Find where they're roosted, so just walk around and listen to them at night when they're up in their roost. Find some birds, and then just learn how to do a basic yelp. Just figure out that that one basic hen sound and that's enough to call on a gobbler. I mean, I knew how to do nothing but the very most basic yelp um, and I was able to call birds in my very first year. Now I didn't kill him, um, but I had some good action, had some close calls and stuff like that. So that's number one right there. If you can do that, I think you can at least like get into the action on some birds and then you can figure out the nuance and figure out all the other things that might help you close the deal more often. But that can at least get you going. Um, there's plenty more. I mean, if you're trying to bow hunt, that can be more challenging, or if you're trying to hold out for a certain big, big mature tom, or if you're trying to kill him in a bunch of different states, Sure things can get more difficult. But to just get some stuff happening, you don't need to be some kind of savant hunter to have some basic turkey any action. Um, what you're saying, I would go back to, like dance point. I asked, like one of the best fishermen that I know, I asked him one time, like, what is the single best piece of advice you've ever gotten or given? And he said, don't fish memories. And so you know, meaning that if you nail the walleye here like two years ago, that doesn't mean that they're gonna be right on that hump again. And that's something that I think applies to turkeys. Like as far as the roost, and this is something that I like fail at every year and I have to relearn every year. I see turkeys roost in a tree and it's like in my head that, Okay, well they're going to roost there again, but that's not always the case. Turkeys are not married to a roost, and more often it's like that they're going to roost somewhere in that creek bottom again within like you know football field stretch. Uh, but they're not necessarily going to be like in that tree and they're not going to pitch down out of that tree into this in little opening. And so just like learning to be mobile or flexible in that first you know, half hour of daylight is a big part of it, because I have uh messed that up a lot of times where I'm overconfident that like yep, they're gonna fly out of that branch and they're gonna land on you know, that piece of dirt, and I'm gonna kill them there. That that's not that simple, and you could go you could go into like all these really hardcore details like we do with white tails, where Okay, you're gonna find where they're roost. Then you're gonna find where they have what they call a strut zone, right, So it's basically a location that these turkeys hang out at part of the day and they just sit there and strap back and forth while the hens are feeding. So it's you can get into a lot of detail. But I think the less you know about turkey strategy, the or successful you'll be because I how I learned a turkey hunt was was with my uncle's and it was literally a you walk into the woods at dark in the morning, you call, you locate them in a tree, You sit down with your decoys out in front of you. You call, you call, do they come in, Nope, get up, move, put the decoys out, call call call, nope, move and then you finally you'll run into something and then you shoot it in the face. So it's pretty easy. I don't know if it always goes quite that easily. But I like, I like the freestyle nature of your approach. What about go back to the roost? Uh, situation that you're mentioning their Spencer. We got a question a number of questions related to when birds are on the roost. So one person asked, when the birds when the gowlers are on the roost, is it better to remain silent and wait till they reach the ground or should you lightly call why while they're in the tree. And then another person said, when birds on the roost, how much calling is too much? It's kind of getting at the same thing there. Um, what would you say to those things, Spencer? Uh, I would let the real life turkeys be the guide. And so if you hear the hands talking a lot, I think that's an invitation for you to do some talking and give up your location. Um. And if you you know, let out a yelp and you have a gabbler that cuts you off, I think that's an invite to talk a little more too. But uh, that turkey is like not going to forget where you're at if you call and they don't respond, Um, you know, obviously it's it's easier to say don't overcall than it is to actually put your call away and not do it, because you know, obviously that's that's what I think. The answer is, don't overcall, But then to actually not overcall is is really difficult to do. So I think the best thing you can do is let the real turkeys dictate what you're doing. Man. The first year I went out turkey hunting on my own, I remember pulling up close to where I thought one was roosted, and then one sounded off, just like I was hoping he would. And for like however long it was fifteen minutes or whatever, while he was up in that tree still and I was down the ground. Every time he gobbled, I was yelping. He gobbled, I was yelping, he was gobbling. I was the helping, and that just kept. If he didn't talk for like thirty seconds, I started helping again, thirty seconds, I was the helping again for like fifteen minutes. If anyone was around there, they would have heard the biggest idiot just calling and calling and calling. Um. I think you're right, though, I think overcalling all the time you do. I talked about I talked back and forth with him all the time. I'm I leaded the conversation. I'm in charge of it. See I've I've found that that was my biggest mistake, was calling too much. Like I would overcall at least here A lot of times these birds would almost not this is probably giving them too much credit, but they'd almost be like, no real hand would be talking this much like that, that's something seems fishy. So I was having these birds that would gobble for a bit and then they would like fall by the wayside. And then as soon as I started playing hard to get with them, so I would just get it to where I knew they heard me, they were interested, and then lots of times I'd stop and I'd wait a long time, and then that's when I when I started, you know, holding up, especially on the roots, like for me on the roost, I would just do a little light yelping just to get him excited and make sure they know our map, and then it usually would just stop until they fly down um and then maybe I hear one and go off. Once there on the ground, then I'll yelp a few more times and a couple more times that they're coming in closer and closer, but especially if they hung up or anything like that where they don't seem to be coming in anymore, but I still hear them. That shutting down and being quiet so often for me has been what has gotten them to come all the way in. They're like, Okay, I know there's a hand over there. Why isn't she talking anymore? I gotta go get her. Um, that for me was like the light switched moment when I started killing birds, when I started getting really picky about how often I called. So that's interesting to hear that you're the opposite. Yeah, I The way I look at it is if they're roosted with a hen, and that hen they can see, and she doesn't even have to call, right she flies down, they're gonna follow her, regardless of the hen that's going bananas across the valley right and on the opposite side, if there is no hen in the tree with him, they're gonna And then let's say there's multiple birds they're going, it's now a competition to see who can get there the fastest. That's the way I look at it. Yeah, yeah, I know I can. I can see the logic to that too. Um, Now, what about this scenario. This is another question we got. So what if the gobbler, What if the birds aren't talking at all? When you've got a quiet morning, nothing's gobbling off the roost, nothing's gobbling during daylight when they should be on their feet and walking around. What do you do Dan in that situation when the turkeys are quiet. That's a great question. And the answer to that is, I go to a local diner and I eat something called a river wreck, which is scrambled eggs, biscuits, and gravy, hash browns and bacon all on one massive pile, and I wash it down with mountain dew, and then I go and take a nap. That's one way to approach it. I don't like, dude, I don't like to hunt. If they're not calling back and forth. Right, I may go out, drive around the section, see where they're strutting, try to sneak up on them and and go from there. But if they're on a different property, there's not much I can do. Yeah, Spencer, about you, Well, if that's the case that, like you are confident the birds should be talking, and the weather's right and the seasons right, and the turkeys are there, then it's probably something thing you did wrong, Like you walked in with your you were skylined, and you know every turkey in that creek bottom saw you come in there. Or uh, you were putting up your ground blind and you were popping out the hubs and goes whishh. You know you do that five times right next to the roost, Well, that will probably shut them down. And so if you think that like all the conditions are right for turkeys to be talking and they're not talking, then I would be, you know, trying to figure out what I just did to shut them up? Man. But you know there's there's some days though, when they just aren't talking, Like even if you didn't do anything wrong, even if you're a long ways away from there where they're roosted, but you would be able to hear them. And I don't know what conditions shut them down. I'm not that much for turkey hunter to know. But I did just read an article before the podcast where they're talking about some research done but I think Mississippi State, UM where they were correlating certain conditions to gobbling activity. UM. So they did see like there was a certain Now I believe I saw like between sixty and sixty nine degrees temperature wise was like the optimal temperature for gobbling activity for like pete gobbling. And then like if you got I think I think that I've read that if it got hotter than that, it went downhill. And then there was other possible connections to like bara metric pressure, um and something else. So there are certain things and a wind to a certain amount of wind can shut down gobbling. UM. So in those situations when I think, even if you're like you're doing the right things, there's just gonna be some days when the turkeys are just quiet no matter what. UM. And on those kinds of days, for me, what I've done, like you said, Dan, I'll get up and move around and just try to spot and stock them kind of just you know, because they're still gonna go and go about their day their daily routine still, so they're gonna still fly down somewhere. They're still gonna strut around for some you know, at some point, um, for an hour hour and a half or two hours for the first thing in the morning, walk around some hens and stuff. But then usually again so at that point, if you can walk around and class them up, then you can move in on them and maybe get them to come and do a call or something. Or the other thing that happens a lot of times is even if it's been quiet all morning, right around that like nine thirty, Between nine and thirty, it seems like for me um is when lots of times the hens break off from the tom's. Maybe they go and they nest or whatever, and then the tom's are back on the move. They're back on the hunt. For another hand, it seems like I've heard a lot of people talk about this time frame two whether it's kind of like their cruise and again kind of like a running buck. And so it always seems to be like there's like a couple hour lull in the late morning and then like ten o'clock you hear that gobble all of a sudden out of nowhere. You haven't heard anything for three and a half four hours, and the boom, there's that lone turkey on the hunt. And uh, lots of times that can be then the start of a good period of the day too. But maybe even if they aren't gobbling, you'll catch that cruiser at that point. So I like trying to move around sitting spots, you can watch and just try. I mean, my one of my favorite hunts ever was with my dad a few years back, and this is the situation when the birds hadn't been talking at all, but we just set up in the spot we could see down a power line a long ways in either direction. We set out a decoy and we just waited and just sit sitting glass and talk, you know, caught up on life and all that kind of good stuff. And finally we just got lucky that Tom crossed that power line like two yards down the way. There hadn't been any talking all day, all afternoon, but we just saw him from long ways off and just because we are determined to sit out there and be there, we saw him and then we were able to call and call him right and he never I don't think he ever gobbled. He just came in and um, I mean, there's something to be said about It's kind of like during the rut. If he has put in the time, even if you're not seeing lots of action, good stuff can happen. But you know, it depends on what you want of it. Like you said, Dan, if you want the gobbling, hot action and that's all you want, then going to get the river record might be the better option on the slow days. I'm a big fan of hot action. I I believe you you are. Um, Okay, how about this one? What what is your favorite way to serve wild turkey? Spencer? What about that one? Mm hmm, go to Dan? Let me think about that, Dan, what's her go to wild turkey recipe? I got to go to number one? Potatoes, carrots, cream, and mushroom soup, some chopped up onions, all in the big crock pot, and then you just cook it and cook it and cook it. But first I gotta hammer it right. You gotta tender eye the meat, because like the breast is really uh like wild turkey meat is a little bit tougher than your or about turkey meat. So I tend to rize it right. I put to put it in between two towels, and I take a cookie roller or a dough roller and beat it. And then that that typically does a trick. Or my wife's favorite is turkey nuggets. You cut them up into about an inch by inch and then you bred them, fry them, serve them with some hot you know, uh, do the hot sauce, dance on them or barbecue or whatever and then serving with blue cheese or ranch. Nice. Yeah. I like to do like a like a fried turkey nugget too, with deep fry them, kind of like fried chicken type thing. Um. But I don't know, I don't know where I found this recipe, but it's kind of like hot chicken like. It's kind of a spicy fried chicken breading. Man. That is good. I mean, that is really good. I'm actually talking about having my nephew over this weekend before we hunt, and we're gonna make some of those up. So that's my favorite one. Um. And then white turkey chili is also a good a good one. You can even use the legs for that slow cook up, tear it up, put it in chili um or pulled turkey tacos. That's another good way to use that leg meat. Um, that's kind of tougher stringer. But if you like slow slow cooking in the crock pot until it starts to break down and then just use forks to tear it all up, that makes some really good turkey filling um or taco type meat. Um. Spencer, did you figure out yours yet? Yeah? So thinking about it a little more probably my favorite is like a turkey Philly and so slicing up or breast super thin and then you know, tossing that in a pan or on a grill fairly quickly you don't want to overcook it. And then with like some green peppers, mushrooms, onions on a HOGI and I love that, And if the season is right, you can like find some morals to serve with it, or pick some asparagus and just get like a real springtime delicacy. And so that's probably my favorite turkey rest to pee. But then I'm a wild game enthusiast, and so this is one thing that I think is important for people to consider as well as like brianing, do you guys do any Brian's for like your wild turkey or your Thanksgiving turkey? That it's a great point, I Brian. Anytime I'm making wild turkey, I Brian at first. So what what is your Brian that you do? Real simple sugar, salt and lemon, usually water and water. Okay, all right, well now I got you. So there's been some food science done on like this has gotcha journalism? Is that what you're doing to me? I got you? So I will send you the article and we're done. But there's been some food science done about like the weight retention and the liquid retention in turkey breasts um based on different Brians. And so the thought with like a wet Brian is that the soul like opens up the pores and then the water comes rushing in there and stuff. And so while if you Brian a turkey breast like that, it will be juicier than a turkey breast that you did not Brian. But what you're getting is not like natural turkey flavor. You're you're putting water in your turkey breast. And so what's actually better is just a dry brine like salt. And I can't remember what the like the science is going on there. I think it's something that like when you're cooking the breast then and you have a dry brine on there, the juice comes to the outside and it hits that salt layer and it turns around and it stays in the turkey breast. And so like a dry a dry brian um helps you retain white better and it's giving you like a better flavor because you're not just shoving water in your meat. Interesting, very interesting Spencer, nice little factoid there. I'm probably still gonna shove water in my turkey breasts, but but I'm interested that to look more into that idea, you have to send me the article if you can find it. All right, Um, speaking of you, Spencer, I don't know why I thought of this while you were talking about that. I guess I was thinking about you shooting these turkeys and putting them in dry brins. Um. But being a bow hunter for turkeys, can you talk a little about arrow placement? Because I think a lot of people maybe that are considering bow hunting for turkeys but haven't yet, might get this mixed up because you see this great, big round ball of turkey and you might think of a certain spot would be the place to shoot it, but it is wrong. Can you talk about the right place to aim on turkey with the bow? Um? I guess it's it's hard to like explain it, but I think the most important thing to consider is that, like people want to talk about turkey broadheads like they do dear oddeads, but the most important thing is just being accurate, because what you're shooting at is about the size of a softball, you know, Although it looks like more you know of a basketball that's that's not the case. There are a lot of guys and I've done it multiple times in my bow hunting Turkey career where a shot is just gonna end with a big puff of feathers because there is like not much actual meat there in a strutted up tom. And I think the best shot that you can take is like when a tom has turned away from you and you can you know, go for like that Texas heart shot. Obviously that's ideal because you can draw, you have like a good indicator of where to aim. Um. But uh, it's just you know, important to be accurate and know where you're shooting and know that there's not you know, much of a forgiving area there. Yeah, So for those who don't know what the Texas heart shot is, that would be shooting it in the vent for the the anus um straight from behind would be the Texas heart shot um or like you said, it's it's a really small vital so you really got to know where this is out of Turkey. But you can follow follow the legs up and then shoot it like the top third of the body right above the legs and a touch ahead would be about where those vitals would be. Um. And then you can also try the head shot. You know, some people have you know, used the specific broadheads to decapitate. Um, I've never done that. Have you ever tried that spencer? No? I have not. Yeah, it seems I guess you either get it done or you missed completely. But that seems to be how my bow hunting for turkeys has been anyways, I just usually missed the bird completely. Um. When I first started trying to teach myself turkey and I thought I should start with a bow, and my first two ever shot opportunities I missed right between the legs underneath them. Um, So I switched to a gun and started killing a bunch of birds. So I think I'm probably gonna switch back one of these years. But UM, it didn't start off too well. What either one of you guys are gonna turkey mounted or have you? It would have to be really unique and big, because obviously turkeys don't have characteristics like dear do, so it would have to be like multiple beards or unique feather configuration or of I don't know, three ft beard or something like that. I don't know. Huge spurs three eyes. I don't know. I was very close to mounting one last year. UM. I shot our state record our three real grand turkey had triple beard UM, and he's number fifteen in the world with a bow, and so I just about mounted him. But then I started like looking at the prices and I'm like, you know what, he's cool, but he's not cool, So I didn't like I didn't do a full strutted out mount, but I got the fan and his wings and then the you know, I kept the spurs and the three beards, and those are all on a plaque together is his fan, the two wings, spurs, and the beard. But uh, you know, I always have that option since I have the important parts. I talked to some text him as if I were ever to get another rio, that I could, you know, have a full body of mount done. But like, where does that go in a home? I don't know that that doesn't look good anywhere. I don't think I've reached out to some music. I've reached out to some museums like the Smithsonian and uh some other places, I think the Natural History Museum to see if they had wanted UM. But there's just like a whole bunch of um paperwork to go along with that, and so at this point hasn't happened. I've reached out to Cabela's about taking it um, but with their best pro merger, they have stopped UM buying mount and stuff like that. So at this point it's just you know, the fan, the wing mounts. But I'd love for him to be on a full display somewhere, whether it's you know, in my basement or in a museum in Washington, d C. Where is your How much did that cost for I can I cost you for a full mount? I can't even remember now. I want to say it was like seven hundred bucks or somewhere around there. It's gotta be like a ton of detail for a full stutting tom. Yeah, that's crazy. Yeah, I don't think I would ever do it. I my first bird I ever killed. I did, like just like the tail, fan mountain, the beard, and that was super cool. I like having that up and getting to see that, you know, that first one. Now, for whatever reason, I keep the beards and I keep the legs, you know, with the spurs attached, and I just have like a table and my barn just stacked with beards and legs, and if anyone who didn't like understand what these things were, they'd be really creeped out by this weird pile in my bar. But uh, but I've I've seen some people like cut the spurs off and like put them on like a a cord or something. I don't know, Maybe I should do something like that someday, because you know, it's nice to have some kind of token or memento of that hunt and that bird. But I don't know, they just don't lend themselves to it like a like a deer. And I've got multiple uh tail feathers and beard plaques that are in my garage that I don't even happen on the wall. It's like they take up so much space. And my success for a turkey is higher than my success for a deer. So I mean, if I wanted to, I'd have them in every room of the house and you know, multiple stacked on top of each other, and it just I don't know. I think I'm to the point now where I'm almost done collecting that stuff. Yeah, I mean it. Yeah, when some when a rarity of it is lost, it does change things a little bit. Okay, last question for you guys, um, do do you have like a most embarrassing turkey experience or story? Either one of you guys? I do. I mean, my life is pretty much an embarrassment, but I will tell you. I'll tell you this turkey hunting story. So it was one of my very first ever turkey hunts. I'm twenty six, no excuse me, two thousand and two, so I'm like two years old. I'm in college. Um, the night before I went out and I just got hammered. And so the next morning I woke up, drove to drove to meet my uncle's and we went out into the turkey woods and started hunting. And the birds, the birds aren't going bananas. And all of a sudden, I am getting this rumble in my stomach, like I gotta go number two, and I gotta go right now, and so I am I put my gun down, and my uncle can't see me because he's kind of behind me. He's calling for me. So I have to like pull my pants down walking the walk, you know, into this taller grass behind a tree. And I got my pants down and I'm holding real still and I'm going to the bathroom and I'm watching these birds fly out of the tree right down to our decoys and strutting. They're already strutting right in front of the decoys. And I hear my uncle just yell shoot him, shoot him, And I don't even have my gun. And then he he sits up out of this this old tree. He was sitting and looks at me, and I had my butt out and I was pooping. That that seems like on par for the core story for Dan Johnson. Can you top that? Spencer? Uh No, I can't think of like one individual moment that bad, but maybe just like collectively, my first couple of years turkey hunting, I was just terrible just what I was doing. Uh you know, my lowest of lows as a turkey hunter were really poor, and nobody in my family turkey hunted. So I was, you know, self taught, learning in the woods. And I think I probably started hunting when I was like seventeen or eighteen for turkeys, and uh, you know, I couldn't kill him with a shotgun. I just I was a failure. And so those first couple of years, looking back, when I was doing as far as like setups and calling and decoys and stuff like that. It was bad. I I that's a very similar situation. Myself took a little took some growing pains. As I'm trying to think of, like my embarrassing story, I realized that probably the best embarrassing stories I have are not my own, but stories about further So. And since Further is not on here, I should tell some of Further's embarrassing defend himself, roast and Furthers when Josh isn't here. Um, so how about this one? Um kind of a serious there's a whole series of turkey further stories where he does these things, and I'm like, really, man, like we're turkey hunting. We were sneaking in to actually get set up on this food plot. I might have told the story a couple of years ago, right after it happened. But we're heading into this blind set up and we get to the food plot. We're just about to step out into the field, and um head towards the blind and usually the birds roost a long ways away from this spot, but it's usually the closest we can get to the roost, and usually they're on a neighboring property. We're just about stepping the field and a bird just lights up, like forty yards away in a tree or just on the other side of the field, like right across the way. There's never birds here, but there was one this night. So we all just collapse on the ground in the tall grass, like right next to the field, right next to the food plot. And fast forward, you know, the next twenty minutes or whatever. I'm made a couple of yelps. He hammers back. When it gets daylight, he flies down right into the food plot. But Josh and me are laying down because again we didn't have a blind, we didn't have any cover. We just collapsed like right right where we were. So the turkeys coming in and I can see the bird and furtherterres watching the bird, and I'm sitting there in the turkeys at like thirty five yards, and he's got the gun, and I'm just sitting laying there behind him watching him, thinking, Okay, when's he going to shoot the bird? When he's gonna shoot the bird? And like the birds at thirty five yards, the birds at thirty yards, the birds twenty five yards, the birds at twenty yards, the birds at fifteen yards, And this whole time, I'm like what's he doing? What's he doing? And then he he turns looks at me and he said, are you ready. I'm like, dude, I'm not doing anything here, man, it's all you shoot the bird thenny. Then he finally gets down on his knees and suits the bird and chases it down and all that. That poor guy, That poor guy. I think. I think, Spencer, we need to have a Wired to Hunt podcast that Mark isn't even on, but we bring further in to talk shit on Mark for a whole hour. Yep. Yeah. The key the key thing that makes this so so much better for me those that I have the keys to the uploads. So so I always get to I always get to make Josh be the butt of my jokes. He's a good sport. He's a very good sport. He keeps that and he's killed plenty of birds and he gives us a good thing to laugh about every once in a while. So cool man. Well, do you guys have any final thoughts on turkeys before we wrap this one up? I have a I have a p s A on something that's been sweeping the turkey hunting nation, and that is the like hashtag long bird and hashtag snood to tail. Are you guys familiar with that? Yeah, I got called out because I didn't provide that measurement on there. And I guess I'm not trendy enough to know that there is a new measurement that actually does not go into the actual scoring of a bird. So this was started by the guys at the hunting public like Zach and Aaron. Uh. And I I believe it's just like kind of poke fun at the idea of like chopy turkey hunting or the idea I got you you know, like that's ridiculous. So look at this ridiculous measurement kind of thing. It was something that they had started a couple of years ago. But now that they have their own deal going, uh, that they can kinda you know, talk about freely. And and so everybody, everybody detail measurements from what I missed. Yeah, yeah, So now that this is the hunting public thing, So get your snoo detail MEASU truments out there. When you upload him, tag the hunting public. Sam sohold. He is a huge promoter of snood detail, So tag him. Take myself, I'm I'm interested in this. I believe the record holder for this season so far is uh Matt McCormick from Sitka. He shot a fifty two inch, which is ginormous from the little bit of uh, you know, information gathering that that I've seen. So last week I killed the forty nine inches, which is pretty good, but it's no fifty two. And so get get those snow detail measurements. Uh what do they pay? What do they pay you for this plug? Dude? H Well, the one rule they said is you're supposed to have fun and uh, you're supposed to have a loose snood when you measure it. So no stretching the snood out. Um. But let's hear those long bird measurements this season, all right? And with that, I guess we will wrap up our turkey talk of the year. Thanks, thanks guys for sticking with us. Gotta have a loose nude. And that is it for episode two eleven. Couple quick reminders. If you haven't yet left a rating or review on iTunes, please do that. It does not take very long. All you need to do is click a little star rating. If you want to leave more feedback, you can do that. We appreciate that. Um. Also, as I mentioned, a couple of weeks back. We're posting more videos over on YouTube, so make sure to subscribe to the Wired Hunt YouTube channel. And finally, I guess we'll just end this right off the bat and say thank you for listening, thanks for your attention, thanks for your time, good luck out there turkey hunting, whatever it is you're doing in the woods this time of the year. I hope you have a blast, and until next time, stay Wired to Hunt.