firehuntfish
AH fanatic
- Joined
- Sep 3, 2009
- Messages
- 762
- Reaction score
- 1,958
- Location
- Nature Coast Florida
- Media
- 355
- Member of
- SCI NRA QDMA NWTF TU DU
- Hunted
- Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, South Africa, USA, South, Central America & New Zealand
We decided to practice our favorite form of social distancing by getting away from the insanity and getting out in the woods for a couple of days. A good friend of ours who runs an outfitting business in south-central Florida invited us up to spend a couple of days hunting for an Osceola turkey. Unfortunately, his remaining turkey hunts have all cancelled due to the virus situation. Still, he was kind enough to invite us up and try for a bird that would otherwise have been reserved for a "paying" client...
We dropped my wife off at a spot on the ranch where my buddy had been seeing several mature birds. His clients had already killed two good long-beards in that section opening weekend, and they still had a couple of good birds on the trail cameras in that area. About 20 minutes after dropping her off, I was just getting set up myself when I could hear the faint blast of a shotgun in the distance. I got a text about 30 seconds later saying "bird down"....
We set her up in a known travel corridor where she put out a decoy spread and sat down in a make-shift palmetto blind. After 1 call sequence, this bird came into the decoys about 10 minutes later. He never gobbled (which is very typical of the Osceola), but sprinted into the spread after seeing the jake decoy fanned out with his hens. He was flopping on the ground at 30 yards a few seconds later... She was back at camp snapping pics with a glass of wine in hand before I even made a yelp... Although she has killed about as many turkeys as Butterball Farms, this was her first attempt at calling and hunting on her own.... I think I just lost my turkey hunting wing-man for good...
Here is a good look at the main difference between the Osceola and the Eastern subspecies... With the Osceola, the wing is primarily black with with mostly solid white bars, while the Eastern is primarily white with broken black bars...
We dropped my wife off at a spot on the ranch where my buddy had been seeing several mature birds. His clients had already killed two good long-beards in that section opening weekend, and they still had a couple of good birds on the trail cameras in that area. About 20 minutes after dropping her off, I was just getting set up myself when I could hear the faint blast of a shotgun in the distance. I got a text about 30 seconds later saying "bird down"....
We set her up in a known travel corridor where she put out a decoy spread and sat down in a make-shift palmetto blind. After 1 call sequence, this bird came into the decoys about 10 minutes later. He never gobbled (which is very typical of the Osceola), but sprinted into the spread after seeing the jake decoy fanned out with his hens. He was flopping on the ground at 30 yards a few seconds later... She was back at camp snapping pics with a glass of wine in hand before I even made a yelp... Although she has killed about as many turkeys as Butterball Farms, this was her first attempt at calling and hunting on her own.... I think I just lost my turkey hunting wing-man for good...
Here is a good look at the main difference between the Osceola and the Eastern subspecies... With the Osceola, the wing is primarily black with with mostly solid white bars, while the Eastern is primarily white with broken black bars...
