Anyone here hunt BIG woods turkeys?

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flinginairos
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Anyone here hunt BIG woods turkeys?

Unread postby flinginairos » Mon Apr 09, 2018 11:02 am

Interested to see if anyone here hunts big woods turkeys? My wife and I are planning a backpack hunt into a huge wilderness area in our state and I'm really starting to get excited/nervous about it :lol: I don't even know if there will be birds where I'm going but i'm going to give it a shot. I'll be in some of the highest elevation in our state. It's going to be mainly old growth timber and pines. My tactic is going to be get high, listen and burn the boot leather. We are going to make a scouting trip this coming weekend i'll be sure to post up what I find!


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john1984
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Re: Anyone here hunt BIG woods turkeys?

Unread postby john1984 » Mon Apr 09, 2018 11:09 am

Sounds like a great hunting adventure!
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Re: Anyone here hunt BIG woods turkeys?

Unread postby jteulker » Mon Apr 09, 2018 11:53 am

Me and a buddy did this exact thing this year in Alabama. We were in the Appalachian Mountains. We got on our birds 3 miles in! Didnt hear the first gobble until we got deep. Cam right to a call. Id say they dont hear much calling way back in. You'll have a blast!!
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flinginairos
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Re: Anyone here hunt BIG woods turkeys?

Unread postby flinginairos » Mon Apr 09, 2018 12:07 pm

jteulker wrote:Me and a buddy did this exact thing this year in Alabama. We were in the Appalachian Mountains. We got on our birds 3 miles in! Didnt hear the first gobble until we got deep. Cam right to a call. Id say they dont hear much calling way back in. You'll have a blast!!


Awesome!! We will be roughly 4 miles from the access and way up on a ridge connecting several smaller ridges. I was thinking that if there are birds in the area that they probably don't get called to that much. A definite advantage!
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Re: Anyone here hunt BIG woods turkeys?

Unread postby strutnrut716 » Mon Apr 09, 2018 12:12 pm

flinginairos wrote:
jteulker wrote:Me and a buddy did this exact thing this year in Alabama. We were in the Appalachian Mountains. We got on our birds 3 miles in! Didnt hear the first gobble until we got deep. Cam right to a call. Id say they dont hear much calling way back in. You'll have a blast!!


Awesome!! We will be roughly 4 miles from the access and way up on a ridge connecting several smaller ridges. I was thinking that if there are birds in the area that they probably don't get called to that much. A definite advantage!


Good Luck !! Will look forward to hearing your stories !
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Re: Anyone here hunt BIG woods turkeys?

Unread postby Ack » Mon Apr 09, 2018 6:11 pm

Used to hunt big woods birds back in the day....that is until I discovered that farm country birds were both bigger and easier to kill! :lol:

Sounds like you're on the right track.....get to the higher elevations at first light and listen.

Also, try your best to get the lay of the land while you are there scouting.....makes it much easier when it comes time to make a move to get in front of a bird.

Killing a big woods bird is very rewarding, no matter what the size.....best of luck!
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Re: Anyone here hunt BIG woods turkeys?

Unread postby RidgeGhost » Tue Apr 10, 2018 1:37 am

Sounds like fun man, good luck with it. I'm sure you'll enjoy it, turkey or not! Are you taking the video equip along for this trip?
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flinginairos
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Re: Anyone here hunt BIG woods turkeys?

Unread postby flinginairos » Tue Apr 10, 2018 2:15 am

RidgeGhost wrote:Sounds like fun man, good luck with it. I'm sure you'll enjoy it, turkey or not! Are you taking the video equip along for this trip?


Oh yeah for sure! 8-)
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Re: Anyone here hunt BIG woods turkeys?

Unread postby Jdw » Tue Apr 10, 2018 4:22 am

I have hunted birds in large tracts of timber in the mountains of West Virginia.

They seem to cover more ground than farm birds.

If you don't have experience hunting the area. I would look for any type of habitat changes you can find. I also find them on points near creeks.
One of the best spots I have found is a flat on top of a point between two creeks.

Sounds like a fun trip, good luck.
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Re: Anyone here hunt BIG woods turkeys?

Unread postby Abishai » Tue Apr 10, 2018 4:40 am

I do. I almost always go in cold turkey (haha) and just sit, listen, and walk, until I hear a bird. It doesn't always equal taking one home, but I almost always can find one that sends enough ice through my veins to keep me going back for more. I'm hunting about 800,000 acres of National Forest. Some spots are better than others. Sometimes I'll be on one ridge, and hear a gobble 4 ridges over. It's hard. It's fun.

Best of luck!
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Re: Anyone here hunt BIG woods turkeys?

Unread postby jteulker » Tue Apr 10, 2018 10:44 am

strutnrut716 wrote:
flinginairos wrote:
jteulker wrote:Me and a buddy did this exact thing this year in Alabama. We were in the Appalachian Mountains. We got on our birds 3 miles in! Didnt hear the first gobble until we got deep. Cam right to a call. Id say they dont hear much calling way back in. You'll have a blast!!


Awesome!! We will be roughly 4 miles from the access and way up on a ridge connecting several smaller ridges. I was thinking that if there are birds in the area that they probably don't get called to that much. A definite advantage!


Good Luck !! Will look forward to hearing your stories !


Yep it was the quickest ive had birds come to a call in a long time!
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Re: Anyone here hunt BIG woods turkeys?

Unread postby Net Guy » Tue Apr 10, 2018 11:38 am

When my dad and I hunted the Ozark mountains we needed to get off the main trails to have any success. We ended walking back 2+ miles before we heard a bird. No one else goes that far back. Once we struck the gobblers they came running right in and we got a double. I'd recommend to keep walking and calling every so often as you keep hiking. I think we would call every 30-50yards.
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Re: Anyone here hunt BIG woods turkeys?

Unread postby brancher147 » Wed Apr 11, 2018 9:53 am

I hunt a lot of big woods turkeys above 4000 ft. I am not seeing any action yet at that elevation. Hopefully your trip is in May. That is when the big woods turkey hunting starts to get good in the high mountains. Especially with the late spring this year. I was scouting today and there is still snow up there, only hit 32 degrees in the sun today. I walked 4-5 miles and only saw a few turkey tracks. But, if you can find gobblers they are usually easier to call in because they get less pressure and there are just less turkeys in general in those areas, so if you find one chances of him coming in are pretty good. The hard part is finding one... Good luck.
Some do. Some don't. I just might...


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