Thrill Kill Decoys

JAYMIE SCORES!

2010-11-18T14:37:00.000-05:00

On October 23, I was fortunate enough to shoot a pretty good buck as the sun was breaking the horizon. Before that day had really gotten started I was on my way home to get all the supplies I needed to field dress, drag, and photograph my deer.

En route to meet my brother, my girlfriend, Jaymie, sent me a simple text....."we have 2 deer to drag out now." Jaymie was hunting over a small foodplot we'd created on the edge of a wetland property my dad owns, and she'd just shot her first deer ever - and with her bow!

My brother and nephew were meeting me at dad's anyway, to ride over to where I'd shot my deer. So before we ever left dad's, we met Jaymie at her stand, and quickly followed the blood trail out to her first deer - a beautiful 2.5 year old doe.

I don't think we could have asked for a better day!

Deer Year

2010-11-18T14:24:00.000-05:00

It's funny how the deer season works out. On an early October evening I had a really good 7-pointer step out of the woods and into the corn field I was sitting over. By the time he followed the ditch bank to where I was waiting it was well past legal shooting light and I passed on the 12-yard shot opportunity.

After that I moved tree stands around, hunted hard, and watched helplessly as the corn was picked and the big 7-pointer became a memory.

For a few weeks I hunted this farm and others, but never had a sighting of even a decent buck. Then on October 23rd I hunted a great farm I've seen numerous good bucks on, but never taken one from. I snuck through a multiflora rose/honeysuckle thicket, down a path I'd cleared in August, to a new stand that I'd never been in. Before I even had an arrow on my bow I had a buck trail a doe into the thicket in the pre-dawn. Luckily, that buck stuck around until legal light, and I shot him inside of 10 yards before I even had time to get settled.

Just over a week later I had good friend Sean Collins up from Tennessee to hunt for a few days. On our first afternoon out we immediately started seeing bucks, and in just over an hour had an encounter with a decent 2.5-year old 8-pointer. Not 15 minutes later we spotted an even better buck headed our way, and I immediately recognized it at the big 7 I'd seen a month before. Long story condensed, Sean shot that buck at 25 yards after I grunted and snort-wheezed him in. It was awesome!

So I got to be part of not only my own bowkill this year, but played a role in Sean's success on the big 7-pointer that I'd spent so many hours thinking about. Like I said, it's funny how deer season works out.

My October 23 bowkill, taken just after legal light on the first sit in a new stand.

Sean Collins with his November 2 bowkill. Now that's a big 7-pointer!

PEACHES ARE IN!

2010-07-05T10:01:00.001-04:00

Fresh off the successful raspberry jelly venture, I picked up some peaches at the Plymouth Farmers' Market this past weekend. I peeled a quart, diced them finely, and put together a batch of peach jam.

There's just something sweet about a quart of diced peaches and 7 1/2 cups of sugar cooking on the stovetop!

The jam actually needed a few more peaches than the recipe called for. You can see the jars didn't have the best peach:sugar ratio! But it still tastes great!

While I was waiting to hear the lids on my jam "pop" I made supper! This was the first cucumber from the garden this year. I peeled it, sliced it, and then battered it in flour, salt, and pepper, and fried it in bacon grease! I put a little sour cream on the side, and it made a great late-evening meal. Then I ate some fresh peach preserves for dessert!

Up next - green pepper jelly!

IT'S PEANUT BUTTER JELLY TIME

2010-07-05T09:52:00.000-04:00

I'm new to making jellies and jams, but the older I get the more I like to eat. And that leads to me tinkering with things like curing, smoking, dehydrating, and even canning. The wild raspberries are ripe in northern Indiana right now, so I decided this was as good a year as any to learn to make jelly.

After the berries are picked, they need to be "steeped" to release their juice. A potato masher helps the process a little.

Then the juice is strained off by transferring the pulp into a collander with a couple of cheesecloth layers added. Letting this happen naturally, without "squeezing" the pulp, keeps the jelly clear.

The juice is measured, returned to the stock pot, with lemon juice and sugar added.

Once the sugar is melted and the mixture brought to a boil, the powdered pectin is added and the stock boiled to a temperature pushing 220 degrees.

Meanwhile, the jars and lids are sterilized.

Jars are then filled, air bubbles removed, and 2-piece lids are placed and centered. Jars are returned to the hot bath for 10 minutes of processing.

The final product is a terrific tasting wild raspberry jelly that's going to taste darned good on a buttered biscuit sometime this winter when the snow is piling up outside!

MORE FROM THE ARCHERY SHOP

2010-06-15T11:31:00.000-04:00

In the colder months my basement is a makeshift taxidermy shop where I put together full mount turkey deeks. But when it's warm out, I'd rather be outside shooting my bow. It's then that my basement gets reogranized into an archery shop. This past weekend I put my nephew's bow back together after his string mysteriously came off (dry fire maybe?). I then found a broken serving that needed fixed, adjusted a small cam timing issue, waxed string and cables, and installed new string silencers. After about an hour of fiddling around, Brandon was back on the range stacking arrows. I love this stuff!

One of the age-old debates that seems to kick up every now and then when I work on equipment for folks centers around what makes a better hunting arrow - a super fast lightweight arrow, or a slower, heavier projectile. For my part, statistics show that the vast majority of Midwest whitetails, my chief fall target, are bow-killed from inside 30 yards. Range estimation isn't extremely critical or difficult at those sub-30 distances, so in my mind, blazing arrow speeds aren't needed. I'd much rather shoot a mid-weight or heavy shaft at slower speeds, which translates to better transfer of kinetic energy when the broadhead meets the deer. The deadliest rig I probably ever shot was a 29 inch 2317 aluminum arrow tipped with a 150 grain Snuffer cut-on-contact broadhead. That thing would shoot through a 55 gallon drum. Slow, but MEAN!

Here's the simple formula for measuring kinetic energy:

Another often overlooked part of successful bow/arrow set-up is the flight of broadhead tipped arrows. Broadheads must be spin-tested to the arrow, insuring that the arrow spins perfectly true with the broadhead installed. If it doesn't, adjustments need to be made to correct the causitive factor (untrue insert face, one slightly longer blade in a replacement-blade broadhead, simple debris on the broadhead ferrule). I make sure every broadhead arrow I put in my quiver spins on my caloused palm without any wobble of any kind. I prefer feeling the spin to looking at it in a tester.

And given real-world conditions of poor releases, wind, flinches, twigs/grass in the arrow's path, etc, an arrow that is forward-weighted will perform much better than one that is balanced near its center. In other words, the arrow should have a front of center balance of no less than about 8%, and somewhere in the 10 - 12% range is generally better (providing the arrow has sufficient spine to accomodate it). The transition to 100 and 85 grain broadheads has created some FOC issues, since lighter tips reduce FOC, all things being equal. But the advent of small, Blazer-type vanes has somewhat reversed this trend. At any rate, anyone putting a bow hunting arrow together should take FOC balance into consideration.

Here's the simple formula for measuring FOC:

I once had a medical doctor friend that spent nearly $1000 on a new bow, rest, sights and so on. But when bow season rolled around, he had 3 different shaft types in his quiver, with 2 different broadhead designs (some 125 grain and the others 100 grains) adorning them. And nothing was overly straight or sharp. I was dumbfounded, and spent 30 minutes lecturing him and another hour or setting up 4 matching hunting arrow. If you're serious about shooting animals with a bow, pay attention to more than just your bow. The arrows and broadheads are the only part that hit the animal, so no matter how pretty/fast/expensive your bow is, performance is measured at the broadhead end of your shot.

TINKERING

2010-06-09T12:26:00.000-04:00

I like to tinker with archery equipment. I got my first bow before I turned 10 - a Bear Blue Denim compound (I still have it). I still remember my dad and brother trying to change the draw length for me out in the front yard. Dad forced the limbs together while Ricky moved the cable ends to holes drilled in the eccentric brackets bolted to the ends of the limbs. It came from Target in South Bend. I shot it so much that dad realized I was serious.

When it became obvious that I'd outgrown the Blue Denim, dad consulted with a cousin, Billy Joe Risner, who had his own basement pro shop, and was notorious for trying out the latest-and-greatest bow gear. He directed dad in purchasing my first REAL bow, a Martin Cougar Magnum. That Martin still ranks as one of the top 5 gifts of my life, and I still have it. The craftmanship is exquisite, and every year I toy with the idea of setting it up and killing another deer with it.

Anyway, I've been hooked on archery since I was a little boy, and my affliction doesn't seem to improve. I recently bought a new bow press that handles the modern parallel limb bows, and this week built a prototype draw board to help look at cam timing, cam lean issues, nock travel, draw force curve dynamics, and much more. I'll eventually have my brother help me build a metal (welded) frame instead of the wood variety I'm experimenting with, but the fun is in refinement!

As an example, I put my Hoyt ProTec on the draw board last night, and used the draw lenght/weight data to build this draw force curve table:

It shows the bow has a pretty gradual build to peak, a wide peak top, and a fairly gradual shift down to the wall. This curve doesn't show it, but the bow has a very narrow valley at full draw. Taking peak draw weight (44 pounds) and subtracting holding weight (16 pounds) gives the let-off amount of 28 pounds. Dividing 28 by 44 and multiplying by 100 gives the percent let-off of 63.6%.

I'll compare these numbers with those of my new Maxxis when I get a chance. Note that I've shortened the ProTec up as much as the cam modules and cable/string twisting will allow, and backed the limb bolts out as far as possible. I'm setting the bow up for a beginning adult archer that needs low draw length and weight.

THE 2010 LINE-UP

2010-05-14T15:13:00.001-04:00

I'm not a "numbers" guy. Honest. When someone this spring asked me how many turkeys I've killed in my life, I honestly couldn't give them the number. I have a strong guess (and it's not that many), but even now at only 39 years old, the events of years-gone-by are beginning to escape me.

So for the sake of posterity, here's the list of 2010 birds that now reside in my freezer, and in all cases but 1, at least 1 picture.

TENNESSEE

April 8 - A jake was the first bird to fall this year. My trigger finger was itchy, and he was gobbling at a train going through on the next ridge over. I shot him in the bean while he had his head stretched out. No picture.

April 10 - Killed a good 3-year old as part of the Governor's One-Shot Turkey Hunt gala. The hunter I was guiding killed a jake earlier in the day, and was willing to hang in there with me until I got this bird within gun range. Video to follow!

April 13 - This was a 2-year old that should have been part of a double, but my good friend missed a chip-shot. I happens to us all. Chalk it up to tight chokes. Video to follow!

INDIANA

April 21 - This was a 3-year old that came in silent to whack my tom decoy, and was my only bow kill of the year. I shot him in the head at 10 yards, but only scratched him. Well, I didn't know that at the time, but as he walked slowly away following the first shot, I decided to anchor him with a second. That arrow, delivered at about 28 yards, hit him stern-to-stem. I'd love to share the video on this one, but I hit the "record" button twice, and have all of 1 second of video. I was almost physically ill.

KANSAS

April 26 - The first Rio of the year fell as part of a double. My hunting buddy on this trip was Bob Allen, 4-H agent in Clark County, IN. Bob and I roosted this pair of 2-year old birds the night before, and got right between them and a longbeard with some hens that roosted on the opposite side of the field. They strutted so close to one another when they got to the decoys that we almost didn't get to shoot. Luckily, it eventually worked out. Cool stuff! Video to follow.

Bob killed his second Rio that night, within 200 yards of where the morning pair fell. No picture, but video to follow!

April 27 - The second Rio was a solid 3-year old with good color. I'm not sure how far he came to get to us, but a jake actually walked him in, and the jake came from nearly 600 yards away - we watched him come every step of the way. The jake bred the hen decoy, fed around, came back to snuggle with the hen decoy, fed again, went away, came back, then went away again. I kept him gobbling most of the time, and when he came back for the 3rd time, he was towing this longbeard behind. Sorry, no video!

So that's it. Six birds for the year, 5 of them longbeards. Bob can tell you, when my 2nd Kansas Rio hit the ground, I was fired up. Shooting turkeys never gets old!

UNSUNG HEROES!

2010-04-16T10:50:00.000-04:00

Spring turkey season brings to hunters a natural fixation on those hard-gobbling, long-spurred, thick-bearded male birds. Gobbler induced wonderlust drives my spring travels across a good part of the Midwest each year, and I know I'm not alone!

But to be perfectly honest, I enjoy watching hens almost as much as toms. Since you can't shoot them in the spring (unless of course they have beards), there's no anxiety associated with having them in the decoys. Just like toms, they have a pecking order instinct that often causes them to do mean and nasty things to the decoys. They can be mouthy, nervous, and in some cases, downright psychotic. And besides, they're just plain beautiful.

Here are a few hen shots from my recent trip to Tennessee. Hen turkeys - the unsung heroes of the spring!

They really are fun to watch! And almost everything I've learned about calling turkeys I learned from wild hens. They're great teachers - and entertainers. So when you head to the turkey woods this spring, rejoice in every hen you see!

IF 1 BEARD IS GOOD, 2 MUST BE GREAT!

2010-04-06T08:55:00.001-04:00

Here it is, the first confirmed Thrill Kill of the year! It was made by Greg Thomas, a 2010 decoy buyer from Tennessee. He bought a TK hen a few weeks ago, then decided he'd like a TK tom deek to round out his spread.

Well, turns out Greg is a good sport, because when UPS delivered the red-headed longbeard last Thursday, there were a few, um, issues. The box had been smashed, the wooden base had been forced through the box, the decoy's head was bent way out of place, and the tail was cracked up. Greg did a little in-home surgery and got the decoy into fighting shape again, and the pictures below show he did a great job.

So congrats to Greg on this awesome Tennessee double-beard, with a bow (at 14 yards)!

PREPARED TO LAUNCH!

2010-04-01T15:46:00.002-04:00

Anyone remember the Beggin' Strips commercial where the dog is about to blow a gasket 'cause he smells bacon in the house? (hint: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CErapf79rqM&feature=related). I sorta feel like that now that my first turkey hunt vacation of the year is close enough to, well, "sniff". I've been working overtime in the basement, trying to keep up with decoy orders, plus have enough new stock to use for myself this spring.

Here are the last 2 mounts I've built. At the time these pictures were taken they still didn't have legs, but I've since remedied that minor issue and these bad boys are ready to do their thing! They're very similar, except for slight differences in overall body size and head posture/position. The one on the bottom will be staying with me!

And I'm currently working with the owner of BagRBuck (http://www.bagrbuck.com/) to incorporate a tail mechanism that goes from down and folded to up and full strut with the pull of a string. It's going to be slick! We actually meet near Nashville next Wednesday to finish off a couple of prototype deeks, with hopes of getting some live hunting footage to use in product promotion in the coming year. I'll definitely blog it, so keep your eyes open.

Best of luck to everyone this spring - those of you that have already started, and those of us that are prepared to launch our 2010 hunts!

TWRF'S TENNESSEE GOVERNOR'S ONE SHOT TURKEY HUNT

2010-03-11T15:08:00.000-05:00

Several years ago fate brought Andy Edwards to the Fulton County (Indiana) Soil & Water Conservation District's annual meeting. Fate had also directed me there as the guest speaker, to talk about the success of wild turkey reintroduction in northern Indiana. Andy and I met after the banquet that night, found we had a great deal in common, and have been hunting buddies ever since.

Well, in those early years Andy worked as the Pheasants Forever biologist in Indiana, but he and I would travel to his home town of Pulaski each spring to turkey hunt. While we were there, we'd normally attend the Tennessee Governor's One Shot Turkey Hunt banquet. Andy used to joke about how he could take that event to the next level if he was in charge.

Well, this is one of those "be careful what you ask for" moments. Two years ago Andy signed on with the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Foundation, and these days one of his chief responsibilities is coordinating the Governor's Hunt/Banquet right there in his home town. Strange, but true!

Last year Andy asked if I'd donate a full-mount decoy for the event, and I glady contributed. This year I'm donating again, and Andy has been kind enough to add my blogsite link on the website for the Governor's hunt. So I'm doing likewise. If you're in Tennessee on April 10, you really should plan to at least attend the banquet. Years ago it was fun. Now that Andy's in charge, it's a full-fledged party!

http://www.twrf.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=33:turkey-hunt&catid=19:events&Itemid=12

And I can't wait to get to get there to be part of it!

A good day in Giles County, TN. Ben Jones, Dennis Edwards, and me!

The Hallelujah Longbeard

2010-02-15T11:25:00.000-05:00

If you've hunted turkeys for long, you've probably had at least one very memorable bird strut its way into your life. Whether it strutted back out or not may be part of the overall memory, but I tend to best recall the longbeards I was able to carry out over my shoulder. Here's one that was on the losing end of Devine Intervention. Really. After all, it's my story...

In 2007 my brother accompanied me on a trip to my favorite out-of-state turkey stomping grounds, Pulaski, Tennessee. Early in our trip, Ricky and I each killed respectable longbeards, but then the weather pulled off wet and cool, and the birds got tight-lipped. We spent a couple of days running-and-gunning various parts of Giles County, but to no avail. Late on a Saturday afternoon I took a forced march to a green field about a mile behind the house we were staying in, and retreated deep into my GoreTex as a late-day drizzle turned into something like rain.

Nestled under an old "wolf" oak tree on a pasture fence row, I let the frustrations of the past 2 days soak in. Truth be told, if I'd been back home in Indiana I'd have headed back to the house. But since I was on a turkey hunting trip, after all, and had paid the hefty cost of the out-of-state license, I guilted myself into staying put.

To occupy the time, while I prayed for day to fade to dark post-haste, I did my best to catch a nap. Try as I might, the incessant roll of raindrops off the bill of my camo baseball cap kept me suspended in that melatonin-hazed netherworld, just between wakefulness and full sleep.

After a few neck-jerking exercises, I started to pull hard toward full consciousness. With my eye lids balancing about 50-50 between open and closed, I started to rally around the thought that I was hearing far-off gobbling. Eventually my brain and ears collaborated on that distant noise and concluded that it was indeed gobbling I was hearing. After 2 days of sitting the bench, I was back in the turkey hunting game!

I hit my feet, grabbed my weathered 870 and headed toward the long, narrow-spined wooded ridge that I knew the bird was on. It was 30 minutes before sundown, and I suspected the overcast conditions would bring dark to the Tennessee hills just a little sooner than usual.

Knowing the terrain, I was expecting the gobbler to head right down the spine of the ridge he was on, ending up in a fairly broad and open flat at the ridge's northern terminus. And I knew that if I didn't double-time it I'd never make it there without him seeing me cross the pasture valley between "his" ridge and the one I was currently standing on.

As I stopped to catch my breath, and course the bird, I was encouraged to hear him still gobbling - alot. But it didn't take long to figure out that he was stalled out on the ridge, and already too close to the flat for me to get there. I was going to have to roost him and come back in the morning - or was I?

No sooner than I'd caught my breath, the gobbler turned and headed back south. Both his ridge and mine curved away to the west as they ran south, and I thought there might just be a chance that I could get around him and cut him off in the last 20-odd minutes of the day. I could stay put and roost him from a distance, or go after him and try to get the job done. If I didn't kill him, I'd at least get close enough to him to know which tree he was in for a morning set-up. I started the 1/2 mile end-around.

The first part of the run was easy - mostly down-hill, and all in open fields or on well-worn cattle paths. But getting back up the hogsback ridge that loudmouthed gobbler was on nearly popped the lungs on this Indiana flatlander. But with every gobble I felt more and more like I was being taunted, so on I went.

When I finally reached the top the bird was still gobbling, but it quickly became obvious that in going far enough past him to insure I wouldn't accidentally bump him, I'd blown any chance of killing him before dark. As that reality, like evening darkness, was settling in, the sound of distant wingbeats cut through the heavy, damp Tennessee air. Despite my heaving lungs, I held my breath, hoping I wasn't the cause of those wing sounds I was hearing. A few seconds of waiting allayed my fears - "g-g-g-g-o-o-o-o-o-b-b-b-b-b-b-l-l-l-l-l-l-e-e-e-e-e-e-". He was roosted, and no more than 75 yards from where I stood, panting.

I eased forward, slow and steady. Just a few yards down the old ridge-top logging lane, I spied him, all alone, and still singing his one-word song. Content with my afternoon's progress, I turned around and began the long walk back to my home-away-from-home. It was poker night back at the house, and with a lonley, loud-mouthed tom roosted, I was feeling plenty lucky!

The plan for the morning was simple. I was going right back to where I'd stood at dark the night before, and let my brother have the north end of the ridge in that open hardwood flat toms so enjoy strutting in. We figured that if I didn't kill him at flydown, he'd head back out the ridge, and right into Ricky's lap. Foolproof. Foolproof?

As the eastern horizon slowly brightened, I settled quietly into the fold of a ridgetop oak and waited for the show to start. As expected, the longbeard, still in the same tree - different limb - sounded off only slightly after the neighborhood songbirds started in. There I was, undetected and within 75 yards of a head that begged for jellying.

He didn't wait long to fly down. I somehow managed to keep my diaphragm call in my cheek until he hit the ground. Then I gave a soft series of yelps that was met with an instant, roaring response. I felt almost guilty; this was going to be easy.

This has become a long story, so let me hasten the ending a bit. Instead of walking into my lap, that longbeard "yo-yo'ed" back and forth between my brother and me, always staying just out of shotgun range of either of us. Just as I'd expect to hear my brother's gun break the Sunday morning stillness, I'd hear the gobbles coming back my way. We were being played!

Nearly an hour into the hunt I decided it was time to make a move. After all, I'd only stayed put this long because my brother was on the other end of the ridge. With my anxiety growing I reasoned that even if I bumped the bird he'd still end up in Ricky's vicinity. So as the sound of gobbles became ever-more distant, I made that bent-over shuffle we've all made, from tree to tree, cover to cover. I advanced my position about 75 yards and settled back in.

Sure enough, it wasn't 2 minutes before that darned bird reveresed course and headed right back my way. I gave him a few reassuring yelps, then stuck my call back in my left cheek, while bringing the gun to my right. And sure enough, here he came. I was going to get a shot - but as it turns out, it wasn't going to be easy.

About 50 yards up the ridge the old road split, with an almost undetectable old lane running west, downslope, toward a small pasture field. Instead of walking into my lap, the gobbler veered to his right and proceeded to edge off the ridgetop. I knew the distance was "iffy," but the woods was clean and clear, and I had him dead in my sights. With a squeeze of the trigger I sent a swarm of Federal Heavyweight #6 shot downrange. I was hitting my feet as the old ridgerunner was hitting the leaves.

This is where it get's almost surreal. The bird was flopping, and I didn't want his downhill momentum to give him any chance of escaping. With sleep-tingled legs, I stumbled my way to my feathered prize as fast as I could. I'd no more than gotten my hands around the longbeard's legs than, as loud and clear as if I'd been standing under a church steeple, the sound of the Hallelujah Chorus came spilling in over the south Tennessee hills.

Standing there, hands on turkey legs, I let out a whoop to reassure my brother that he could get up and head my way. Then I simply stood there while Handel's famous overture filled the air. The timing was so perfect that I figured the Good Lord must have willed this turkey into my life. Now I know, sceptics will say that Christ Himself wouldn't do such a thing, but if you'd been there that morning, praying like I was for the chance to put a tag on that longbeard's leg, you'd know Devine Intervention is possible, even in the turkey woods!

This is the church from my story - see the loudspeakers on top?!

To better explain the source of the music, one ridge over from where I was hunting stands a beautiful old country church. In fact, it's the one my friends Andy and Audra were married in. Each Sunday morning their loudspeaker system broadcasts beautiful praise music across the entire neighborhood before the Sunday services start. It just so happens that the first song that Sunday morning coincided with that longbeard singing his last praises; If I hadn't already been a convert, I can promise you I'd have become one that day!

Hallelujah indeed!

JAKE BREAK

2010-02-12T15:44:00.003-05:00

I'm not too proud to say I've shot a jake (or 4 or 5) in my turkey hunting career. In Tennessee a few seasons back I killed 2 on consecutive days. I'm trigger happy, and make no apologies for it. But I don't normally try to transfer my blood lust onto others. I say that as preface to the video you're about to watch, taken on my 2009 trip to Tennessee.

The hunter is Sean Collins, and this hunt took place on his farm in Giles County. Tennessee regulations allow a hunter to kill 4 spring birds, and at the start of this hunt, Sean had already tagged 3 April longbeards. That previous trio fell to the miracle of modern smokeless powder; for the 4th, Sean was toting his Hoyt Alpha Max.

When a gang of jakes showed up in our decoys spread, Sean decided, without any help from me, to thin the juvenile population a little. But he needed 2 tries!

Hey, sometimes it's nice to take a break from the pressures of chasing limbhangers!

BLACK HILLS AND WHITE STRIPES

2010-02-09T12:11:00.000-05:00

Several years back my brother and I took a May trip to the Black Hills of South Dakota to chase the subspecies of turkey named in honor of the late zoologist, Clinton Hart Merriam.

Meliagris gallopavo meriami, or the Merriam's wild turkey, is one of the 5 subspecies of wild turkeys that compose the slam most turkey hunters aspire to. Our 2002 trip was the first time either my brother or I efforted to bag this beautiful, white-accented cousin of the Eastern subspecies we routinely chase back home here in Indiana.

While the weather was fickle, and the birds scattered, we did have a great time in the beautiful western hill country of South Dakota. Ricky managed to tag a nearly-beardless 2-year old tom during a snowstorm, but try as I might, I couldn't connect. It was an awesome trip, regardless, and I wasn't even back in Indiana yet when I started making plans to go back.

So in 2003 I returned to the Black Hills with another hunting buddy of mine, Andy Edwards. Just 2 days into our week-long trip, Andy managed to connect on a beautiful bird that I had heard gobbling at dark the night before. Andy and I spent the next few days driving around the Hills in search of another lonely longbeard, eventually ending up back at our jumping-off point near the town of Lead.

The last day of the hunt Andy dropped me off, before daylight, in a spot that had proved to hold birds the year before. His plan was to trout fish most of the day, but check in on me at noon, and every 2 hours after that, in case I killed a bird. We had a designated meeting spot about 3/4 mile up the access road from where I was hunting, and Andy planned to spend about 15 minutes sitting tight each trip in, giving me a little flexibility for showing up.

At about 2:10 that afternoon, I was surprised to see my white Ford truck coming across the valley bottom I was watching. I stood up and waved for Andy, and he quickly drove to meet me. "Man, I was sitting in the truck playing tennis on my cell phone when a longbeard started up within 50 yards of the truck. I figured I'd better come see if you wanted to go after him."

That's all it took. By 2:20 I was sliding off the bumper while Andy drove on. But try as I might, I couldn't seem to strike that bird. I did a nearly mile-long end-around, covering the entire circumference of the roadside "bowl" Andy had heard him in earlier. In disgust, I walked back down the logging road and stood at our pre-arranged pick-up spot to wait for Andy to come back. The only problem was, in our hurry to get back to the bird before he shut up, we hadn't make any plan for exactly when Andy would return.

As it turns out, it didn't matter. No more than I'd hit the bend in the road where I'd been dropped off, that longbeard lit up all on his own about 1/4 mile east of where I stood. He was in a big cutover, full of a thick stand of pine regrowth. I headed up-hill to get above him, hoping I could make him come back toward the road where Andy had heard him earlier.

My first set of yelps got a quick response. By now the bird had been gobbling just fine on his own, but when I gave him the proper incentive, he started a darned-near maddening series of gobbles that would last until I pulled the trigger nearly 90 minutes later.

The hill I was climbing, now trying to cut him off as he streaked back my way, was the tallest and steepest around. Try as I might, I couldn't get to the top, or even far enough around the side, to get in front of him. Gobbling with every breath, that Merriam's longbeard proceeded right around me on the opposite side of the hill, then across the road and back into the bowl he'd been in when Andy first heard him.

I followed. He gobbled. I snuck closer. He moved away. I followed. He gobbled. I snuck closer. He moved away. This cat-and-mouse game went on for over an hour, with me worrying all the while that Andy would drive back up the road and bump the bird in the process.

Then, with only about 30 minutes of legal shooting light left, the tom crossed back over the road and started making his way east toward a mature stand of conifers. I figured he was headed to roost, and I might just as well see where. If Andy was willing, I could extend our trip by 1 morning, hoping to get a crack at this roosted bird.

So as the longbeard started putting ground between me and him, still gobbling his fool head off, I crossed the road and headed straight back uphill, hoping to get high enough to give him a good listen. In over 70 minutes of chasing him, I still hadn't layed eyes on him. For me, just seeing him was going to be a moral victory.

As I dashed toward the crest of the hill, I could tell the bird had changed his course a little. Slowing down to get a better fix on him, I was stunned to figure out that he was actually getting CLOSER. And, he wasn't wasting any time in doing it. I parked my camoed hind end against the nearest pine tree, and heart racing, barrel swaying, pointed upslope toward the approaching turkey.

At about 40 yards that gobbler finally showed himself, strutting down off the edge of an old logging lane. It took me a second to comprehend that he was actually standing there, in full bloom, with nothing between me and him but the clean cool May air of the Black Hills. "Never shoot a strutting bird" did enter my mind - for a second - when I centered my sights on his slick, red, strutting head.

I did pay him the courtesy of letting him touch off one last gobble before I snapped that thin clean line between sear and firing pin. As my payload arrived, feathers flew, and the gobbler started rolling downhill. I pounced. Only a couple of hours before I was facing the reality of going home from my second South Dakota trip without tagging a bird. I wasn't about to let this one get his feet, or wings, under him.

Post-mortem pictures show that, in my exuberance, that tom lost a few neck feathers. About 4 days earlier I'd poked fun at Andy for "denuding" the bird he shot as it flopped toward the edge of a pretty deep ravine. I knew the payback was going to stink, but with a huge "whoop" of relief I threw my partially-plucked longbeard over my shoulder and darn-near floated the 100 yards back to the access road.

No sooner had my boots hit the gravel then Andy came driving up. I figured he'd been waiting patiently back at the main road and heard my shot-and-holler. Turns out, he was just coming back in to check on me. Had he done so 5 minutes earlier he'd have ruined my hunt for sure. As it turns out, his timing was perfect.

It was nearly dark before we could start snapping pictures, but I'm not sure there were 2 happier turkey hunters anywhere in the Black Hills that night. As we drove back into Lead to get a hotel room - and a for-real shower (not just milkjugs of water dumped over our heads), we kept reliving the highlights of our trip. As we dug deep into the back of the truck for our "going to town" clothes, I asked Andy where he'd put my gun. Let's just say that Andy got the first shower that night. I got to drive 30 miles back out to the top of a nice green hillside, complete with scattered, white-tipped feathers, to retrieve my favorite fowling piece. It's a trip I'd make again in a heartbeat.

DEER DAZE

2010-01-07T18:58:00.001-05:00

It's official - Indiana deer season is now closed. The late archery season ended on Sunday, January 3. In an earlier post I shared a few photographs from the 2009 season. While looking around for some turkey images, I ran across a folder with several deer photos from years past, and thought I'd share a few. Some day I'll scan in some images from the pre-digital camera era, if for no other reason than to prove that I once had a full head of hair! Note: The photo comes first, the year/hunter/story after.

2007 - Archery: Randy Dickson (that's me)

This deer doesn't carry the biggest rack, but he did have great mass and was 5.5 years old (by tooth wear and replacement criteria). He also happened to be HUGE of body. We didn't have a way to weigh him, but I've killed 3 bucks that dressed over 200 lbs, and this one was far bigger than any of those. He also had a really cool hole in the back of his right main beam, with the beam being porous way out toward the tip.

2008 - Archery: Eric Sampson

Eric killed this deer while hunting with me in northern Indiana's Marshall County. The buck nets right at 140, which is awfully solid for an 8-pointer. As you can see, the deer had great mass throughout. While we were taking pictures, my brother called to tell me he'd just shot a buck with his bow......keep reading!

2008 - Archery: Rick Dickson

Ricky shot this deer late in the morning, approaching noon, well after most guys have normally left the woods. This is proof positive that when you're hunting good habitat in early-November, all-day sits should be the norm. This deer grossed in the mid-160s. He was absolutely worn out from chasing does - skin and bones - but his antlers didn't shrink any!

2001 - Archery: Randy Dickson

I killed this buck mid-afternoon on November 7 (my favorite day to be in a stand). He was with a doe that was coming into estrus, but hadn't quite made it yet. After pushing her around, out of range, for nearly 2 hours, the doe finally walked past my stand. He wasn't so lucky! It was nearly 70 degees that day - don't let a little thing like warm weather keep you from hunting (especially when the rut is kicking in).

2005 - Archery: Rick Dickson

A good, clean harvest of a nice 3.5 year old buck. My brother has since learned to pass these 120 inch bucks up - I'm not quite there yet!

2002 - Shotgun: Wally Palmer

This buck came out of standing corn to a ground blind set-up Wally had on opening day of the 2002 Indiana firearm season. The buck was approaching Wally's decoy, with bad intentions, when Wally sealed the deal. This is one of those deer that proves net score doesn't always measure the quality of a buck.

2003 - Archery: Randy Dickson

This is by no means a monster deer. But that's a monster smile on the face of my nephew, Brandon. I settled into a fresh stand at 12:30 p.m. on a cool early-November afternoon. By 1:00 p.m. I was walking out, having heard this buck "crash up" in standing corn boardering the woodlot where I'd just shot him. Talk about quick! When I drove to dad's to see if he'd give me a hand, my brother and nephew happened to be there. It was great to have 3 generations of Dickson deer hunters go make the recovery!

2008 - Shotgun: Baleigh Dickson
And in the air of saving the best for last, this is my niece with her first-ever deer. She killed it on opening day of the '08 Indiana firearm season. It was a perfect double-lung shot at 40 yards, and the buck piled up in the thick stuff about 30 yards from where he was standing when Baleigh let fly. The buck was a heavy-based 2-year old 9-point, and as the smile shows, Baleigh was happy to take him. And the best part of all (for me) was that I got to be in the tree with her when she pulled the trigger! The smile behind the camera was as big as the one in front of it!

There you are - a few of the deer that helped make the memories that drive me, my family, and friends back to the deer woods each fall. If you aren't part of the grand deer hunting fraternity, you probably don't understand why we cherish these moments so much!

OF WOOD STOVES AND DECOYS

2010-01-07T17:25:00.000-05:00

When the weather is nice, I tend to keep busy outside. Mounting turkeys in the confines of the basement workshop doesn't seem like much fun when I could be squirrel hunting, gardening, fixing fence, managing food plots, cutting firewood - you get the point. But now that winter weather has really kicked in here in northern Indiana, spending evenings and weekends in the shop - 10 feet from the wood stove - seems like a pretty good alternative to making snotty "beardcicles" while shoveling out the driveway.

In December, I finished mounting the last of my client orders for 2009. Now I'm mounting turkeys that I killed, or were donated to me by family and friends. Once finished, these birds will be: 1) sold; 2) donated to NWTF functions; 3) used in the upcoming spring season. And the reality is that unless winter lasts until August, I'll never get around to mounting all the turkeys I have in my freezer. Right now I'm thawing out my 2009 spring Indiana bird. Once he's finished there will be a roughly12 more wild bird capes left to go, plus a few wild-colored domestics.

My 2009 Indiana tom - the next bird to become a Thrill Kill Decoy!

Last week I finished a bird donated by good friend and hunting buddy, Sean Collins. Sean lives in Giles County, Tennessee, and was kind enough to let me kill a good tom on his farm in 2009 (another one I haven't "decoyed" yet). When we finished that hunt, Sean said he had a bird in the freezer he'd been saving for me if I wanted it. I've learned never to pass up a wild bird in good condition. Turns out, not only was it in great shape, but the bird had extraordinary color. It's the prettiest bird I've mounted in a long time.

So as I finish each successive decoy, I'll post a few pictures. If I was involved in the demise of the bird, I'll even share the hunting story that goes with it. For the next several weeks I'll keep warm - and busy - in the basement, all the while wishing spring would hurry up and get here!

Snow might be flying outside, but in my mind I see decoy spreads and spring weather!

Beardzilla Lives!

2009-12-17T13:55:00.001-05:00

I mentioned in a previous blog that my niece and I video taped, on the opening day of the 2009 Indiana deer firearm season, a tom turkey with an unusually wide beard. I won't describe him any further - the video can do all the talking. Let's just say, in Bill Winke fashion, that this one will be on the "hit list" come April, 2010.

And the follow-up good news is that Ricky (brother) and Brandon (nephew) saw this bird and his running buddy on December 12 while checking muskrat traps. They let me know about their sighting in a very simple text message - Beardzilla Lives!

I will note, if you listen to the audio, that this bird initially fooled me. I thought he had multiple beards, but that his overall beard length wasn't exceptionally long. By the time he left the field I'd come to my senses. I think he has just one really wide beard, and that it's easily longer than average. Doesn't really matter - he's a hoss!

Head Case!

2009-12-17T09:31:00.004-05:00

As mentioned in a previous post, I think there are lots of reasons that a well-constructed full-mount decoy out-performs all other types of deeks. But it all boils down to realism, and one of the principal components in making a decoy look life-like is the head.

Thrill Kill Decoys are built using cast heads, as opposed to freeze-dried heads. We do this simply because we feel the cast heads are more durable and thus last longer. They're also fairly easy to repair (when your niece puts holes in them while gunning down her spring longbeard).

A finished hen head and an unpainted tom head

Taxidermists that use cast heads can purchase pre-painted heads, or choose to paint their own. For me, it takes about 90 minutes to complete a paint job, start to finish. (Full-time taxidermists can probably cut that in half.) Comparing the value of my time and materials to the added cost of a pre-painted head (about $25 more than an unpainted head), I feel I benefit financially from doing my own painting. But more than that, using an airbrush to recreate a head color scheme that fools live birds is professionally rewarding, and that's hard to put a price on.

An unpainted head comes to the shop as an essentially white casting, with ultra-realistic glass eyes pre-set. We prep the head to insure our laquer-based paint will readily stick, and then begin the painting process. When we've finished, we clean the eyes of overspray and let the head dry before spraying a sealer on it (normally about 24 hours post-painting). It's amazing how a decoy head "comes to life" once the overspray has been removed from the eyes - another reason why full-mount decoys are so much more realistic than cheap plastic birds.

A wide range of paint colors are needed to paint a turkey head - tom or hen

A small "hobby" compressor will easily drive an airbrush

If you have any artistic ability, you might want to give head painting a try. If nothing else, you can use an airbrush to repaint the heads on your plastic deeks. After all, plastic decoys are mass-produced, which means they are "fast-produced", and in the overseas shops that most deeks are made in, quantity, not quality, is the objective.

After all, if you were a wary old gobbler (or hen), which one would most likely fool you?

A Turkey Hunter Is Born!

2009-12-09T11:38:00.000-05:00

My best turkey hunting buddy (next to my niece, Baleigh), is one Andy Edwards of Pulaski, Tennessee.

A couple of years back he had the great good fortune of finding a beautiful girl (Audra) with limited vision and even more limited judgement, and eventually convinced her to marry him. He outkicked his coverage, married up, fell in it. You get the point.

Well, his life got even better today. He and Audra welcomed their first child into the world at approximately 7:00 a.m. today. And Andrew Henry Edwards, at 8 lb 11.8 oz and 22.25 inches long, is a BIG addition to the Edwards' family.

Congratulations to Andy and Audra, and welcome to Andrew, who I know will grow up lucky to have a daddy that loves the outdoors, and sharing outdoor experiences with those around him. In that respect, baby Andrew and I are both blessed to have Andy in our lives.

DECOY TIME!

2009-12-04T14:13:00.000-05:00

Now that it's starting to get cold out (finally), I'll be stoking the basement wood stove more often and spending nights and weekends putting decoys together. I ordered supplies from Van Dyke's Taxidermy Supply today, and stopped by the local WalMart and Lowe's Home Improvement store for other odds and ends.

Andy Edwards holding a tom I killed in Tennessee in spring, 2009. His spurs will stay at home, but the rest of the bird will be a decoy available for purchase in the coming weeks!

There are still a few client-killed birds to turn into deeks, but I have several donated birds that will be mounted for sale to whoever wants them. The 2010 pricing will remain $300 for a tom or hen decoy, and $500 for a tom/hen pair. Anyone that's interested is welcome to email me at thrillkilldecoys@live.com

And as always, if you'd like to know more about full-mount decoys than this blog tells you, just drop me a line! Just don't ask for trade secrets!

2008 Hen Decoy covered with our custom carrying bag

Propper skinning is the first step to any good turkey mount. Email for tips!

DEER ARE FUN TOO!

2009-12-04T13:56:00.000-05:00

I've never been able to decide which I'd pick if I had to choose between spring turkey hunting and fall bowhunting for whitetails. But I'm leaning toward spring turkeys (at least now that the rut is over).

Friends know that I have an itchy trigger finger, so despite hunting some of the best whitetail habitat in northern Indiana, I tend to shoot 120 inch bucks with a bow rather than waiting it out, risking an unnotched tag come season's end. This year was no different! On November 8 I shot a decent 3.5 year old 6 x 4 buck that will gross around 130 and net around 120. No great shakes.

But luckily, just like in 2008, my brother upheld family honor in the deer woods. His 2009 deer, a 6 x 6 with a brow tine sticker, will run in the mid-140's. But he used a shotgun, so there has to be some "shotgun shrinkage" thrown in! How 'bout a standard 20 inches? Or maybe 1 inch for every yard outside of bow range the deer was standing when he got shot (about 50 yards/inches, in this case). Either way, it was a beautiful animal (and I'm probably just jealous!).

Best of all though is the giant 4 x 4, with between 9 and 11 scoreable stickers, that happened to get himself run over on State Road 14 on the east side of Winamac, Indiana. This buck died in the yard of my brother's inlaws. His mom-in-law called him to see if he wanted it, and I was lucky enough to get a text to see if I'd help recover and skin this deer (Ricky and his daughter were on their way out for an afternoon deer hunt). One road-kill tag from the local police later, we had a goregous European mount prepping in my brother's pole building. He'll tape out around 170 gross non-typical inches. It's too bad a brute like this had to meet his fate on the business end of a bumper, but at least he ended up in the hands of a family that will truly appreciate him.

And thanks to deer season, my niece and I were able to get video of a tom turkey on November 14 that we hope sticks around until spring. In the days to come I'll post video that shows a tom with the widest beard I've ever seen - probably 2.5 inches across at the base. And since I preach that beards don't really matter, I'll mention he had big-ole spurs, too!

WHEN THE MUSIC ENDS...

2009-10-07T11:50:00.005-04:00

WHEN THE MUSIC ENDS....

I previously posted some hunting footage of my buddy Wally killing a longbeard during the 2008 Indiana turkey season (Hank Jr. Would Be Proud). At that time I promised to add video showing what happened at our decoy spread after Wally pulled the trigger (and his cell phone quit ringing).

In case you missed it, Wally shot his tom out of a group of 4 longbeards, but a particularly good tom was strutting on the north end of the field about 200 yards away. That bird kept strutting, even after the shot, so I asked Wally if he minded letting that bird clear the field before we picked up. He had no particular place to go, so we settled back.

While we waited, another good tom showed up, and from there I'll let the video do the talking. What you're about to see exemplifies why we've come to love full-mount decoys so much. You just don't get this out of plastic deeks!

HUNTING FALL BIRDS

2009-10-06T15:37:00.012-04:00

Spring turkey hunting in Indiana can scarcely be called a tradition. Our first modern turkey season took place in 1970, so the sport is less than 40 years old today. And it wasn't until the late 1980's that turkey reintroduction work really caught hold in northern Indiana, so exposure to these fabulous birds is even less lengthy for us flatlanders. Consider then that the fall turkey season didn't come about until the past decade and it's easy to see why most Indiana turkey chasers are still feeling their way around a bit where pursuing autumn turkeys is concerned. Most birds in these parts are shot as they amble under a deer hunter with a turkey tag in his/her pocket.

The past few years I've put a fair amount of time into fall turkey hunting, and can say that, although it's different, fall turkey hunts can be every bit as exciting as spring ones. On October 3 I killed a would-be 2-year old tom on a Marshall County farm, and he displayed all the aggressiveness of a spring longbeard. While there was no strutting or gobbling, the video will show that this bird came to the decoy without reservation, pecked the head, and then "flogged" him.

Dominance hierarchies in turkey flocks are constantly changing, so it makes sense that, given the opportunity, a male bird, even in the fall, will pick on a decoy. Slight tactical changes are needed, though, so here's what I've learned in the past few years:

* Turkeys are vocal creatures, even in the fall. You won't hear nearly as much gobbling, but 16 - 18 month old jakes (commonly called super jakes) yelp a ton, as do many true toms, and will often respond to "jake" yelping (a longer, more course and drawn-out version of the hen yelp). Don't expect to call fall toms in with hen calling.

* Young-of-the-year poults are learning to talk, and mimicking their "kee kee" calling is a great way to get their attention. If you can break up a hen/poult flock with a good scatter, don't hesitate to give the woods a few minutes to settle down, then start mimicking lost hen calling and poult kee kee's in an effort to reassemble the flock - hopefully right in your lap. A friend of mine missed a hen with his bow this weekend. When she and her poults scattered he didn't throw in the towel. He just waited a few minutes and started calling. He was rewarded with a fine hen poult that will make great eating at Thanksgiving (if he can wait that long).

* Male birds are grouped up in their own flocks, while hens/poults are in theirs. You'll have more success if you treat them individually, scouting for the type of flock you want to hunt and using male decoys on males and hen decoys on hen/poult groups, even if they're showing up in the same fields to feed. One of the farms I hunt routinely has a male flock exceeding 15 birds. Try to find that many toms in one spot in the spring.

* Food is critical. When scouting flocks, key in on the areas they are feeding. Pattern their comings and goings, then get in their way.

* Tread lightly. Fall turkeys, while still pecking order-oriented, won't typically be as aggressive as they'll be in the spring. Use a single jake decoy when hunting male birds, and a hen or two when hunting hen/poult groups. Realize that you'll normally encounter more birds in the fall than in the spring, which translates into more eyes and ears to catch you with! The smaller the group the more likely it is they'll pay attention to you and your decoys. Get a single bird in your vicinity, as I did in the accompanying video, and the odds really go up.

Still a little confused about fall turkey hunting? Don't sweat it. Most important of all is just getting out in the fall and enjoying being around turkeys. You'll learn so much more about their behavior and biology than you can by spring hunting alone.

NOTE - I self-videoed this hunt, so the quality leaves a bit to be desired. Also, I record my hunts in full HD, but my editing software will only work with standard definition, so I have to convert back before editing. This actually makes for WORSE footage quality than if I just recorded directly in SD. But I routinely watch the raw footage on HD televisions, so am reluctant to change. The raw footage, on a widescreen with stereo surround, is about as close to being there as you can get without getting mud on your boots! Eventually I'll buy software that edits HD footage easily, but for now, this is the best I can come up with. Hope you like it just the same.

WHY FULL-MOUNT DECOYS WORK

2009-09-18T15:01:00.003-04:00

I try to preface any talk about using full-mount decoys with a disclaimer - I don't think you need full-mount decoys, or any decoys at all for that matter, to kill turkeys with regularity.

So why go to the trouble of mounting a turkey (or buying one) to use as a decoy? Because the interaction between a live turkey and a well-made full-mount gives the hunter a look into turkey behavior that he/she will likely never see otherwise. Full-mounts bring out the dominance behavior inherent in pecking order oriented turkeys - both male and females.

But it's more than that. Full-mounts fool turkeys so completely that turkey-decoy interactions last much longer than the average hunter has ever experienced. For a few years I used a plastic full-strut tom with a real tail fan. He was great at getting toms to come in, but if they touched him the gig was up. They quickly realized the plastic bird as unnatural, and would leave - often without presenting a good shot. Full-mounts don't only have tremendous drawing power, but the all-important holding power.

So why do full-mounts actually work? Well, the most obvious reason is that they look real. But there are a couple of less obvious reasons we should cover. Let's look at the obvious factor first.

No paint scheme on any plastic bird will ever out-mimic real feathers! And real feathers move when the wind blows, giving the bird further realism. Freeze-dried or cast heads (we use cast heads for their durability), when airbrushed correctly, are so realistic that the untrained eye can't tell live birds from decoys captured on video. Combine life-like heads with real capes and the combination is unbeatable.

So what else is involved? The first thing that comes to mind, and has already been briefly mentioned, is feel. When turkeys rub against full-mounts, which happens VERY frequently, they feel what seems to them to be a real turkey pushing back. This doesn't scare them, it encourages them. Our decoys are made in such a way that when they're placed in firm ground, they stay put. When toms peck at the heads of our tom decoys, or flog (wing-beat and spur) our deeks, the decoys hold fast. Think of it as a playground bully pushing on the nerdy kid. He expects the kid to run, and if he doesn't, he gets doubly mad! And when toms do the breeding preparatory chest rub over the back of our hen decoys, the fact that the she stands ready gives him the consent he's looking for.

Shape is also an important factor. Our decoys not only stand their ground, but are built in a way that encourages toms to mount them. Notice our tom decoys aren't full-struts, but tail down semi-strutters instead. Video footage proves time and again that male birds will mount, and attempt to breed, our male decoys. At first we thought this was a fluke. But now we see this behavior so often that we've given it the tongue-in-cheek name, prison whipping.

Finally, our decoys work because they aren't sex-specific. As you'd expect, wild toms are drawn to both hen and tom full-mount decoys. But arguably just as important, live hens rarely pass up a chance to check out a full-mount hen decoy. And when hens come in, they're often towing longbeards along behind them.

And I suppose there are a number of other reasons why full-mounts work so well that I haven't yet thought of. Combine those I've mentioned with those I haven't and one word keeps coming to mind - REALISM. Short of using a live turkey as a stool pigeon, you're probably never going to beat a good full-mount decoy.

ONCE UPON A TIME.....

2009-09-03T11:41:00.002-04:00

Every now and then I get asked why I started building turkey decoys. If this sort of thing interests you, keep reading...............

"Real", or full-mount decoys aren't new to turkey hunting. My brother and a taxidermist friend were building prototypes back in the mid 1990's, and it's not like they came up with the idea all by themselves. Today it's turned into a fairly big business for some, with world champion taxidermist Cally Morris (Hazel Creek Decoys) leading the world in full-mount decoy sales.

My start in decoy building came about from a mistake I made following a short nap on a morning Tennessee turkey hunt in 2004. I was dealing with a sore back, brought on by too many hours sitting against trees in the spring woods. So late in the morning I decided to stretch out on the ground to save my back a little wear-and-tear. Next thing I knew, I was dreaming of turkeys, lots of turkeys, making lots of turkey noises. When my conscious mind reconciled that the noises weren't coming from deep in my sleep-addled memory banks, but from the decoys 20 yards away, I snapped to.

What I saw, through squinted eyes, was a gobbler and about a dozen hens causing a ruckus. I did my best to right myself without spooking turkeys, and when the birds separated enough for me to shoot the one sporting the beard, I pulled the trigger. But when the tom flew away I began to worry that I'd accidentally killed a hen. Well, I had actually, but one with an 8-inch beard! Tennessee law allows the taking of bearded hens, but it wasn't something I'd have done had I been fully aware - uh, awake. (Note to self - Don't shoot guns when you're half asleep.)

So during the stern talking to I had with myself on the way back to the truck (it was a 1-sided conversation), I reconciled that this hen was going to become a decoy if I had to mount her myself. Turns out, that's exactly what happened. As soon as I got back to Indiana, and with guidance from local taxidermist Craig Browning, I made a respectable facsimile of a real hen turkey. In 2 weeks I was back in Tennessee, and proceeded to kill my biggest longbeard in years using "Susie".

And it all got rolling from there. Susie only lasted that season and the next, because we revelled in watching hens attack her and jakes and toms attempt to breed her. Admittedly, she wasn't the most durable decoy. But when, in the winter of '05 I tried to find a commercial replacement, I quickly realized that I was either going to have to spend $400 (or more), or do without. Unless...........

Having made 1 effective decoy already, I decided I could make lightning strike twice. So I invested my $400 in taxidermy equipment and domestic hen turkeys. By the time the spring season rolled around in 2006, I had 4 new decoys to field test. And boy did they ever produce!

Now, 4 years later, with the help of family and friends willing to test and comment, we've made some refinements and arrived at a product that can be reproduced consistently, and that works like a charm. I started this venture just to make decoys for me and my brother, but enough friends wanted their own that I had to do something!

So that's where Thrill Kill Decoys got its start. And the name came to me at the end of a successful hunt, when I told myself just how thrilled that particular gobbler was right before he got himself killed. As I now like to say, "Anyone can kill turkeys, but can you Thrill Kill them?".

In an upcoming blog I'll show the decoys in more detail. I won't reveal trade secrets, but I will show you a little about how we build and use them.

HANK JUNIOR WOULD BE PROUD

2009-09-02T12:05:00.001-04:00

During the 2008 Indiana turkey season, my good friend Wally Palmer hinted that he wouldn't turn down a chance to hunt over real decoys. Always looking to make a convert, I was more than willing to take Wally on a hunt. I even pulled out all the stops, taking 4 Thrill Kill decoys along (1 tom, 1 jake, and 2 hens).

When our first-light set-up produced no gobbling and only a couple of hens in the decoys, I offered to take Wally to a field that routinely holds birds at mid-day. It was fairly hot, definitely windy, and the thought of baking ourselves inside a Double Bull blind in a wide-open cut cornfield all afternoon wasn't exactly appealing, but it was turkey season after all, so we agreed to give it a go. We weren't disappointed!

We hadn't been in the blind for 20 minutes when a bruiser longbeard came to the field, but ignored us to go strut on the far north end of the field (you can actually see him in some of the video). And it wasn't another 15 minutes before a group of 4 longbeards, all 2-year olds, stepped out. A little fighting purring was all it took to get them to amble our way, and the video from that point on more or less speaks for itself.

Our hunt was shaping up to be a classic "pick the bird you want" done-deal, but while we were enjoying having multiple longbeards in the decoys at 10 yards, Wally's cell phone started to ring. His ring tone? Hank Jr.'s "A Country Boy Can Survive". Apparently tom turkeys aren't big fans of country music, because they started laying down tracks in a hurry. Watch the video to see how well Wally handles going from spectator to shooter, in about 3 seconds!

And as follow-up, I turned Wally's 2-year old tom into a decoy, and he used it to kill a bearded hen in the spring, 2009. She's now in the freezer, and will ad realism to his Thrill Kill decoy spread for many years to come!

Oh - some might wonder whatever happened to the big tom strutting on the north end of the field? Keep an eye on this blog - in the next few days I'll post the video we took in the minutes following Wally's Thrill Kill! More exciting turkey hunting footage is hard to find!

HUNTING - GIRLS CAN PLAY TOO!

2009-08-31T12:04:00.018-04:00

My niece (Baleigh) is, by most measures, a girly-girl. She's pretty, a snappy dresser, active in school, church, and 4-H, and is involved in a number of sports. But she also knows how to get serious about shooting stuff, and her stone cold demeanor when she's aiming down the barrel at a would-be target is amazing. Boys at school don't know if they should pursue her for her looks or loathe her because she's a better hunter than they are! Either way, it was my pleasure to be there when she killed her first and second turkeys, and her first deer.

This video is of Baleigh killing her second longbeard. In 2008 she shot her first, in what was probably the most memorable hunt I've ever been on. While the 2008 tom surrendered on opening day, getting a 2009 bird proved not to be nearly as easy. This video, taken on the very last day of Indiana's 2009 general season (Mother's Day) shows that perseverance can pay off!

What the video doesn't show is my sleeping niece, worn out from an all night church or school function the night before - I don't remember which. What I do remember is waking my niece up just in time to have her get her gun pointed out the window of the blind. As the video shows, when Baleigh takes aim, things get serious in a hurry. It's a short video, but remember, we had to be back home in time for a little Mother's Day lunch!

Hide Where You Can!

2009-08-27T13:54:00.025-04:00

This past spring, my good friend Andy located a particularly wary longbeard near his home town of Pulaski, in Giles County, Tennessee. The only problem was this tom preferred the neighbor's cattle pasture to the overgrown field Andy had permission to hunt. After trying unsuccessfully a number of times to get this bird to leave his favorite cow-cropped strutting spot, Andy broke down and called the guy that owned that little slice of turkey Heaven.

With new-found permission, Andy offered to let me kill the bird while I was there on vacation, but only if I'd agree to hunt from this old calf creep feeder located in the bottom of the pasture. Andy didn't feel this bird would tolerate a pop-up blind in his spot!

Not being one to argue over details when there's a turkey to be killed, I gladly accepted. So WAY before sun-up, we snuck in, stuck out decoys, cleared privet, and crammed ourselves into the rusty confines of that old feeder. It wasn't comfortable, but it did put us right in the sweet spot. As the video shows, sometimes hiding out in unusual places can really pay off. Thanks Andy!

And as an interesting aside, the ridgetop you see in the video was held by the Union Army during the Civil War. Cannon emplacements were located there to protect the main east-west road into Pulaski. I wonder what the turkeys thought of cannon fire?.............

Clearing the Cobwebs

2009-08-20T14:52:00.013-04:00

It's amazing how much you can forget about turkey hunting from the end of one spring to the beginning of the next. Especially where calling is concerned, I usually find that winter weather has caused a little rust to accumulate on my turkey hunting abilities!
So as spring approaches, I do my best to get in the woods, not only to hear what my admittedly limited calling skills sound like without a roof over my head, but also to start reconnecting with my hibernating hunting instincts.

When Indiana's turkey season opened up on April 22, I was still clearing out the cobwebs and feeling a little unsure of my decisions when this 2-year old longbeared snuck into my full-mount decoy spread. After letting him bully my tom decoy for nearly 9 minutes, I decided to pull the trigger and end his day - and my Indiana turkey season! Boy does it feel good to get that first one under your belt each year!