Montana 2021

[hobbes]

We were on a group of birds at daylight that sounded like a few jakes and a tom with hens but they gobbled too much and someone else moved in on us again. This year is the most interference I've had while hunting turkeys in Montana. We backed out then ran by and grabbed more coffee and a little food before heading into some new stuff higher in the mountains. It paid off at 9:30. This guy strutted, drummed, and gobbled his way in for Isaac's first hunt of 2021.

 

[hobbes]

I like snow, but not in turkey season.

 

[hobbes]

I'm packed up and ready for a MT turkey road trip. We should be on the road by 11 AM.
The weather forecast continues to decline.

 

[damxam]

Good luck! I’ve got to wait until after 5 tomorrow before I get to play chase the turkey again!

 

[hobbes]

Really good day of turkey hunting yesterday, but snowing today. I'll add photos with feathers and a few details this evening, or maybe this weekend.

 

[hobbes]

The next set of photos is my annual spring turkey hunt with my pastor. We try to hunt somewhere new in MT when possible but have hunted at least one area more than once. We went somewhere that was new to him but I had hunted close by around 8 years ago. Part of the reason we decided to hunt here was he knew someone with an apartment above their detached garage that had offered for us to use it. A nice place to stay is always a bonus.

We arrived Wednesday evening and did a little scouting. We found some birds but they were on a ranch that we didn't have access to. There were also birds behind our hosts house but they only have 10 acres and their 13 year old son will be hunting next week. We didn't want to sit down hill from their house and didn't want to kill a turkey that the kid could kill with his dad. He had killed a tom back in the fall and was proudly showing us the fan and beard.

We were planning to hunt Thursday, Friday, and Saturday morning. The forecast wasn't looking too good for Friday, so we knew Thursday would be our best day.

 

[hobbes]

I rarely have access to private land out here besides BMAs that anyone can hunt. When I do have access, I'm with Pastor. He's developed contacts everywhere and a couple last minute phone calls had us meeting a rancher the next morning at 7 instead of listening for turkeys on a ridge top.

We started off in a riverbottoms, but the birds that were there were on the neighbor with a pile of hens and really had no reason to even consider coming out way. I did find a nice matched set of last year's whitetail antlers along the river laying 20 feet apart.

 

[hobbes]

The rancher then suggested that we drive a few miles back into some BLM that he has grazing rights to and hunt some cedar a pine draws. The rest of our hunt on the rancher was actually on public land, but it might as well be private because it's landlocked by private land and the only access is through private.

We found this bird around 11 and called him across a draw. I watched him strut down through some nasty broken stuff then when he got to the bottom, he paced back and forth a little before flying across about a 10 foot deep wash. He then strutted his way up a steep incline and I shot him pointing straight down the slope when he gobbled at a yelp.

 

[hobbes]

We found Pastor's bird around 3 after we took a break. Actually, we made a sandwich then he took a nap while I cleaned my bird. This bird was strutting with hens and didn't gobble much. We were lucky that we didn't bump them because I thought he was father than he really was and got closer than I should have. It's probably the only reason that we killed him. We were just too close for them not to take a look at us. His bird was a better bird than my own but that's never a bad thing.

 

[hobbes]

We headed out from the ranch after that and drove to some land that I'd hunted 8 years ago to look around expecting to hunt it on Friday and Saturday. We stopped and talked with another rancher longer than we should have. Being a pastor, my buddy is also a talker, but it probably gets him more access than I'll ever have. While they were really friendly, these folks had hunters coming in that evening to hunt through the weekend. We continued on to our destination without any real expectations besides maybe locating birds for Friday.

However..........
I'd just mentioned that Isaac and I had killed a bird by parking at this spot and hiking cross country, so we decided to stop so I could throw out some yelps down through a canyon. Two birds responded unexpectedly from 300 yards or so immediately. I jumped back in the truck so we could drive down the road out of site. We could see both birds on a small ridge strutting with a couple of hens as we drove off.

We parked a few hundred yards down the road and circled a hill to set up on the other side of them opposite the direction of the road. We'd already gotten lucky just finding them but got lucky again on the setup. They were apparently moving somewhat in the direction that we chose because I heard a spit and drum as soon as I yelped and it was within 75 yards.

Over the next 5 or 10 minutes the drumming was crazy and steadily getting closer every time that I yelped at them but they didn't gobble again. We finally saw fan tips straight ahead about 50 yards but the birds were hidden in a swale moving left to right. The strutter popped out straight right at 30 yards or so but my gun was not pointed at him. I swung my gun right when the strutter spun and had his head hidden by his fan and Pastor rolled around right almost to his knees but couldn't shoot past me. We couldn't see the other birds but knew they were right there too in the swale behind a little grass. When the strutter came out from behind a tree I was going to have to kill him or he was going to be too far right. I shot him when he walked out half strut head out around 32 yards. Pastor rolled all the way to his knees and the other gobbler had stood straight up trying to figure out what was going on while the two hens between him and the now dead strutter took off flying. He should have flown like the hens because he was on his back within a second or two of his buddy.

Crazily enough we had filled our region specific tag and general tag all in one day.

 

[hobbes]

It was a heck of a good day, probably one of the best single days of turkey hunting that I've had. We didn't really hear a lot of birds but we put plenty the cooler. We also slept in during the snow on Friday and drove home a day early. I'd like to be hunting now but we are out of general tags to hunt locally so I'll have to head out of town for the rest of my tags. I'm supposed to take a kid and his dad out tomorrow here locally but that could turn into a flop.

Closing out Thursday on the way to the truck.

 

[timbrhuntr]

Nice ! Turning into a very good spring for you awesome !

 

[MTSasquatch]

Nice work. Weather up my way has been pretty unsettled this spring compared to the last handful of years. Making it hard to get a few days in a row that aren’t broken up by snow. I’ve been out a few times to some favorite haunts, but the mature birds have been glued to hens pretty hard. Should be breaking up soon if not already. Might take a week off here soon to punch a few regional tags plus the general. I’m over in Great Falls, where are you located? Thanks for sharing.

 

[hobbes]

Nice work. Weather up my way has been pretty unsettled this spring compared to the last handful of years. Making it hard to get a few days in a row that aren’t broken up by snow. I’ve been out a few times to some favorite haunts, but the mature birds have been glued to hens pretty hard. Should be breaking up soon if not already. Might take a week off here soon to punch a few regional tags plus the general. I’m over in Great Falls, where are you located? Thanks for sharing.

I'm in Helena but started in Western MT this spring then to Eastern MT.

 

[hobbes]

Wild turkey legs and thighs require slow cooking until the meat will fall apart and all ligaments and bones become very easy to remove. Once that is done, you can use the meat however you like. I like to chop it and use it in tacos,but it works good in soup or other dishes.

I've just placed 8 thighs and legs in crock pots to cook on low overnight. I've added a little seasoning and broth. The pots are really full so I'll rotate meat around in the morning and bump the heat up.

A pressure cooker or insta-pot would be quicker but I usually just use a crock pot.

 

[hobbes]

So these were cooked on low overnight and most of the next day. I would have preferred cooking them in chicken broth but only had beef broth. They would have finished up quicker on High. The second Crock-Pot with thighs only was cooked on high through the work day only and not overnight because I had failed to turn it on.

This is what they'll look like, meat coming off the bone.



Bones, tendon and ligaments all removed. These are what make the legs nearly impossible to eat without slow cooking and removal.


Leg and thigh meat ready for tacos, sandwiches, soups, etc. I prefer to chop it some instead of the big chunks of pulled meat.

 

[Foster]

Now that the 2020 Big Game and Upland seasons are both over, I’ll stop adding to my 2020 thread (https://www.rokslide.com/forums/threads/montana-2020.190653/) and go ahead and start a 2021 thread.

Thus far in 2021, I closed out my 2020 upland hunting on January 1 and closed out my extended cow tag on January 15. I posted details on the Montana 2020 thread, but here are a few photos:
View attachment 255702

View attachment 255703

View attachment 255704

I got out for a single morning of coyote hunting with my son on the 9th without any luck:

View attachment 255705

I’ve picked up a relatively inexpensive Foxpro Patriot E-caller since then:

View attachment 255706

I've watched this whitetail a couple different days. I've been hoping that he would drop soon and a buddy could try to pick up his sheds. The buck is forked on his left G2 and the main beam is broken in front of his right G3.

The 7th:
View attachment 255707

View attachment 255710

The 13th:

View attachment 255709

It’s been a crazy mild winter here in Montana with very little snow so far but it actually snowed around an inch here in Helena last night and I’m assuming that it snowed more in the surrounding mountains. I would really like to go east to hunt coyotes for a few days but I’m running pretty low on vacation and comp time. I’m also trying to go easy on spending money since we are headed to Florida in March.

Since we can’t go to Eastern MT, we are going to give coyotes a run in the mountains tomorrow morning. We are also going to check out some areas that should have wolves to see if we could be so lucky. I know a lot less about wolves than coyotes and wouldn’t be surprised if there are very few coyotes to be found in wolf country. The wife and I may take a drive this afternoon to look some areas over

As far as the Florida trip goes, I’m supposed to hunt Osceola turkeys in March. I’ve said that I was going to do it for multiple years now but it’s a long trip and something always gets in the way. I’ve got a little more incentive now because friends of ours here in MT have moved back home to FL and my buddy’s wife’s dad has private land lined up for me to hunt. My wife will also have someone to spend time with while I’m hunting. I wasn’t expecting the private land but had instead planned to jump into the madness of Florida public land. I’m not going to hold my breath on it working out because it seems almost too good to be true. I’ll be content with hunting public land if necessary. I may even try to hunt both.

After that, I’ll start hunting turkeys here in MT in early April through most of May. It’s always possible that I’ll try to hit another state afterwards that stays open until May 31st. I did South Dakota last year, but have done NE and WA in the past.

In addition to turkeys, I usually threaten to get out and look for a bear. Bear hunting just never has turned me on too much. It’s always just been a side bet tag. Maybe I’ll finally put some effort into it this spring.

The summer will include some elk scouting and hopefully I'll get a camera up on a really good looking wallow. I'm also hoping to scout some new country this year with Pedro, my inexperienced llama in tow.

I'll plan on the usual fall and winter of antelope, elk, mule deer, and pheasants.

looks like you have had a great time!

 

[hobbes]

Hunted a relatively new area this morning. I had some company where I planned to hunt so walked back to truck and moved across the drainage. I found some birds and was pretty sure there was a tom in there but ended up calling in two separate jakes. I did roughly 6 miles and found lots of tracks but no more gobbles. I guess I was due a slow day.












From my phone:

- YouTube

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

youtube.com

 

[hobbes]

I took a kid out with a mentor license yesterday. His grandfather is listed as his mentor so had his dad and grandfather too. They are really good folks but that's a pretty big group especially when they move almost half the pace that I do. We got on a couple birds but I could not pull one off of private and a hen. I'm pretty sure that we bumped the other bird because they didn't quite understand how fast they needed to sit down when a bird gobbles that close. It was fun but I was really hoping to get the kid his first bird.

I've got a buddy and his wife flying in tomorrow for their first visit to Montana and hopefully his first Merriam's around mid-week.

 

[hobbes]

It's been a good morning in the mountains with a good friend for his first Merriam's.