Spring turkey hunting part 3, Shotguns, Camo and opening morning.

Your calls are working well, your decoys are ready, your blind is set, and you know where your decoys are going. All that’s left now is to make sure your shotgun is sighted in and a few other things.

First and foremost what shotgun will you be using? I highly recommend you use the shotgun you can shoot the best. Whether you use a semi auto, pump action, single shot, bolt action, over under or side-by-side it really doesn’t matter as long as you shoot the shotgun well. I recommend at least a 3 inch chambered shotgun; my personal choice is a Browning A-bolt 12 gauge. This is the old model with a smooth bore and screw in chokes. You will want to use a full or extra full choke. Just remember that with a full choke you have a very tight pattern for the first 10 yards. Since my eyes are not very good anymore I have a scope on my shotgun. If your eyes are good, open sights are more than adequate. Of course you can go with a hollow sight, red dot sight or fiber-optic rifle sights as all work very well. I also have a bipod of my shotgun that I can use from a comfortable sitting position.

Shotgun shells for turkey hunting are a special shell, in Minnesota you must use size 4 shot or smaller. Most turkey loads will be one and a half to 2 ounces of shot they are also expensive. Don’t let expense get in the way, the cheapest part of your hunt is your shotgun shell, you have been waiting a year, two years maybe three years to get out turkey hunting so don’t scrimp on shells. Your best bet is to buy at least three boxes of shells. Set up a target at 30 yards (I draw my target on computer paper) and pattern your shot. Take at least two shots from each box and see which puts the most shots on the head and neck. When aiming aim for the middle of the neck to give you a good shot pattern for the entire neck and head. The shells that delivered the lowest density shot pattern should be used for practice. I do recommend that you use a size 4 or 6 shot or a matrix of the two. Shotgun shells for turkey hunting have heavy recoil don’t beat yourself up literally and only shoot a couple of rounds a day with practice comes perfect.

Within a week of your season you will want to get all your camouflage out to make sure everything is in good working order, remove last year’s mud, any burrs and that left over sandwich from last year. If you don’t have camouflage it is time to go to Cabela’s and get some new stuff. You will want pants or coveralls, jacket or parka, gloves, head-net and a hat of some kind. Your camouflage does not all need to match but should be relatively close. Early season this year may need some snow camo, if that is the case pick up a light coverall to put over your warm clothing. It’s almost always muddy during turkey season so get some boots that come up quite a ways in case you sink into the mud. You can get camo boots if you want but it won’t do much good if the bottom is muddy, so I don’t worry about it.

The night before your season starts if at all possible you will want to “put the turkeys to bed”.  What this means you will want to be in the woods the evening before and find out where the turkeys are roosting. By hiding in your blind and doing some calling, you can hopefully locate their roosting area. As stated in Turkey hunting part one if you know where they are half the battle is over.

It’s opening morning and you need to get up early, very early. You can put all your camouflage on in the house because turkeys don’t care about scent control. Get to your hunting area and try and walk in the last quarter mile or so even if you can drive right up to it, you want to be very quiet and not have any extra light. In Minnesota you can shoot one half hour before sunrise, if it’s a cloudy day it may be a little on the dark side but if it’s clear day you will see quite well. Have your decoys in place and be in your blind when it is still dark. As soon as legal start calling with the hen call I will use a yelp call at this time and I will be as loud as I can with it Repeat calling every minute or so until the turkeys magically appear in front of you or you hear a Tom gobble in the distance. If you’ve done everything correctly and have a little luck on your side hopefully the turkeys will be in front of you within a minute or two but don’t despair if they’re not. Turkey hunting is interactive between you and the turkeys. Tom will gobble and you will call back, this can go on back and forth for hours but eventually you should win. Keep your ears open and listen for leaves crunching and small branches snapping. When the turkey shows up make sure it has a beard, you can only shoot a turkey with a beard in the state of Minnesota. When the turkeys at 30 yards or less aim for the middle of the neck, squeeze the trigger slowly, don’t pull the trigger just squeeze until the gun goes off.

Take some nice pictures of your big turkey and register it with the state. If you want to have any taxidermy work done. Get it to the taxidermist as soon as possible, if you’re not able to get it to the taxidermist within six hours lay the bird down flat wrap in plastic and freeze it. If you just want to get the tail done, again bring to your taxidermist or remove the entire tail and freeze. If you plan on eating the bird right away field dress it on-site, register the bird, then take it home and clean and pluck it. Deep-frying is about the best way to make wild Turkey.

If you have any suggestions for the next blog feel free to let me know. I’ve been fortunate to be able to hunt and fish in many parts of the world and I may have the answer you’re looking for. bye for now