Turkey hunting is a practice steeped in tradition and skill, a blend of patience, knowledge, and a deep respect for the natural world. The latest episode of our podcast brings to light the rich experiences of Hunter Farrior and his buddy/brother, Austin Sills and Chase Farrior, as they navigate the spring woods in pursuit of the ever elusive wild turkey.
The thrill of the hunt is palpable as Hunter recounts his recent move back to Mississippi, a decision that has brought new life to the podcast with a newly dedicated video studio and enhanced equipment. The trio's excitement for the upcoming turkey season is contagious, as they reminisce about recent sightings and the unique challenges they face while hunting these intelligent birds.
As they delve into their turkey hunting escapades, it becomes clear that the journey is as rewarding as the destination. From the loss of a camera filled with valuable footage to the intimate dance with a turkey in West Virginia, the hunters share their authentic experiences, both the highs and the lows. The discussion reveals the emotional toll of difficult hunts, the mental fortitude required to persevere, and the importance of remaining true to the sport, camera or no camera.
One of the most engaging aspects of the episode is the detailed observation of turkey behavior. Hunter's personal experience on a rainy ridge, using his ol faithful Greenleaf jacket as a shield against the elements, provides listeners with a front-row seat to the social dynamics of these birds, and how hunter mentally illustrates the insight he received of a henned up mountain gobbler. The strategic patience required to avoid overcalling and the subsequent appearance of a longbeard turkey with his hens encapsulates the essence of turkey hunting—a dance of strategy and serendipity.
The podcast doesn't just stop at recounting tales; it provides invaluable insights into turkey calling techniques. The hosts discuss the subtleties of using a scratch box, the restraint needed to let the turkey come into range, and the importance of understanding the bird's "temperature." These techniques are not merely stories; they are lessons in the art of turkey hunting, advice that listeners can take with them into the field.
In a reflection on the unpredictability of turkey hunting, the conversation shifts to a hunt in Alabama that made it to YouTube, albeit briefly. The hosts emphasize that experience and persistence are key to successful hunting, more so than perfect calling skills. They also consider the value of recording hunts, not just for personal memories but to share these experiences with a broader audience.
The episode wraps up with a discussion on turkey hunting gear, emphasizing the importance of listening to gobbles and interpreting their meanings. The hosts share their preference for using sound over sight in locating turkeys and the strategies they employ on public lands.
As the podcast comes to a close, Hunter Farrier expresses gratitude for the community that has formed around Spring Legion, both through the podcast and the brand. He
Check out the SPRING LEGION YouTube Channel to watch the hunts referenced on our show, as they happened and as real as it gets.
New Bottomland Woodsman Series Shirts and Pants are HERE for Spring 2024 at spring legion.com
Follow us on Instagram:
@springlegion
@hunter.farrior
@austincsills
@chasefarrior
Shop Spring Legion Online, using code PODCAST24 for 10% off your next online order! Limited time offer
Turkey hunting is a practice steeped in tradition and skill, a blend of patience, knowledge, and a deep respect for the natural world. The latest episode of our podcast brings to light the rich experiences of Hunter Farrior and his buddy/brother, Austin Sills and Chase Farrior, as they navigate the spring woods in pursuit of the ever elusive wild turkey.
The thrill of the hunt is palpable as Hunter recounts his recent move back to Mississippi, a decision that has brought new life to the podcast with a newly dedicated video studio and enhanced equipment. The trio's excitement for the upcoming turkey season is contagious, as they reminisce about recent sightings and the unique challenges they face while hunting these intelligent birds.
As they delve into their turkey hunting escapades, it becomes clear that the journey is as rewarding as the destination. From the loss of a camera filled with valuable footage to the intimate dance with a turkey in West Virginia, the hunters share their authentic experiences, both the highs and the lows. The discussion reveals the emotional toll of difficult hunts, the mental fortitude required to persevere, and the importance of remaining true to the sport, camera or no camera.
One of the most engaging aspects of the episode is the detailed observation of turkey behavior. Hunter's personal experience on a rainy ridge, using his ol faithful Greenleaf jacket as a shield against the elements, provides listeners with a front-row seat to the social dynamics of these birds, and how hunter mentally illustrates the insight he received of a henned up mountain gobbler. The strategic patience required to avoid overcalling and the subsequent appearance of a longbeard turkey with his hens encapsulates the essence of turkey hunting—a dance of strategy and serendipity.
The podcast doesn't just stop at recounting tales; it provides invaluable insights into turkey calling techniques. The hosts discuss the subtleties of using a scratch box, the restraint needed to let the turkey come into range, and the importance of understanding the bird's "temperature." These techniques are not merely stories; they are lessons in the art of turkey hunting, advice that listeners can take with them into the field.
In a reflection on the unpredictability of turkey hunting, the conversation shifts to a hunt in Alabama that made it to YouTube, albeit briefly. The hosts emphasize that experience and persistence are key to successful hunting, more so than perfect calling skills. They also consider the value of recording hunts, not just for personal memories but to share these experiences with a broader audience.
The episode wraps up with a discussion on turkey hunting gear, emphasizing the importance of listening to gobbles and interpreting their meanings. The hosts share their preference for using sound over sight in locating turkeys and the strategies they employ on public lands.
As the podcast comes to a close, Hunter Farrier expresses gratitude for the community that has formed around Spring Legion, both through the podcast and the brand. He
Check out the SPRING LEGION YouTube Channel to watch the hunts referenced on our show, as they happened and as real as it gets.
New Bottomland Woodsman Series Shirts and Pants are HERE for Spring 2024 at spring legion.com
Follow us on Instagram:
@springlegion
@hunter.farrior
@austincsills
@chasefarrior
Shop Spring Legion Online, using code PODCAST24 for 10% off your next online order! Limited time offer
Alright, everybody, welcome to the Spring Legion Podcast, the podcast where we will be talking about the Wild Turkey and those who hunt them for the greater foreseeable future. I'm your host, hunter Farrier. I'm the founder of Spring Legion, joining you today by Austin Seals and Chase Farrier, a good buddy and a brother and two familiar faces to those who have tuned in in the past and, for the first time in a very, very long time, always right in the world all three of us together in the same room. So good to see you. Good to see you finally we all been up to you.
Speaker 3:Chase and Deer. That's about it Chase and Deer getting ready for Spring. I actually saw some turkeys the other day on my cameras and it got me all excited.
Speaker 2:How much you chase.
Speaker 1:Not too much Deer hunting, a little bit here and there working on some things, doing a lot of skull mounts and things like that, Keeping myself busy filling orders, everything in between.
Speaker 3:Yep, Good skull mounts. You got one of mine right now.
Speaker 1:I got one of them, yep, yep, so it'll be done here in a couple of days. Well what have you been up to, Hunter?
Speaker 2:Not sleeping, which is kind of usual. But nah, I've been, I did a little deer hunting yeah we did.
Speaker 2:We me and Seales went deer hunting for the first time in a long time the other day. So it's good to be back where we're able to do stuff like that, regardless of how that turns out. I think more than anything, seales and I talked about turkey hunting the whole time and we've got a lot of stuff kind of in the works with spring legion. So it's growing and we're now kind of to the point where, oh yeah, I've got to tell everybody I moved back to Mississippi.
Speaker 3:That's why we're all here. This isn't a one-time thing. This is for sure.
Speaker 2:This is how the podcast is going to be from now on. So we've all three of us has kind of had a hand in creating this little video studio yeah, I forgot, folks don't know this yet. So pretty much what we've all been up to, and a lot of that lack of sleep, it kind of comes down to making this as cool as we could possibly, make it as feasible as possible, to where we can bring a good product to the podcast world. Now that we are all back together and we want to make the most of it and I hope you all like it as much as we kind of like it we like it enough to film our podcast here. We've invested into some cameras and some mics and stuff like that. A whole lot of lights. This is a lot more lights than I've really ever expected. But here we are and now we just got to find some stuff to talk about. Yeah, you all got any thing to talk about, or yeah, we got some stuff to talk about.
Speaker 1:We got plenty.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So for the next few weeks this is kind of a trailer episode for folks who usually tune in or if your new Spring Legion is a brand that we created in 2019 that is really just dedicated to a higher standard of turkey hunting, so to speak. It's something that really encapsulates the mindset of turkey hunters as we know them Down here in the South we're from Mississippi Turkey hunting. Turkey hunters are almost a culture in itself and in some areas it's a religion, or at least close to religion. I think we're all three proud to say we're from one of those areas where it is dang near a religion and we wanted something to kind of necessarily celebrate that but bring a little light to it, something that we think kind of says turkey hunters aside from everywhere else. I think turkey hunters are different. They care themselves differently. They're meticulous to a degree of aggravation. I know you'll get aggravated with my meticulousness if that's even a word all the time, but it's just part of it and it's just who you are and I wanted something to celebrate that. So Spring Legion came about. Me and Seal sat in a guest bedroom and stitched a couple hats together, and then Chase hopped on and started helping with the podcast and we sat down and had a $20 little plug into your computer mic and started the podcast three years ago and never thought it would grow to be something this big. But now we have a video version. So I think it's a big step. It's something that we've been wanting to do for several years, or at least the past year and a half, I'd say but we're unable to because I was living seven hours away. So now we're not. Now we're able to do this. We're going to be incorporating a lot of the videos from this past spring into the podcast audio version, if that makes sense.
Speaker 2:So, believe it or not, I know the podcast ended abruptly. I think it was March 21st of last year. It all of a sudden ended, and that was kind of halfway on purpose. Not to mention we were pretty busy turkey hunting. But I kind of made the executive decision to put a halt with no warning to anybody that I wanted to save everything from then on for the upcoming 2024 spring turkey season, and so that's what we did and we actually kind of got a pile of it. So we're going to really flush through these episodes pretty quick to get them all out in time for y'all to hear them before spring 2024 really kicks in the gear again.
Speaker 2:Kind of going into the plan a little bit, this is a little bit of a pilot trailer episode and then on the 21st of no, I'm sorry, on the 1st of January 2024, we are going to start releasing our usual weekly episodes. That's going to correlate with the videos of hunts that we're talking about. Some of them are already on our YouTube channel, which is at Spring Legion. We hope y'all will follow that, subscribe to it and kind of follow along, because it's going to kind of go hand in hand with some of the stuff we're talking about on this.
Speaker 2:If you're hearing this and you're truck riding to work and stuff like that, chances are a video version of this released on YouTube the Saturday prior.
Speaker 2:So we're going to upload the video versions on Saturdays that's our goal at least every week once they start pumping out weekly on our YouTube, and then the following Monday, the Monday following the releases on YouTube, will be available on the Spotify, the Apple podcast and all that good stuff. So you'll have the option to hear it regardless. But if you want to hear it first you have to watch it, stream it, listen to it on the YouTube and then with that you can kind of go back and watch the hunt we're talking about, and this is making on us figuring out the editing part. So I think we've got a couple hunts that we're going to dive into first, and that's going to be some that we do have on the YouTube channel. Which is one of my favorites is going to be the Mississippi Delta hunt, where I was proved incredibly wrong about there being no turkeys in the Mississippi Delta, and y'all remember that one.
Speaker 2:That was pretty fun, that's going to be, if I had to guess. That's January 1st episode, right there. So we're going to go from there. We're going to dive into y'all's Florida stuff, more Mississippi hunts I got to in Georgia that we can. We can air. All these are already on the YouTube.
Speaker 2:But kind of the kicker is, I'd say, late April of all, through May and even in June, we all went hunting and with the exception of one or two times, chase and I, we were not together. So we met a vow on that 21st of March or whenever, we decided to put an end to it to make this cool. We're not going to talk about these hunts until right now, until we build a studio to talk about it, till we video the podcast, till we get everything we need to make this as good as we possibly can make it for our listeners to have some seer reactions and seer stories, all that good stuff. To the hunts we're talking about, I haven't heard them from seals. Chase hasn't heard it from me, seals hasn't heard from Chase.
Speaker 2:All these hunts that y'all are going to be listening to, after we get through the stuff that I'd say mid, mid January, we're going to be really diving into stuff that we haven't heard that we're telling for the first time. Y'all are hearing it for the first time, just as much as these folks will be hearing it from the first time and I'll be hearing from them, so we hope it, you know, keeps everything really authentic. Nothing's kind of being, you know, regurgitated for the ninth time and you start losing details and start losing all kinds of you know cool things that you forgot about and kind of the sincerity to you know storytelling, which is what we're here to do. We're here to tell stories and hear listeners stories, and we're avid podcast listeners, just as much as you know, distributed them.
Speaker 2:So and I know turkey hunters like talking about drinking hunting, that's a fact.
Speaker 2:But aside from that, we have got a couple different projects we've been working on and that's what's kept us busy here and kind of delayed this a couple weeks more than I wanted it to be.
Speaker 2:But we, um, we have gone from a higher standard and drinking hunting shirts and hats to gear and apparel. So we are branching off into the gear market. That has been something that has been a long time coming and something that we have worked on for two years I think at least, first being whoo figuring it out, because this is this is not nearly as easy as I thought it was going to be. Branching into an industry such as, you know, actual gear that you're going to wear a turkey hunting that's always been kind of in the game plan but at the same time I wasn't sure about it. I never wanted to just dive into it. I like what we had going at work. You know it was easy but, um, but it's something that a lot of folks have asked over the years when you're going to start coming out with stuff that we wear turkey hunting um, you know, hoodies just wasn't cutting it. You know, that's just a casual kind of thing you wear around. So we've, uh, we broke down and tried to think of some things that were we thought were needed in the turkey hunting you know, actual hunting realm. Um, the first was going to be something that five years ago I thought was sacrilegious turkey hunting and that was wearing anything other than you know lacrosse granges with mud all over them and stuff. That's what turkey hunters wear.
Speaker 2:Started traveling around a little bit and learned that it was really hard to climb a mountain in capicular Tennessee and a pair of granges and I learned that the hard way and I learned every other mountain had to climb in them the hard way as well. Um, so broke down, we got us some, you know, some shorter hiking boots and stuff. And then, uh, some some gators that we liked, that they were really hot, they were, they worked for the waterproof side but they were tough to tow around and stuff and kind of loud. So first thing kind of mind was I want some thinner gators, I want some gators that are made for turkey hunting, not for care of hunting. And um, and we broke down and I've been in touch with a million different manufacturers in the past two seasons.
Speaker 2:Um, finally got some that were able to get us pretty close to where we wanted them before the end of 2023 and I was able to wear a lot of them through the season to just literally sit through yes, no, yes, no, yes, no, found a pair, wore it the whole season and they held up great. They did great. They did exactly what I want them to do. I said this is what I want. You know, this is what I want to. You know, provide and and and to offer to the public. If we can get them made and we are, so that's some good news. We're gonna drop a link, we're gonna drop a little image here I don't know if we figure that out on the on the video side, where you will be able to find a little more information on these gators.
Speaker 2:They're releasing January 1 with our first episode of our first real episode of the podcast, so we hope you all check them out. It's something that we're really excited about. And we've got a couple more things that are in the gear industry I hate saying the industry word that are in the gear realm. They will be coming out in late January that you're not going to want to miss as well, and that's that has taken up a majority of my time for the past at least six months. So, um, so it's something that we wanted to let y'all know about here.
Speaker 2:On. The first kind of return episode was, um, something to look forward to on the spring legion side, aside from the podcast. But we're going to get into a couple of different things here to kind of kick it off, get the stuff, you know, get the juices flowing again. This is about our. It took us nine takes just to get the welcome to the spring league podcast out without laughing or, you know, messing up. Once we got that good, you know, everything was all right, but I mean we're a little rusty, I ain't gonna lie.
Speaker 2:It's been a minute, it has y'all need to talk, get? I don't, I don't think us three recorded a podcast.
Speaker 3:Oh, shoot in a while a long time, maybe a year. At least yeah, I know, for a while it was when you were in Georgia. It was me and Chase, and the last one we did in Florida was just me and Chase, I think we had planned to do one after that Mississippi hunt, and then we decided to make the vow, and that makes sense not talk about it. So I think it's probably been a year.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 3:It's all three been together.
Speaker 2:We did the live ones you know an Auburn and and then Nashville and then then I didn't make the one Rick's having a baby.
Speaker 1:And I forgot about that, mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:So I wasn't there for that. And then I Want to say the last one if you, you know, went back, an episode was the Florida hunt, was it?
Speaker 3:the last one we you weren't on.
Speaker 2:The floor or no episode yet.
Speaker 3:Yeah yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, which I still don't know anything about because I didn't listen to it either.
Speaker 3:With that being said, we recorded the Florida podcast the day before you killed a turkey, really, so that wasn't even on there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was actually. I was talking about my Mississippi, turkey. I think it was talking Okay we recorded it in in the in a hotel room in Florida, though.
Speaker 3:But it was. That was the day before you killed your Florida.
Speaker 2:Yeah, whoo, yeah, we had a lot to catch up on.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, I've just about released some stuff that Hunter doesn't know about, really, yeah, I was. I wanted to say something about how we even were doing the podcast, and you don't know that.
Speaker 3:I'm. One thing I'm excited about is hearing about the hunts, because, yeah, you know, like especially me and Hunter talk Mm-hmm after just about every kill and not doing that it's been weird.
Speaker 2:It's been weird yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I killed that deer with my bow. What was, I guess? Yeah, you know. A little while back and he text me and said call me when you get in the trucks we can talk about. I was like holy cow. We can talk about this, talking about we can talk about this one yeah.
Speaker 2:So I mean heck, I went on a long trip there hunting and some of it didn't even make the social media.
Speaker 2:You know a lot of the stories and stuff I wanted to talk about and I was thinking I don't want seals and Jaysa here. You know just, and that's been fun. You know, it's not like we don't know. Y'all don't know I killed one in Minnesota, but y'all don't know about the two days prior to that where I mean it was a gauntlet and Murphy's law was evident in every corner and I went through five boxes of shells and traded best that left and right and what kind of boot it was on me now and it was. It was rough. I was questioning everything I've ever learned about turkey hunting and so that's stuff y'all don't know about and it's gonna be. Y'all gonna get kicked out of it. I might not retelling it cuz.
Speaker 2:I'm thinking about it now and going this was this was rough on me yeah, rough on the mental side of things. It kept me up at night and on nights I didn't need to be kept up on because I was about worn out. But it's gonna be cool and the stuff that we got on video some of this good, some is really cool and some of us not that great, and that's you know. That's why we have a podcast. We're not videographers by all means. Chase is a little better than us on the video side. He's been practicing it for a little while and Mine. Now there's there's several hunts where you you can, sometimes the a turkey, sometimes you can't, sometimes you just see dirt and here Calling gobbles and a gunshot and that's just I.
Speaker 2:I got to figure out a way to keep a camera on because I forget about them and I and I. And there's a. There's several turkeys that Are still walking today remaining uncured because that camera and I got to figure some stuff out before next season Because I about just to start swinging it at him at some point because I was getting pretty frustrated. So, yeah, a lot of authentic reactions gonna be on those videos if we figure out how to edit them and bundle them up, put them in a real video. But a lot of cool stuff happened, a lot of stuff that I'm really looking forward to getting out there and I'm in work that I'm looking forward to doing because it's gonna kind of take us back into the mindset of spring, which is where our minds men Minds best 12 months out of year, oh yeah you know pretty safe to say At least every day I'm thinking about it.
Speaker 2:I'm thinking about, you know, between memories and anticipation for the upcoming, you know, memories that haven't been made yet. I'm always thinking about it and I mean that's why we created this. You know, for us to talk about turkey hunting and I know we other folks are, you know, cover them that same cloth and want to talk about it just as much and listen to it, and we got a lot to provide for that and I'm proud to say we were able to pull a lot of stuff off that it was Out. There was a reach for a couple guys winging it right.
Speaker 2:So, but we're gonna dive into those later. We're not gonna get into it cuz I feel that rabbit hole kind of starting to form here. We're gonna run down and I'm trying not to do that on this one. This is just to kind of test the waters, test how this is gonna work. Make sure the lights work, make sure that y'all can hear us on these microphones and make sure the video is correlated. Right, we got to figure out how to edit them and then in the background we're gonna be editing these videos. If you have followed us on YouTube, you've seen some videos that we've put out from this past spring that are the whole hunt. It is press play. I mean press record. Let let it right till it runs out of battery. Some on we were able to get on the camera. Some of them died, some of them. You know the camera's still back there where we let it last. If I was holding it, I guarantee you it is probably still there right now.
Speaker 1:Well, at least one. Yeah, that is sitting there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that we don't know where a good one, one that had a lot on it yeah, it is, it's somewhere between Northern Oklahoma and South Dakota. Yeah, and I'm pretty sure I know where it is. But I actually drove back through when chasing them came and met me somewhere in Kansas and I was like guys, I lost a camera, they lose SIM card, lost the whole decom camera and it had some of the coolest stuff on there. Let me tell you, like, of all the cameras I've wanted to lose, this was the cheapest one we had. So that's the one I was responsible for was the cheap one, but, needless to say, I happened to, you know, carried around with me everywhere. So it's a little different than lugging around one of these more expensive cameras where you don't really want to mess it up.
Speaker 2:I didn't care about messing this one up. It was there to get you know as much as it could and the lifetime that it had, and Rest in peace, buddy. But it did not last too long after I really started getting into hunting all day, every day, for a week or two. But and that's actually gonna kind of segue into the one story I felt comfortable telling here y'all don't know about it, but it's one that's not on video is not gonna be on video unless there's a good Samaritan in Kansas. It finds this mini camera and and on that camera is a bird in West Virginia that I feel for the sole purpose of just Five seconds, I zoomed in, filmed him struggling for five seconds and put it back in my bag and then carried on. That's not where I left it, but I did that because that was my first hunt of the spring where I didn't have a camera and I kept it accidentally, so to speak, in my vest and I wanted that to be a real turkey hunt, without worrying about the cameras, without worrying about all this stuff that we've kind of sort of piecing into it, which is not necessarily as bad of a thing that I thought it was gonna be. I was kind of worried this was gonna get in the way of not getting the way of killing a turkey in the way of. You know, appreciate in the moment. I never wanted to call differently than I would call if there wasn't a camera. I never wanted to react differently if there wasn't a camera.
Speaker 2:As time went on I learned that don't change. You know I Pretty literally you forget about the camera Especially at least I do but but it didn't interfere with the feelings that you feel in Turkey hunting nearly as much, but the stresses of you know, trying something new, trying to, you know, make this work. And it's something that we're not great at. I'm not gonna say we're great at Turkey, I'm, but we really ain't great at filming. So it's stuff that required conscious work and conscious. You know countries and it's part of your mind. You know for the pretty much entirety you're trying to do both. So it was a relief for me to kind of branch out. I was up there with my buddy, gary Stanton. We had also been through the gun with the past couple days and I'm gonna get him on here to tell a little bit about that. I'm not gonna tell about those hunts, because we do. I do have a little bit of film from that on a different camera.
Speaker 2:When I was filming, gary had a great time, kind of you know it was one of those like this is, this is, it's getting rough now but um, but on the last day that I was gonna be there decided to branch off good by myself and Um, and just appreciate Turkey hunt for what it is or what I've been wanting to be. It was raining, I mean it was. It was exactly what I I'm not gonna say I love good and sitting in the rain, but it was everything I needed, and more. When it comes to if I could just have a turkey hunt to myself, you know, out of, you know out of the eyes of anybody else, when nobody. That's first time I hunted by myself all year to I had someone with me. Every other hunt, besides one I have one of. The hunt in Georgia does by myself. But, um, but this was a good, you know breath, the fresh air. The one in Georgia was a place I've hunted before several times.
Speaker 2:I hadn't really gotten that to scratch the exploring new grounds. Yeah, just me and a turkey that I met that morning. You know, develop a quote-unquote relationship with that turkey, kill him, you know, two or three days, or you know, get beat by him in three days and have to leave. And you know you didn't think about him for a year. I'm hadn't gotten to do that yet and we'd already gotten into late April, may.
Speaker 2:So, and Gary had, gary had roosted one, he was gonna go hunt and I thought we knew where some were and it's because we pumped them the afternoon, a couple afternoons prior and and and West Virginia can't hunt that after one or noon or something like that, but you can't scout. So we were out kind of scouting around and found some, and actually I think it was Gary. Yeah, gary kind of bumped them, kind of bump one or bumped another one, and they ran out and by the time I was able to kind of get over there and lay eyes on it, that's just on where they kind of went up. You know they were walking uphill or up a you know foothill of a mountain and and I'm kind of went towards the top and and then I came back the next day. This was this was not roosting time, but it was close to it when Gary and I were there. But um came back the next morning.
Speaker 2:I'm talking, I was trying to get there at three o'clock. I knew that's probably where they roosted, but I don't know where they came out at because this was the afternoon. I just knew I mean a is the only woods. You know, everything behind me was a cut over and there's a big open hill. This is where video comes in, helpful, because it's very hard to explain. So I knew that be on that side, obviously, but I didn't know anything else. And I came back the next morning and there was a car stuck on a railroad track or something and it was like three cars in front of me. So I'm trying to get there really early and Obviously I don't because they had to like just stop all this Traffic, and there wasn't but like two cars me and one other person, so they were not in a hurry.
Speaker 2:This was at three in the morning. You know, get a little tow truck out there or something, and you know took forever and I didn't get there first. Somebody else has gotten there first. There's a truck that have been there a couple times that I'd seen, so I know he knows about him and I'm a little disappointed and I don't really go and get on anything else. And then, um, we, we hunted a couple different more places together and stuff.
Speaker 2:So getting into the hunt I'm talking about. So I'm frustrated. I want to go hunt by myself. Gary, he wants to go home by his self and we're like deal, let's give it a go. You know, spread out and I get in there.
Speaker 2:I managed to get in there early and I get in there real early Because I wanted to beat the rain, so to speak. So I got in there earlier I hadn't hadn't rained yet starts drizzling, starts short enough raining. But I'm sitting there like under a tree. I wind up getting the old green leaf jacket that I've talked about, about over turkey hunter stuff that y'all seen several times Come in so handy, and situations like this make some little tent over me and kind of just kind of get under it and just I'm like wait this out, because this is it my last morning here and I'm just gonna sit here and I got to think about turkey hunt. I got to think about everything I love about turkey hunting, stuff that you know that has happened before and stuff you know. I've just kind of reflect on a lot of stuff and I'm much much needed morning and and then if a call I didn't bring a lot of my calls because I knew it was gonna rain it rained a lot longer than I thought I was going to is supposed to kind of just miss for a second and then get on out of there. It didn't, but it started pouring. That I was, I was there.
Speaker 2:I'm like this is where I am, you know, be where you feed, or kind of do like, make the most of it made a little tent, I mean, it was just like a little bit of a dry, and then after that, you know, it started just pouring through it and I was soaking wet. I'd pick my tree and I had my wing. I had a little scratch box was in my pocket that we used in Alabama. There's a little, you know, you kind of pop it like that and I had that and I had, um, I don't even, I don't think I brought my slate calls and stuff. I know I brought my mouth called pouch, I have my mouth calls, don't care if they get wet, but I'm a wing and that little scratch box, by accident, honestly, and my mouth calls and I was sitting there and just trying not to get drenched. Um and um, I just sat there and sat there, sat there, the rain lifted and I'd almost kind of not forgotten I was turkey hunting but just wanted to really soak it in and see what happened.
Speaker 2:Naturally, and I, if I had to sit at that that Tree until one, I was going to, because we had bumped these turkeys twice. Actually we had seen them two afternoons before and bumping both times. They saw us before we saw them. Um, we weren't hunting them. But it still was not a good feeling, knowing that they saw humans walk in here Right and, judging by the boot tracks, they'd seen a lot of hunters walking through here, because it must be a very known area. It looks good on the map, it looks good in person, but, um, there's a lot of boot tracks walking the right kind of where I was at. So I didn't want to do anything. That would be too. You know, typical walking there stay on the road and call and let them know where I'm at. So I waited and waited and waited.
Speaker 2:By nine o'clock I'm sitting there and I'm just really kind of date, not dazed off, but really, you know, in a deep thought about turkey, hunting and all the. You know the times that have gone, good and bad and all this stuff and how, just soaking in the smells of it, the sounds of it, and one hammers like I Don't even know where, how, how to gauge how far or how close he was. It was that unexpected. I was not expecting a gobble at all at this point. This is 9, 30, 10 and um, I Can tell is in the open and I can see all of the open.
Speaker 2:So I'm a little thrown off and I'm kind of my guns kind of there, you know, on my knees soaking wet, and I'm trying to kind of I mean I remember sitting there like just trying to cover up everything I could in that rain after a while I'm like, well, you just got a little loose. After a while they're like just gonna get wet. But so I'm kind of using my gun. I mean, I didn't really move my gun at all, I just kind of picked it up and put it on my other knees, waited and waited and waited and I was like I don't want to call cuz I know he's been hearing this left and right and he got him once and that was it.
Speaker 2:And for about 40 minutes I'm kind of sitting there like I know he's. I'll have to see him at this point cuz I'm on the highest point I'm looking down into, I'm on the edge of the wood line, it's. It's wooded kind of mountain Behind me and this open valley, almost it's a big. I guess they can't see me now. This is awesome.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah we're on video. But it's like it's a. It's a big ridge that comes out that it got cut at one time. So the wood line stops here. The ridge keeps going and kind of eases on down, but there's two you know hollows on each side, both the both other times I'd seen them They've been on this side and this time they ran up to the top and run by this one tree that I'm sitting by and I had a my, my heck.
Speaker 2:Worst comes the worst. If I sit here until one o'clock, you know chances are If there's some you know jerk out there that wants to kind of come in on me if it's always he comes in before one o'clock I know they're gonna run up this way, I would think. But that didn't happen. I'm kind of glad it didn't because I was able to sit there and eventually I called a couple times, nothing and and then I got nervous. I'm like he's either out there, I've run him off and I wanted to get to practice, make sure I could see down in those hollows before they would have walked off if they did catch on to. You know, the jig is up kind of deal if I did call. So, caught a couple times, waited just a few minutes. I didn't feel confident that he even heard it, so I was like, alright, I'm okay moving.
Speaker 2:I get up a little higher and I'm able to see down in there, and way off in there I can see him standing there, you know, in full strut, and by that time I would say six or seven hands had come to him. And it's just, you know, divine luck. As I peek over this edge I see him gobble one more time. That's the second time I got any, only gobble twice total. And I'm telling you it was the coolest thing I've ever seen, because as much as I think I know about turkey hunting this reminding me I don't know nothing about turkey hunting, I don't know nothing about the behaviors of water he's apparently because this I mean just blew my mind at how this operation worked, and it was truly an operation of how a hand up long beard acts, completely natural, without any type of influence whatsoever. So I might just felt like I was literally just a fly on the wall getting to watch this happen firsthand, really, for the first time like I mean, the other time I've seen it, you know, and really just studied it. I was trying to kill him, you know, pretty quick I was calling out and trying to put peeling off and all this stuff but he gobbled that. One time.
Speaker 2:I caught up six or seven that came out the woodworks and I don't know where they came from. And Then he got with that one time and I'm telling you, these hands just appeared out of nowhere. They were like standing by this one lone tree and just walked over to him. And then this one came over to him and one walked down here and there was just like there was gravitating this magnetically towards his long beard sitting under strutting. He was real, black, real. I mean. His fans up is one in the middle, I think, not the very bottom, but he's one of the bigger fans I've seen and Um, beautiful, you know, just, I mean tell, a big ol head out there and he was just, I mean, the boss. You could tell. I mean there was no doubt about it. But what happened after? That kind of really just opened my eyes to see what, what is happening.
Speaker 2:Most of the time I would be willing to bet when the longbeards end up and you're sitting there wailing on a call trying to get him peel off or anything like that, he looks so stressed out. I've never seen a felt the turkeys emotions like that in my entire life. He was just, I mean it was all he could do to corral these hens. I mean there was just. It wound up being probably 12. One longbeard, 12 hens and one would walk off and he'd have to run over there and get hurt and then another one would kind of ease off and he'd have to run back in here and get hurt and then three would walk off. This way they kind of split in a group and he'd have to run over there and pull with them back and then run over here and pull with them back. I mean broke strut and would run, run, run and he'd run up peel, he'd run downhill and he did not care. And I've never just understood it so much and it might have been a state of mind.
Speaker 2:I was in at the time, I was under a lot of stress and stuff like that. I'm like I feel you, buddy, I mean there's just so much stuff going haywire and you're just trying to corral it in, you're just trying to just get it handled, get a hand on it. But he, I mean he would, he did all he could just get them in a wild almost. It was like a sheepdog almost. But I've never just seen a turkey's emotions on a sleeve like that. I mean, he was stressed out.
Speaker 2:A turkey could sweat. He was sweating and the last thing he wanted was another hand. I promise you and I'm like man this is probably why, when you sit there and try to call him off, he's saying please, no. He's probably pushing the hands of the way, saying do not go near that hand. This is all that. My hands are so full right now. I can not handle number 15 over here, which completely, just, I mean, made so much sense, so much stuff that's going on in the woods before where you call and you're like. The main debate is you know, are the hands jealous and walking away? Or the hands want him to peel off to you because they're annoyed by him? So they're walking the other way? I bet you he's pushing them the other way because he does not want to add to that, you know, rat nest of a day he's having. So far.
Speaker 2:It's got a lot of work you know kind of working these things like you would any other kind of cattle or anything like that which was just. I mean, it blew my mind. I don't know if y'all have ever gotten to experience anything like that, but it was. It was really cool. And then I was okay with not killing the Sturkey at this point. I was hanging on to this as long as I could. I got to thinking I'm thinking, man, you know, I did sit in the ring for about four hours of this. I wouldn't wouldn't hurt to give it a try. But after this has gone through my mind, the last thing I wanted to do was that pressure to him, you know as another hen trying to call him over here and you know kind of what you would usually do. So this kind of goes back to let me think if this is before or after, there's another hunt we haven't talked about, so I don't want to say too much.
Speaker 2:I watched the hen kind of cluck around a couple of times. I think this was this might have been the same trip or not long before it. I watched the hen cluck around a couple of times and call it kind of pull a hen over to her and, as far as I could tell, it was kind of like, you know, just a couple of quick clucks here and there, with no purrs really, so to speak, and it was kind of like a location call, like they were. They were when they spread out, they would click here and click here, and click here and click here, and it was just kind of like here I am here, I am here, I am just kind of directing. You know where the other one will go, one will cluck and then they kind of go this way and one will cluck and go this way. And it's kind of like they were like I don't know what they're saying. If it's you know, all is okay over here, or you know, it's just kind of their language. You know, it's fun to study but it's hard to understand.
Speaker 2:And so I did a couple of clucks on that scratch box that I just magically happened to have, and it wasn't soaking wet because I did see it before it started getting waterlogged and like, literally, like, put it underneath my shirt so it wouldn't, because that would ruin it and I had nothing. I might cluck on a mouth call, but you try clucking on a mouth call that comes out as a putt and it's kind of game over, you know so. And then that little scratch box does sound pretty good, it's hanging up there somewhere. So got it out, popped it a couple of times. I could tell that he had started hearing it because they did start gravitating. But he kept trying to get in front of them, so he was trying to keep them from over here and that's when it started clicking. You know, not wanting, you know, any extra stress and all that stuff, and this is complete speculation. This might not be how it works, right. I'm trembling like here. There's no close, but no, but this is what I was thinking at the time. And it kind of wound up working a little bit later in Michigan.
Speaker 2:The same scenario, but long story short, it wound up hearing there clucking every now and then and those, those hands would kind of ease back, ease back, ease back. And then he finally kind of like said all right, we'll go up there, right, and it was. It was really cool because they stopped. He comes up up the hill probably 60, 70 yards. He's still probably 60 yards in front of me, I'd say, and I'm set up to shoot. Now I've done kind of reposition myself. I'm in the woods, not in the open, in the shadow, everything they don't know. I'm in the world and these hands come up here. He comes up to kind of the very top and it's almost like a doorway or something that I don't know about that.
Speaker 2:They do so, they. He comes up and he stops by this stump and he's he's walking at me, not in strut, he turns around faces sideways in strut, like he's guarding a door and these hands all single, file on what, one by one by one, up right next to him, right in front of his face, is like he was letting the door in, letting them in, and just solid strut, didn't drum, didn't do nothing, didn't spit, didn't turn nothing, just stone, you know, just still a stone, standing there until all 12 or however many. It was passed by him on the last run and this this whole time. They're walking. I'm talking for me, to you, for me.
Speaker 2:I'm set up in the middle like this and I'm dead still, and they're walking and they're clucking and doing this and they want to go this side of me, want to go this side of me, want to kind of go around here. They know where they're going. I don't know where they wind up going, but I'm watching him at. You know, 60. And then he kind of turned around, but last he passed as he just follows suit with him and pushes them all back up and kind of gets about 40 and he stops and I had you know, had to make a noise or something, I have my mouth call in just enough for him to stick his head up and shout him at.
Speaker 2:You know, 30, 35, I'd say, but the coolest. I mean, I don't get to do that as much as I used to, obviously, but that was that was worth every bit of it right there, just getting to really experience that and being able to use that later on. You know, during the season when it was, you know, end up time in some of the northern states later on, I'm like, well, if I can go back to kind of relate to that one store right there, I can handle this a little differently. I can not make it worse. That's for dang sure, right? So I don't know if y'all have ever had an experience like this. This could be preaching to the choir, but that was really cool for me to see because it kind of debunked a lot of theories I had about end up turkeys at that point.
Speaker 1:No, that's totally something you wouldn't expect.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I wouldn't. I would have never thought about him trying to keep from adding him to it until you said it, I mean kind of make sense.
Speaker 1:So when you think, I mean, when you explain it that way, like it really does make sense I hadn't seen it necessarily firsthand, but I mean I get where it would be coming from.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, I mean, there's been many a times that you're working on a turkey when they're hend up and you know I've done it. I've sat there and thought like of every scenario except that one.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I never would have thought of that.
Speaker 1:I mean.
Speaker 3:I thought do you make a move and try to circle and get him, you know, caught him from different angle. Do you just and what happens, they kind of start going this way that's right. Or do you sit there and try to call the?
Speaker 2:ends over.
Speaker 3:Try to make them mad, do you? You know what do you do, but I've never, that's never crossed my mind, but, like Chase said, that makes, makes sense.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, if you, if you look at him being hend up as work, he wakes up, puts his heart hat on and goes to work, which is kind of what he's doing. Yeah, you know, I mean who wants. I mean I felt like if I were to call, it would be like me walking into my boss's office and just going hey, I got some more stuff. You know some problems for you, or?
Speaker 2:you know kind of something like that. I'm like I don't. I can understand, you know. I mean he doesn't want more work right now, just let it ride and let you know if you can't get in front of them, you know, then call to the hands, but don't you know kind of do some assembly helping and stuff like you ain't going to call him off. I mean he's trying all he can to get this over with. Not over with, but you know to get this efficiently handled.
Speaker 2:He didn't breathe a single one that I saw. So I mean, this was all just trying to get them, I guess, and just you know, to submit to whatever his grand plan was how many he can handle. And then you know he's moving elsewhere. He's probably just going to sit there and strut around all day, and I've actually done the whole clucking stuff before, but I was able to see it firsthand and make a little sense of the whole. I was talking about the location of them and, more than anything, is safe over here as well? I think a lot of clocks are. We're good. You know it's okay over here If you do want to come over here, you know it's not.
Speaker 2:You know a bunch of turkeys over here, just me, just one or two of us, stuff like that. Or there's food, they, they cluck when they're. You know scratching and stuff like that, which these turkeys knew. This was way better than I did. They knew where the food was.
Speaker 2:I wasn't going to try to tell them where it was, but just a little bit here and there, let the other hands know it's safe, kind of make them want to come over there, maybe. And then that's when you get into the theory of maybe they've seen his art trying to peel off. So you know he'll stop bugging them. Heck, I don't know if they want to be there, if they want it to be somewhere else or do something different. You know, I don't know, but I'm thought he'd run over there, grab them by the head with his beak, turn them around like a you know, a bad kid or something, just like grab his ear and you know, pull them back. And he'd pull them back and they kind of get back in there. And those other ones were adventagent. I mean, they'd wait for another one to run off and he'd go get them and they'd turn and try to walk off. You know, quietly.
Speaker 2:Try to slip out and he'd run back around and push them back. And I just remember thinking, if I call, if the bird had five fingers, he'd give me the bird. You know he did not want to hear that, which I mean I can't believe it's taken this long to see something like that and even think of that. But, like you said, it makes pretty good sense to me.
Speaker 3:Well, that being said, most of the places we were on up hunting you can't see Right.
Speaker 1:You could see.
Speaker 3:So we're in. You know we're in Hardwood River, Bottoms Creek, Bottoms, so we're sending them off, or 60 yards. They may be standing there doing the same thing. You're talking about you just can't see them.
Speaker 2:And I mean and I started thinking about other times I'm thinking that's what was happening at the time back in, whenever, wherever we were, I'm thinking that's exactly what was happening.
Speaker 3:But because I mean because there's been times, um, I've had a turkey hend up and you know you pull with him for or wait on him two or three hours, however long you do try to pull with him and you get up and walk. You know like I don't want to find another one. Well, you bumped those turkeys walking out. So they didn't necessarily walk away.
Speaker 2:They just stood there, and that's very well he could have been doing is you know, herding his hens to stay in that same area and it makes sense for them to sit there and gobble like you can come here, but I ain't pushing seven of them over there to you, you know you are not that important.
Speaker 3:And you know it makes a little sense.
Speaker 2:That's the only thing that can I, instead of trying to pull him backwards or pull him left and pull him right. Can I get around and veer him one way or another? Keep him in with his 100 yards of where he's probably going anyway. Just make him pick the left side of this rock and pick, pick closer to the creek than he would if I didn't call. I'm not turning them. They're headed this direction. I just want them to walk within 40 yards of me you know, instead of let me make them walk.
Speaker 2:You know, west of their head is straight south, you know.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And I mean there was enough opportunities in the you know the, the, the, the weeks that followed that, that I was able to kind of re-imagine what was happening in a different perspective and I think it paid off. I mean, I think I wouldn't kill the turkeys if, if I would have kind of went at it how I would have in March instead of April After that hunt. And I've been hunting turkeys a long time and I changed stuff a lot when it comes to how I perceive things. I don't change much, as far as you know, how I hunt them. It's, it's, it's, but it's how I perceive what's happening. It's going to change what I do.
Speaker 2:You know, the mallocalls and stuff like that ain't going to change. I'm still going to shoot an 870 and it's still probably hadn't been cleaned in a couple of years and the shells are probably all three still different shells, the first ones I found, and I mean that's just stuff that I mean we use the same slate call probably until I die and as long as they make them or I'm still going to call it glass, call a slate call.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, it's the same thing. That don't change.
Speaker 1:And he's still going to act like he has three shells. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And which really is one.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Yeah, if we're lucky, I mean there's been times when there wasn't one, but there's a couple of times in the, in the weeks that followed that story, where I'm needed all three and we'll get into those. Yeah, so we've gone a long time without making fun of sales. I'm about missing because I can't do that anymore, cause I miss something too. And it was more than one, and it was. It was a lot to handle.
Speaker 3:I don't know if we can give a spoiler or not, but for everybody that listens to, y'all give me grief on missing only one this year.
Speaker 2:Only one, only one.
Speaker 3:Really yeah, there was only one miss. Every other one was shot at one single time.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 3:Congratulations sales I'm proud of you, you got it figured out.
Speaker 2:I know one of them and this is one that folks can see on YouTube already was what like 13 steps on in Alabama.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:That's a cool video.
Speaker 1:With a loose red dot.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I forgot about that. That may have just been luck there, cause it sure was yeah.
Speaker 2:I mean, and this is easy to miss, one of that close, that's for sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:That wait, you were already there and he's already seen it.
Speaker 3:I remember he hadn't seen the whole hunt.
Speaker 1:What the Alabama hunt Okay.
Speaker 3:I just showed him. I put a little clip together, like he's seen the keel.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's all it was on YouTube, I think it was like seven seconds. Just the quick the keel shot now is pretty much.
Speaker 2:He's only like four or five minutes of thing, yeah.
Speaker 3:It's not really long.
Speaker 2:That's all we put on the YouTube and that's all I've seen is what's on YouTube.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I mean it wasn't a long hunt, though. No, I mean it was a lot that went into that hunt.
Speaker 2:You know that we're going to be adding into these videos and stuff, which I think is going to be a really cool thing. You know that one West Virginia, turkey, that's the only one. I remember thinking I'm so glad I don't have a camera here, but I remember like I do have a camera here if I really didn't need it for the outro. You know, not the outro, but like to log it. I've learned to like logging stuff so I can go home and show my dad, who has never been to West Virginia and will probably never Turkey hunt West Virginia, but I can at least go show him this is what it looks like in spring turkey season in this you know state that you know I don't know be very why would he go to West Virginia?
Speaker 2:to hunt and however old he is. So I mean it's just cool to bring that back, or bring it back and show you all, and this is what happened. And then we've had some wild stuff happen on camera that I'm like that's cool to have you know, and Turkey doing this or that or something happening, and but I remember thinking I'm glad I didn't have a camera, but I wanted to get five seconds of this turkey so I could remember this and I can see it so vividly Cause I watched it on that same mountain. I'm like I did. I'm glad I got that While he was still alive.
Speaker 2:This, the video, this turkey, and then I explained that a lot in a video that we were going to put on YouTube. I just lost the whole day on camera and I really hate it cause it was there was multiple mornings on that camera where things didn't pan out and I was kind of considering at the time making a, an entire series of just mess ups. But yeah, the things that didn't work out. This is this. I mean you don't go out there and kill turkey every time.
Speaker 2:You know some people might, can, but if they they hunt it every single day, they're not going to kill every single morning. You know, that's just a fact. And then the folks who kill a lot of turkeys usually are the folks who turkey hunt a lot more. And that's all it comes down to. You know, I mean we're not world champion colors, but all means there are better Wiseman out there. Probably in this county, in this neighborhood could be.
Speaker 2:And I've learned stuff from 10 year olds and when I've, I mean then, past two years, I've learned stuff from 10 year olds from a different perspective, and I was able to learn something from them. And then it's just I mean, it's an every not every evolving, but it's an ever revolving kind of state of mind. You've got to reset it to see how does this work. How does this work? Am I right? Correlation versus causation is what I did make this happen, or I did this and it just happened to make this happen. It doesn't happen every time and nothing you do is going to work every time, and there's no way in the world you're going to predict the turkeys' behavior. The only predictable thing about Turkey is that they're unpredictable.
Speaker 3:I was about to say the only guarantee thing is you can't guarantee what Turkey's doing. I was gonna say it different than you did, but yeah.
Speaker 2:And that ain't subject to change. Turkey's more unpredictable in the 1800s and they're gonna be unpredictable when our grandkids on them.
Speaker 3:I remember when we were younger, and I would have, and I would hunt a turkey that morning and he would do one thing I'd go back that evening and I'd reached him and you would be like you'd come down the next morning and I'd change how I told you because I knew what I was saying, but I'd say I guarantee you that Turkey's gonna do this in the morning. Well, that's not guaranteed. I'm telling you what he did this morning. I don't care if you watched him fly up in what limb he's on.
Speaker 2:I don't trust he's on the ground. I don't trust him on the ground. I don't trust he's on that limb.
Speaker 1:Yeah, never.
Speaker 2:But Seales would know the vicinity of hey, the bottom is here and this and that and this is the way they work and a lot of times they do something similar to that. You don't know they're gonna walk down this path, but it's not like a deer.
Speaker 3:They don't necessarily use the same exact trail.
Speaker 2:You know where they eat and if there's a lot of acorns down here, if those are good, you know mass crop or however you say the correct words for that, and there's been a lot of rain and it probably washed a lot down in there, they're probably gonna be at the very bottom. They're not gonna be scratching at the top.
Speaker 3:You know, you can make dots like that.
Speaker 2:But man, I'm the worst. If I can go listen to a turkey fly up, watch him with my eyes on a tree and I still don't consider him or his dumb like man, anything can happen. I don't, I don't. I won't like go sit down on a tree like waiting for him to. I mean, I just don't trust. Sometimes they're, most times they're probably on that same limb, but I just that's how much respect they have for the whiz of a turkey, like thinking that man, that bird knows I know about him, he's gonna something's gonna happen.
Speaker 3:Well, I do know in one instance that I watched him fly up and before I left I watched him jump from limb to limb about three or four times. So, he was still in the same area, but you know he wasn't on that limb that he originally flew up on. So if you you know if I'd have slipped out when he first flew up and there's no telling how many times I or anybody else has watched him fly I'm like, all right, he's reached it there and he may.
Speaker 3:He may jump, but I'd have never known he jumped if I wouldn't have sat there and hung out.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I was on the phone with one of y'all. I saw a turkey at night one night.
Speaker 1:Me, I was on the phone. Yeah, he said a Jake just ran across the road.
Speaker 2:There's a Jake Eastern Turkey ran across and this was 1130 at night, at least I almost hit it. I'm driving from Mississippi to Georgia and I'm coming through Gatsden area or something like that in Alabama and I'm running, I'm going 65. And I see, you know you can see Turkey's eyes like you can see. You know he was eyeing a flash or something like that. They're somewhat nocturnal. I guess they ain't nocturnal, but I mean. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:They have the flash in their eye I follow what you said Like a deer shining, they shine a little bit yeah.
Speaker 2:It's like red or something. I did not know that Well, I saw this little dot coming out of like my fog lights and I'm like the Coon is getting it. If, as a Coon, and all of a sudden a Jake runs across the road, I'm like are you freaking? Kidding me I was. I knew I was on the phone somebody. I'm like you're not going to believe this, but I just saw a Turkey run across this road at 1130 night.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was like you were full of it yeah, he was hauling. But the shock in your voice I could tell yeah, it definitely wasn't a raccoon.
Speaker 2:No, it was a. I mean, I was 100% a raccoon.
Speaker 1:I mean a turkey.
Speaker 2:And that's the last thing I expected it to be and I'm like kind of you know, kind of shocked. I didn't know they could do that.
Speaker 1:I don't know where he went or what made him go that way, but he was getting there in a hurry and at some point last year I remember seeing like a viral trail cam picture of a long beard at night.
Speaker 2:And everybody was like told you that at like 3 AM.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it was like you know the big everybody chiming in everything. I remember seeing that. So whenever you said that, I was like no, no, but yeah.
Speaker 1:I believe you. I mean I do, but that's I mean that's pretty much why a lot of people, if I go home with somebody, especially somebody new, I was like let's go roof. When I'm like we ain't got to, we can stay, we can sit on a black top and listen to your property or, you know, get on somewhere in the middle, but I don't want to go sit where you think he's going to roofed up.
Speaker 3:I never try to.
Speaker 1:I don't trust myself.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I've been burned too many times and I know that there it's never and always.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I never try to sit like where I go, but I enjoy sometimes in the evenings.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Just going to sit out in the woods.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 3:And you know my my thoughts on roost in a turkey are not watching him fly up. You know being able to tell when he's gobbling on the ground and when he flies up if they're gobbling right. And know the vicinity, the vicinity he's in. I'm not trying to go watch him, but I know that, like I said, that won't and it happens sometimes you just happen to be in the spot.
Speaker 1:Right, I have accidentally gotten real close to.
Speaker 2:Rooster Longbeard. We more than I have purposely gotten. Rooster Longbeard without him gobbling.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:I would much rather listen from the gate, listen to the hood of the truck and work my way in just to, because not all turkeys gobble in the evening, especially Mississippi I've talked to, we talked to a guy from Pennsylvania. We were in Tuscaloosa area or something, or no, we weren't in Tuscaloosa area, we're in Alabama in public land, came across a guy from Pennsylvania and he was like I tried. He kept saying like do turkeys here not gobble on the limb in the evenings? I'm like I've heard it a couple of times, but not really.
Speaker 2:I mean they do obviously, but in public land in Alabama, like they kind of only gobble when they really really really got to gobble Right, especially if he's going to be on the road or something Especially and I know they breed a lot in the evenings and stuff, but you can really gauge the turkeys' temp in the evenings. That's the only reason I like going is to A figure out, like you said, where. What half of this place are they on? Or is there one here or not necessarily. I'll go to a place that I know has had turkeys in the morning prior or something they don't gobble at an evening. That don't discourage me one bit.
Speaker 2:They just didn't gobble that evening, go back the next morning and they're exactly where they were the morning before. But it is good to, if they're going to gobble and let you know, hey, I'm on this side or I'm on that side, you couldn't know. Going into it. I don't change really what I would do, but I definitely feel comfortable going two ridges over instead of sitting on the truck.
Speaker 1:Sitting on the truck, yeah.
Speaker 2:If I need to, and it's helped out a lot and you can kind of gauge that birds temp If he's hammering at night, hammering at night, hammering at night, and he's like up until nine o'clock just at every hood arrow, every code, every door slam, everything hammering.
Speaker 2:Sometimes I really think that means he's trying to really get a head start on A. I'm not, didn't make it as far as I got called up and I got dark and now I'm here and I'm really trying to figure out where I need to go in the morning and he kind of gets a little worried, or just real, probably by himself.
Speaker 1:Almost by the place. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:He's not looking at all the hands hammering Right. It could be wrong, but I mean the ones who gobble once or twice they're with the, they're used to with the hands I'm talking mid to late season, and then the one that's hammering, hammering, hammering. He usually, when his feet hit the ground, he's going to hit the ground first and he's going to move immediately.
Speaker 2:He's going to hit the ground and move probably to where the other gobbler was or where that. The other guy's probably with the hands Right. He's just he didn't make it far enough for it Got too dark, kind of got caught up, and that's a good spot to be, you can figure out, to get in between those two.
Speaker 1:Oh, absolutely.
Speaker 2:You know it's kind of a 50-50 shot but you know, when you got 360 degrees to work with, if you're going to pick a spot, you know I like to get between him and another turkey that was gobbling. A lot of times it does, you know.
Speaker 1:One on strong You're, you're in a good spot. You're doing something.
Speaker 2:Normally, yeah, but it's usually the one that gobbled the most to even the prior and. But yeah, I don't want to. We're getting there, we're getting in the rabbit holes. So, we'll wrap up the story part at least, because we go away, we got to record all of them first.
Speaker 2:So, this is going to be something that we're new at and hopefully work out all the kinks in the meantime, but we do. We appreciate you listening and watching. Now I guess we have to use the same that appreciate you watching, watching and tuning in, because this is something that we're going to really start pumping out. It's going to be. I know for a fact we've got a video of at least 1920 different Turkey hunts where we kill Turkey.
Speaker 3:It's another thing I'm excited about, because I have a good many hunts that I didn't have a camera. So, y'all haven't, not only have. I not told you, I hadn't even seen the highlights, so everything y'all here is going to be brandy.
Speaker 2:And I've got good number two.
Speaker 2:So, it's going to be fun to kind of dive into that. You know, be real, you know authentic inner storytelling and kind of like what you just heard, and get to hear some theories and get debunked theories and stuff like that, and then you'll have a video to kind of correlate with on the YouTube channel. So really encourage y'all, ask y'all to subscribe, to share there should be. We should be able to put links down here, hopefully on this YouTube stuff, if we figure that out. It should be a literally you click it, you subscribe, you're going to get you know whenever we upload something you find out is on your home feed or however you see it. You'll know when the next video is out and we're going to put them out at least once a week and there's going to be a couple of weeks where we're going to have more than one and there's going to be some weeks where we have dang near seven once a day kind of coming out. So we're going to stock up a lot of these storytelling to where we can really pump these out, you know, when folks minds are getting right for springtime, and we're going to get it all out of our system before you know the NWTF convention around mid February. Then we'll be able to start getting some guests on here. We're not going to just get, you know, everybody and their mama as a guest. We're going to get a handful of really good, you know, well-known to turkey hunting guests and really pick their brain and get some cool stories and stuff like that. And then we'll get into current week stuff. We're going to be going into a real turkey season and we're going to talk about what happened that week. I don't think we're going to do this again. We've got, you know, what we waited for was a studio, you know kind of setting to do these in. Now that we have that, we're going through June, you know. You know we're going to have a lot of stuff to talk about then and it's going to be kind of in real time. So but looking forward to that, looking forward to getting these, this Gator project solidified, done deal.
Speaker 2:I want to be very clear on as we kind of branch off into this gear, that that nothing we produce or make is going to make turkey hunting any easier. This whole brand was founded on the fact that turkey hunting is a not the easiest thing in the world. It's a pretty hard sport, if you want to call it that. It requires effort, it requires overcoming challenges and a lot of adversity is associated with it. A lot of learning has to be had to be, you know, consider yourself skilled and, like we just mentioned, I'm learning stuff after 20 something years of doing it left and right, and I know a lot of old pros who learn stuff in their 80s. It's a, it's fun that way and that's what we like about it. So, and we get into the when you have the means to start producing gear and stuff that you take on with you hunting. One thing I'm going to make sure was that we're never going to do anything that's going to make the hunt easier.
Speaker 2:Now I hope some of y'all are able to become better turkey hunters, marginally. Do you know? Thanks to some of the stuff we say on our podcast or stuff we're able to show you lessons. We've learned the hard way that you're able to avoid, or even with the gear and stuff with these gators, that you're able to hunt more. You're able to hunt harder, that you're able to, you know, travel further and get more opportunities to.
Speaker 2:You know, really battle it out with an old Eastern lawn beard or wherever you are, but what you do with that battle is up to you.
Speaker 2:That is in your hands. That is a one man, bird man versus man kind of game. We believe that's how it's supposed to be, as it should be, and I don't want to kind of lead anybody's perception astray that we're going to start coming out with all kinds of stuff just to make money. I think there's already a lot of stuff that is just being produced for the sole sake of making money and as marketed as is going to make turkey hunting easy for everybody. We don't want to cross into that category, so to speak. And other than that, business as usual on all the other cylinders as well. So we got a lot to keep up with. We're still just us three kind of figuring it out, and some of these episodes are going to be winged as a not going to sound as rough as first one, but because more or less to the more rough that does sound, I guess that means we are getting a little better.
Speaker 3:But it can get any worse. Yeah, we thought it was good.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, we thought we'd done something.
Speaker 2:But but that's why I like documenting this stuff is cool.
Speaker 2:This is, I mean, this whole company is just an idea of something, you know, we thought would be cool for us to have, like a.
Speaker 2:I mean, these gators are literally something that I wish somebody made and might as well be us, you know, might as well, we might as well make it. Now we have the means to do that, and that's all we're still trying to do is just make stuff that we would like to have Turkey hunting or, you know, in daily lives that are centered around Turkey hunting, or wish, wish this happened or wish this would come, somebody would come out with this. We were on to where we can do that now, and that's all we want to do is just be able to provide that for other folks who recover from the same caught that we are, and that's why we want to, you know, really just interact with folks who are, you know, tuning in, and we really do develop relationships with folks who, you know, have been keeping up with us and we go hunting with them and we hang out with them and we, you know, we text them, snapchat them, all kind of everything you think of.
Speaker 2:We've come friends with a lot of folks who have, you know, thanks to this podcast or thanks to this brand, and so we asked you all do follow along, follow some. Social media is at spring legion, across the board, on everything from Instagram to YouTube to I think we've got a Twitter and what is the new ones called threads and we got tick tock, all the cool things. I guess you know we're. We're pumping out content left and right and interacting with folks and looking forward to what this season holds, but right now we've got to focus on last season for a little while longer, so you all able to see it and able to hear about it and I think you're going to enjoy it. So, with that, we appreciate you all listening to the spring legion podcast.