I just got back from the great state of Texas last night from a 4 day hunt. Never hunted anything quite like it. It may be the ugliest place I have ever hunted. There is a record drought going on down there and everything is brown and looks dead. The wheat fields are green but unfortunately there are none on our lease where I was hunting. The temps were in the 95 to 98 degree range mid-day with the wind blowing 30 mph. There was also a wildfire in the area I was hunting and it looks like it may burn half of north Texas. There was no way they could do anything with it because of the dry conditions and high winds. Again, nothing like anything I have hunted before. I hunted these four days alone and that also makes for some long days when there is nobody to talk to.
I saw several turkeys while there. I saw flocks of hens that had as many as 15 birds. I saw one flock of birds that had probably 20 hens, 3 gobblers, and about 5 jakes. It appeared the birds had not busted up yet. I only saw 4 gobblers during my hunt and was able to kill two of them. I had my Burris FF2 on another gobbler's head at about 40 yds but did not kill him. I was on our lease and he was just across the fence on another man's property. I just could not get him to cross the fence like an earlier gobbler had done. He was lucky that day.
First bird I killed left his flock and came to my Lonnie Sneed Hot Hen slate being run with a Steve Torman dogwood striker. He put on a show strutting, drumming, spitting, and spinning around my decoys. The second bird was taken on a mesquite flat and also came to my decoys after hearing Ole Jane from Chuck Anderson. He strutted in and gobbled at every call I made. I also called in several Jakes on the hunt cutting on a Steve Mann long box.
Again, different than anything I have ever hunted. I also saw bunches of wild hogs. I had one 300+ pound boar lay down within 10 yds of me by a brush pile I weas set up beside. He laid there a minute and smelled me and jumped up and took a couple steps toward me. I had my safety off and was about to pull the trigger when he finally turned and went off the hill like a deer.
Both birds looked like very similar. They both had little scraggly, thin bears. One beard was barely 6 inches long and one had some strands 8 inches long. I guess the cuckle burrs keeps the beards pulled off. They both had decent spurs. One was about 1 1/8" and the other one about an inch.
Excuse the poor pictures. Hard to do much by yourself. At least I had my camera with me both days.
