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My son caught his first walleye this year at fools hallow

Long, solid day yesterday. We threw back 50-60 crappie under 12" between Fri-Sat.

A big group of my hunting buddies and I drove up to the San Carlos Reservation on Friday morning to chase turkeys for the weekend. We got to our campsite around 2:30pm and got the wall tent and kitchen set up. After consulting OnX, we figured out where each group was going and hit the road for a little evening scouting. It was the first weekend of the first season on the San Carlos, so we couldn’t actually hunt until Saturday morning. My hunting partner and I opted for a spot close to camp, hoping to minimize the drive time the next morning. We drove our road from about 4pm until just before sundown, without locating any birds (about 10 miles out-and-back with no gobbles). We had the windows down, heading back towards camp when I thought I heard a gobble. We stopped the car and listened for 5 minutes… nothing. I was sure I heard a tom! My hunting partner climbed back in the rig, probably thinking I was pulling his chain. He shut the door and BOOM - gobbles. Perfect. We had at least two toms roosted and were even able to see one of them roosted halfway up a ponderosa. We dropped a waypoint on OnX and made our way back to camp. After a good night’s sleep, we were up and at ‘em at 4:15am with coffee and premade breakfast burritos on the wood stove. While we were packing the truck, it started to snow (NOT IN THE FORECAST!). We made the short drive to our spot, parking 600 yards from where we had roosted the birds the night before, and heard the gobblers going off! That made it easier to pick a good spot to set up in the dark. The snow was really starting to come down as we made it into our spot and set up our decoys. I only started hunting turkeys in the past few years, so I was unsure how the weather would affect the birds. But I was convinced our toms would just hangout on the roost all day because I sure as heck wanted to be back in the warm truck! We made a few quiet yelps to let the gobblers know where we were and sat back. They gobbled for the next 30 minutes, without us prompting them. We felt like we were in a good position and made another quiet yelp sequence to keep them intrigued. 15 minutes before sunrise we heard some gobbles 100 yards to the north of where our birds were roosted. It was either another set of toms that we hadn’t known about OR our birds had gotten down out of the roost without us hearing them. It ended up being the latter! The next 5 minutes was chaos, with the gobbles getting closer and closer. Each time they gobbled, I could feel it more and more in my chest. I understand the thunder chicken moniker now! I began seeing movement 75 yards out, which was a feat with the snow coming down in droves. I didn’t know it in the moment, but I think the snow covered up our decoys making it harder for the three incoming toms to know where we were. They missed the “X” and were moving to my left. In doing so, they forced me to rotate my sitting position and turn my shotgun towards the birds who were in the open at 25 yards. Aiming at the middle tom, I squeezed the trigger and CLICK. While trying to be quiet at the truck earlier that morning, I guess I hadn’t let the bolt slam all the way closed on my 3.5” shell and had a misfire. Trying to not the let moment pass me up, I cycled the bolt on my shotgun and got another round in the chamber. With all that noise, the turkeys knew something was up. They were confused and fixin to leave, but not before I got a shot off! What a cool morning! I had my first tom on the ground after an exciting hunt and the pictures in the snow will remind of this weekend forever. Side note: we filled my buddies tag in a similar fashion on Sunday morning, after it had warmed up a bunch. I’m hooked - and we will be back in the turkey woods next spring. CHEERS and thanks for reading! -MM

I have a 2000 f250 4x4 that I bought brand new with the v10. It has 145,000 miles and never leaked a drop and probably the best vehicle we have ever owned. Solid motor...seriously.

Flat line is about the best unit paper map

Mature coues buck cape for sale. Buck was shot in October and has been in the freezer. Buck field dressed at 94 lbs. Cape is in good condition. $75 in Sierra Vista. Call 520-250-7183

Like new leica 2700-B. Comes with everything as new also a 8gb micro sd card for ballistic profiles. $425 tyd

sold

😀

I was on parental duty this weekend and took the kids out fishing. Second cast I hooked this big walleye. 24". My biggest walleye and only the third I have ever caught out of here. 300 casts later we decided to call it a day!

https://phoenix.craigslist.org/wvl/rvs/d/surprise-2005-fleetwood-fiesta/7466510021.html I would take a few grand off for a member.

Seems to work pretty well for bear and lion.

Seemed to be the only piece of info missing. Dependable engine.

Oof, wish I saw this in time. Went today, same thing. Tons of dead fish everywhere. Shores full of dead bluegill, 20lb+ catfish ballooned up. Got skunked but I guess I can see why, the fish that are left must be feeling sick

Saw "AZTroutman" at the G&F Expo today buying some really nice deadheads through a buddy so his name couldn't be associated on the auction ledger... G&F officers recognized him, and mentioned the fact they would not be auctioning off the Powerline Buck.

Haha probably. So interesting story, I had a G&f person come out and ask me a lot of questions about my fishing experience on upper lake mary one time. He asked me if I was keeping the fish and I told him now because of the mercury. He told me that for wild animals the epa set regulations and asked me when have I ever been concerned about what the epa says I should eat. The fda is what you typically defer too for food. Fda and epa have widely varying definitions of what is safe and that the fish in this lake are far better than any canned Tuna you can buy as far as mercury levels are concerned, his words. I don't know what to believe but I do know that mercury consumption is an issue over an individuals lifetime and us arizona land lovers get far less seafood than a lot of other individuals. Too be safe this will be the only high mercury fish we will eat for a while!

I just bought a Garmin 93sv UHD. I run a couple of them on my boat. I have had 3 Lowrance graphs go bad on me.

Johnny Carson loved the bit about the Fakawees. Censors couldn't touch it.

I think you should ask the A3 guide service. They seem to know the boundaries well.

Where the Fakawee ?

Got fancy tonight. Crappie picatta

A few more this morning

PUPPIES !!!

We built 1600 sq ft shop 2 years ago ~ $60 per sqft, I did a lot myself, depending on how much you do yourself, could save a lot of money.

UPDATE - BLUEBONNET LONGBEARD My brother picked up me in Dallas last Thursday and we got on the road. It took us about 2 hours to get to some private ground we have permission to hunt - we cracked some beers and got ready to roost some birds that evening. We spent the last hour of shooting light trying to locate some longbeards and spent about an hour afterwards owl hooting, hoping to shock gobble a few. No luck. We woke up Friday morning with an uninformed game plan, really just hoping we would get into this hayfield on the property and get lucky. We parked about 1000 yards from the tree line, on the far end of the hayfield, about an hour before legal shooting light. As we closed the distance across the field, we decided to stop and make a set of owl hoots. I couldn't even get the first three notes out and POW. POW. Two gobblers struck up on the left corner of the hayfield. We made a beeline for trees. We set up as close as we could in the pitch black of the early morning, with a jake and hen decoy set out about 15 yards into the field. After 15 minutes of letting things cool down, I let out a soft hen call and immediately - POW, POW. I gave them some time and hit them with a little bit louder and longer hen call - POW, POW. They were keyed in on our location and all we had to do was wait for flydown. 10 minutes after legal shooting light, the gobbles start to move direction slightly. Again, we don't hear them fly down... but we see two dark blobs 100 yards into the hayfield. In the grey light of early dawn, we can barely make them out. But we know one of them is a tom, with the thunder coming from their location. 20 minutes of cat/mouse calling, and we have this jake and tom barreling in our decoys. I'm sitting behind my brother and I give them a soft yelp to get the tom's head up inside the decoy spread. He fired off a round and the big tom cartwheeled in place. Epic morning and a cool experience to get it done with my brother.