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Just called the Ranger District, and 300 is open now. Going up to 4A Thurs.

Card hit: Unit 8 muzzleloader cow!

Isn't it! I saw these and thought they were the nicest mounting boards I'd found.

Got to celebrate the 1st's. Full story Story Cedar mount by Taxidermist' Woodshop; custom brass plaque by Nemoci, Amazon. Brass beard holder--cut down 30 06 shell. Beard was 8" long when straitened.

Yes, particularly with a knight tk2000. Mine is however, average.

Thanks! One shot one kill, because that's all you get!!

I've been hunting both Spring and Fall for several years and have only harvested a couple of hens and a jake--all in the Fall. I've come close a time or two, but have previously failed to connect with a tom in the Spring. Yesterday, the second day of the last season, my luck changed. First morning, we heard a tom going at it almost right behind camp. But after calling to him with my glass pot call for a while, he shut up. My buddy and I trapesed around the woods all morning calling and hearing nothing. Then yesterday, I decided to ditch the pot call and try my ghost cut mouth call that I'd been trying hard to master. I'd never felt confident with the mouth call (although I'd been trying for a few years). This year, I felt like I was ready, and apparently the tom did, too. About 7:00 I leaned my ML shotgun against a tree, plopped myself in front of the tree, and started calling timidly. To my surprise, a gobbler replied immediately. I got serious, and grabbed my gun and pointed it in his direction (probably over 100 yards away). I kept calling, giving clucks and yelps that verged on kee kees. He kept on gobbling. Soon, I saw him cross an opening quite far away. I kept calling, using mostly clucks, as to not accidently make a weird sounding yelp. After loosing sight of him behind some trees, I looked over to my right and saw something red beside a tree. I thought, "that's got to be his head"! He walked further right behind the tree, and I used that opportunity to move my shotgun toward him. When he cleared the tree (at maybe 45 yards), I pulled the trigger and he went down. Quite a heavy tom with a 7" beard. CVA Optima Pro with 12ga ML barrel 1-3/4 oz #5 magnum lead shot BPI Multi-metal shot cup 75 grains 777

Those are some smart internet savvy bulls 😁

We too use to hunt archery cow exclusively (can't say we slaughtered them, though 🙂 ), but we got to hunt every other year or so. Then I remember a letter G & F sent out in the mid 2000's saying something like "It has come to our attention that too many hunters are applying for archery cow as their first choice and getting drawn often. When the allotment of cow permits was originally made, it was assumed that hunters would be applying for bull tags for their first choice and cow tags as 2nd." Then something about more fairly distributing the hunting opportunity, they were reallocating more of those tags to bull hunts.

Was up on the Mogollon this weekend. Opening day there was still snow on the ground from a couple days earlier. We saw a lot more tracks than usual but heard nothing. By end of the day, all the snow had melted, and there were large puddles everywhere. Creeks had more water than usual. Next morning while watering a tree, I heard a tom going at it maybe a quarter mile away. We took off after it and set up to try and bring it in. We heard some hens yelping as well, but at least one of them turned out to be another hunter who was positioned better than us. After a few minutes we heard the tom heading up to our left, then boom. The forest went quiet again. We never saw the other hunter, so we do not know whether he was successful or not. Sunday, we got into two different gobblers, but just couldn't get either of them to come within range.

Nice bird and great story! Congrats.

Congrats! That was a great story. Hope to have one myself in a couple of weeks.

Thanks for the great seminar. It was very helpful! This is the first time I've got any mouth call to sound remotely like a turkey!

Congrats, Bigbuck! We left after Monday morning hunt, as the wind was so fierce we could barely stand up. We didn't see any elk, and we hunted both mountains. If you don't mind me asking, which mountain?

Went up Saturday about noon and returned this afternoon. The bulls were bugling like crazy until that rain storm came and they were pretty quiet the next day. But the following day, they were at it again. A herd was so close behind my camp that I could hear cow calls. While out hiking around, not seeing turkey at all, we ran into a couple of elk herds. One had a bull that started bugling after we jumped them. The other had 6 cows that I walked up on 35 yards away. I froze but couldn't believe they stood there for a minute or so staring in my direction as I felt wind hitting the back of my neck. They finally busted in two directions. As I walked on, I heard one of them give a belated bark. Oh, one bad thing. We found a dead bull in the bottom of a creek canyon that was likely a few weeks old. No arrows found or any indication of death, as the carcass had been eaten pretty well by a bear and other scavengers. Didn't see a turkey one...sure wished I had an elk tag instead!