Got my first choice tag, 2nd season Clark. Good luck to everyone, hope you get the tags you want. Now on to Colorado and Arizona!
Nice! I pulled a 1st season Jo Daviess tag for this year. I'll likely pull a 2nd or 3rd season tag as well, which will give me some options depending on what the weather looks like and what the birds are doing. I'm also going to try and get my son out for a youth season hunt this year. He's itching to go and even though we'll only have 1 morning to hunt, it should be a good time. I'm going to have to do some serious scouting and trail camera work to make sure we're in the right spot.
YES! Got 1st season in Marshall Co. After a decade away from turkey hunting I took a jake with my 12 gauge this past spring. Next spring I’ll be trying to get my first with a bow. Can I get another permit for a southern county another season? I better look that up because I may have another invite.
This will be my first Spring hunting turkeys. Got drawn for first season Morgan 2nd lottery, then put in for a second tag 3rd lottery for the 2nd, 3rd, 4th or 5th season. Still hasn't shown up on the inquiry system for some reason. Find out in due time I guess. Might try for a 3rd OTC if any are still available. I'm already addicted to the calls, have 2 box calls, a pusher fighting purr that were given to me, a mouth call(new ) that is gonna take some practice and just got an owl call today. In case I have to try shock gobbling. It's all about the land where I hunt, so failure is all me if that happens.
When you pull up the page, scroll down. It should show up at the bottom as applied for. Don’t believe they draw until after 2/10.
It showed up yesterday or the day before. Got my 1st permit in the mail today via 2nd lottery. Also got the choke today as well, not going to mess around with a bow for my first spring turkey, hopefully I get a 2nd and/or 3rd and can try after grtting the first. Really don't want to buy a blind.
Went with a Carlson's Long Beard XR. It's a .660" choke. Says it was designed specifically for the Winchester XR Turkey load so I'll likely start there with 4 and 5 shot. Have a coworker who said I can come out and get it patterned.
Those XR's are nooo joke. I want the choke so lemme know how it patterns. It's really good with my generic Winchester extra full, but I'd love to see how yours performs, Clint. Sent from my SM-G960U using Bowhunting.com Forums mobile app
Got that choke last year for my browning gold - I can confirm that the patterns are really tight with the longbeard XR #5 shot 3-1/2” magnums but if you want to see an insane pattern and you got a big tax return this year then you gotta try that choke with some of HEVIshot’s 3-1/2” Hevi-18 TSS Turkey in #9 shot. If you do your patterning by counting pellets in a 10-in circle then you’re will need to plan on shooting your patterns at around 60 yards with the hevi-shot. You try patterning it any closer and it kind of just makes one big 2’ wide hole in the paper instead of a bunch of small holes so you won’t be able to count the pellets since there isn’t any paper left. Fair warning - those hevishots are $10+ per shell so make sure the store has one of those automatic defibrillators nearby before you hit the check out counter.
Kinda weird you brought that up, are 3 1/2" shells preferred ober 3"? Literally just came here to ask that question. I'm not afraid of the price of a box of shells, do it right and that should net you 5 birds regardless. Think I'll stick to some cheaper stuff this year though being my first time out. Just like a rage over a fixed blade, turkey won't be any deader because it took $5-6 more to kill it.
Also, right now I have a scope on my shotgun that was dialed in for 2 3/4oz lightfields, haven't used it for deer hunting in several years so will probably just leave it set up for turkey. Will the scope be way off from sabots to say a#4 or 5 in 3 1/2? I'm going to take a few 6×6 cardboard squares as a backboard, so I'll definitely be able to tell where it's hitting, rather than just a soda can on a stick
3” shells are more than adequate for killing turkeys - 3-1/2” shells have more pellets which can let you shoot a little further before the you start seeing holes in your pattern. The TSS shells are more expensive because the pellets are made of tungsten which is more dense than lead - that means that 7 or 9 shot can match the impact energy and penetration of a #4 or #6 lead shot meaning a lot more pellets. With the lead shots you’re pretty much limited to 40-50 yards. You get into a situation where past 40 yds the smaller shot sizes lack the energy to reliably penetrate a turkey skull but if you move to larger sized shot to get the necessary penetration you aren’t able to fit as many pellets in the shell so outside of 40 yds you start to get turkey head sized holes in your pattern due to the lower pellet count. The TSS is a big game changer since it means that smaller shot sizes can match the energy and penetration of larger lead shot. Lets you use higher pellet counts of smaller shot so your pattern is still dense enough at longer ranges and still have adequate energy and penetration to kill a turkey at these ranges. Also the tungsten shot is harder than lead shot so it deforms less when fired which translates to tighter patterns and more uniform pellet distribution within the pattern.
TSS is overkill for 12gauge, a lot of people dropped to custom 20g's shooting TSS. I really have had great patterns with Hevi 13"s in 5 shot. Trying a new load this year, Hevi X in 5 & 6 blend, its a tungsten load but a lot cheaper. Keep your shots to 40 yds or less. That Hevi 18 TSS is running $12 a shell. Draw a 10" circle on your cardboard, step back 40 yds , you might have to start at 20yds to dial in scope, but you want somewhere around 200 pellets in circle, even pattern, no empty areas. A great website for turkey hunting, OLDGOBBLER, go into forms, have a lot of pages for all guns and different chokes with different loads. Lot of great info, great place to buy calls, spend lots of money.
It shouldn’t be too far off but definitely worth checking. You also may want to try a couple different sizes of shot and loads because shotgun patterns are kind of strange. You can take 2 shotguns that are the exact same brand model and barrel length and install the same choke in each one and often you will find that the shell that produces the best pattern for one of the shotguns is different than the best patterning shell for the other shotgun, despite the fact that both are supposedly identical guns and chokes. To truly pattern a shotgun including testing out different shell and choke combinations to find the best one for your gun is really a time consuming, boring, pain in the ass process, particularly when it involves turkey loads with their higher shot and powder weights and the recoil that comes with that. With 3 or 3.5” magnum loads you can pretty much gaurantee that by the end of the day your shoulder will be sore and bruised if you do it right. I have never shot a buckshot or slug shell that comes anywhere close to a 3-1/2” magnum turkey shell in terms of recoil. I use the 3’ wide rolls of paper they sell in the paint section of Lowe’s or Home Depot for the process but the cardboard should work just as well.
Got a 3rd season permit as well. Remaining permits go on sale OTC on the 10th, link to remaining permits by county https://www2.illinois.gov/dnr/hunti...y STK Permits Remaining After 3rd Lottery.pdf
Just under 6 weeks and I still have not a clue on what I'm going to do or how I'm going to do it I don't know whether to set up in the clearing, try to set up in the woods, sit in a deer stand or plan to be mobile. I've seen turkey roost and come off the roost in the fall, had many encounters with them and not being busted but I'm hearing they are not as congregated during the spring. I might try for a 4th or 5th season tag OTC, probably going to need a few chances. I've never seen spring turkey aside from bumping a hen off the nest while mushrooming and that will scare the bejeezus out of ya lol
