Saturday May 13, 2006

I chose to head to the Rochester area this weekend because it was Mother's Day and I wanted to see my Mom and my Grandma. This means that I had limited land to hunt, and from reports from my friends, the birds had been pretty quiet all week. This morning I went with my Dad to H-town, our spot in Henrietta. My dad witnessed numerous birds fly down and work to the west on opening day, and then following day when Bill Lang connected with that Jake, he witnessed the same thing. So, common sense told me to setup to the West of the roost. Well, we snuck in to the west, something I don't like doing because you have to cross a few open fields and it can be pretty noisy. In the journey, I think we found where all the deer hide in the fall. There is a lot that is just full of young dogwoods and willow, that has some of the greatest deer trails I've ever seen. We could walk upright and straight down the trails, no twisting to get between some of the trees! Well, anyway, as we got to the woods, we were about 150yds from the roost, and in the right direction, so I was pretty optimistic, as we set up in a real nice opening in the hardwoods. Sunrise came and left and not a single bird was heard. I figured that the other birds on the property would be on the move after just flying down, so I motioned to Dad and we got up and started after them. Well, as soon as I stood up, I spooked a bird out of a tree about 80yds away from me, straight back in the woods. It obviously saw us as we came in, I can't believe it was roosted where it was, and that it was alone. In all the years I've hunted there, they have always been roosted where I thought they would be. Anyway, we hunted the rest of the property, to no avail. There wasn't anything happening. On our way home we stopped at the Quinn Oak Openings state land in Rush. We made a few calls, and didn't hunt it very hard. There was nothing gobbling there either. I have a hard time putting a lot of effort into marginal turkey habitat when I don't have any sign to rely on, even though I know they are there.