The Missouri Sportsmen's Information Network would like to welcome you to hang
AROUND THE CAMPFIRE
with
DUKE TURNAGE
PRO-STAFFER for PRIMOS HUNTING CALLS
and follow along as the year progresses.

 What you will read comes from Duke Turnage private hunting journal and the pictures from the hunt.
 

So pull up a chair! Kick up your boots! Enjoy the Campfire!

Each spring brings on a new challenge for me to balance turkey hunting and farming and still have time for my wonderful wife Teresa and daughter Casey. I try to wind up my Primos Hunting Calls schedule before mid March to concentrate on putting these great hunting calls to use in the field. I had an excellent season in 2003, learned a lot of lessons and hunted with some really good people. Hope you enjoyed the spring woods also.

Date: March 26, 2003
Location: North Mississippi
Calls: Power Cutter 2.5, The Freak
Camouflage: Mossy Oak Shadow Leaf
Weapon: X2 Winchester
Ammunition: Nitro 3.5" No. 6 Shot

I try to go to MS for an early "scrimmage" every year. Blake Palmer and myself were checking out a farm one afternoon of planted pines and pastures. We were working our way through the pines and calling on the pasture edges. At one stop before calling we heard turkeys scratching in the thick woods. I started out calling soft with just clucks and purrs with some of my own leaf scratching.

When the hens started talking we picked it up, going into cutts and long yelping series forcing the unseen gobblers to let us know they were there also. I don't think in 30 years of turkey hunting I've yelped so much. Two long beards crested the rise first, Blake took his at 15 yards and I completed the double with an even closer wing shot. The next day Blake took another good bird right off the roost we saw the afternoon before.

Date: March 29, 2003
Location: West Tennessee
Calls: Power Owl, Lil Heart Breaker
Camouflage: Mossy Oak
Weapon: Remington 870
Ammunition: 3" Remington Hevishot - No. 6 Shot
Decoy: Buckwing

Hunted opening day with Clark Brock of Brock Seeds. He had scouted these birds and knew what their direction of travel. We set up with a gobbler and hen Buckwing decoy set and while the flock skirted us, one longbeard strutted right up to the decoys. Clark took him with one shot of Remington Hevi Shot at 25 yards.
 
 

Date: March 31, 2003
Location: West Tennessee
Calls: Lil Heart Breaker, Diamond Yelper
Camouflage: Mossy Oak Shadow Leaf
Weapon: X2 Winchester
Ammunition: Nitro 3.5" No. 6 Shot
Decoy: Flambeau Jake & Hen

On a tip from Eugene McLean, I set up before daylight against a large cottonwood on a sand bar in a chute off the Mississippi River. Eugene had seen a gobbler strutting there after a hunt where he and Joe Tidwell doubled. Birds started to talk in the trees and when they flew down, I poured on the box calling.

Before long, two gobblers stepped out on the bar, looked at my decoys and strutted right in to my soft calling on the diaphragm. This was the only time I used decoys by myself this year. I believe early season they are deadly, but I do not use them much after that. Was back at the shop early for work. Two days later, I took another bird in the same area. He and four hens were traveling along a field edge and I shamelessly ambushed him.

Date: April 9th, 2003
Location: East Kansas
Calls: Power Crow, Power Cutter 2.5
Camouflage: Mossy Oak Shadow Leaf
Weapon: X2 Winchester
Ammunition: Nitro 3.5" No. 6 Shot
Decoy:

Rains allowed me to travel to Kansas with Mike Sentell. We met up with our good friend Travis Scott and like my trip there last year, had a blast. I roosted hens on the edge of a small pasture the night before and eased in before daylight very close. I was surprised to find there were several longbeards and jakes in the mix roosted lower in the hollow and convinced one longbeard to strut over to me.

I could have shot another that was following, but he got mixed in with the jakes and I was too shaky from the cold (26 degrees that morning) so I let them follow the hens into the woods. After tagging my 22.5lb prize, I circled the flock and got ahead of them in the next pasture. I managed to call three longbeards and one hen out of the group and finished my Kansas hunt before 8:00 AM. The lead bird came so close I missed him on the first shot! He weighed 23lbs and had some great hooks. I left the next day and later found out that our group limited out in three days.

Date: April 13th, 2003
Location: West Tennessee
Calls: Power Owl, Power Cutter 2.5, Lil Heartbreaker
Camouflage: Mossy Oak Shadow Leaf
Weapon:X2 Winchester
Ammunition: Nitro 3.5" No. 6 Shot
Decoy:

I took a WMA bird on this morning, called him in about 20 minutes after flydown around a slough. I had seen turkeys use this end of the slough and knew they crossed the bottleneck of woods there. Setting up in the right place is a big chunk of turkey hunting. This turkey had beard rot or "red rot". The beard broken off at about three inches.
 
 

Date: April 17th, 2003
Location: West Tennessee
Calls: Power Crow, True Double II
Camouflage: Mossy Oak
Weapon: Remington SP-10
Ammunition: Nitro 3 ozs No. 5, No. 6 & No. 7.5 Shot
Decoy:

Friend and neighbor David Haddock took me with him to let me enjoy watching him take his first bird. We kept checking gobbler by crow calling to get set up closer and Dave poured it on with perfect yelps from a True Double II. Soon the bird was strutting at 20 yards, a sure range with Dave's 10 gauge!

Date: April 22nd, 2003
Location: Southern Missouri
Calls: Power Crow, Power Cutter 2.5, Lil Heartbreaker
Camouflage: Mossy Oak Shadow Leaf
Weapon: X2 Winchester
Ammunition: Nitro 3.5" No. 6 Shot
Decoy:

It was the second day of Missouri season, cousin Van Turnage had tagged on the opener and the rest of our camp was long faced from uncooperative turkeys. I chose to hunt a place I call my favorite, a long thin point ridge with a log road that leads to a roost site three-quarters down into the hollow. Birds usually fly down and come right up the road to calling. Trouble was this morning they were across the hollow.

After several minutes of thinking the gobblers would come across, I finally convinced myself to go to them. I went about 50 yards, hit the crow call and they were on my side coming up! I backed up to the closest tree, pulled up my mask and got my gun up when I heard the longbeard drumming down the road. I took him at 35 yards and the jake he had in tow got the education of his life!
 
 

Date: April 26th, 2003
Location: West Tennessee
Calls: Power Crow, Power Cutter 2.5
Camouflage: Mossy Oak
Weapon: Remington Super Mag. 12 Ga.
Ammunition: 3 1/2" Winchester Supreme
Decoy:

Once again I went with Dave and this time the shooter was his son Jake because ole Dave had tagged out! Mid-morning we struck a couple of longbeards together and I managed to pull them into Jake's lap by falling behind him, scratching and calling. Dave crouched behind Jake's tree and gave instructions while the birds came in. Jake's bird weighed 20 lbs and had a 10" beard. The two hunts with Dave and Jake made my season this year.
 
 

Date: May 3rd, 2003
Location: Southern Missouri
Calls: Power Crow, Power Cutter 2.5
Camouflage: Mossy Oak Shadow Leaf
Weapon: X2 Winchester
Ammunition: Nitro 3.5" No. 6 Shot
Decoy:

Joe Mueller, my buddy from Olive Branch, MS and I had a chance to run back to Missouri for another hunt. This was the second weekend and I was surprised to hear gobbling. I bow hunted from a Double Bull blind on the first morning, called in a jake and chose not to shoot. I could hear a bird up the hollow and knew I would gun hunt him the next morning. I hunted my way to him the next day and got side tracked by a couple of early hatch jakes that fooled me with their full gobbles. I finally got them in and was shocked they were jakes.

I left them and headed straight to the area I heard the bird the day before. He answered the first crow call I gave him at about 150 yards. He didn't answer the first yelps immediately, so I didn't call again for quite some time. The next time I called, he was closer but still didn't cut my calling. After what seemed to be forever, I could hear him drumming and then saw him. He came to 45 yards, stretched to look then turned and walked off. I let him go until he gobbled where he started from. I turned away and called on more series and waited forever again.

Finally I saw him coming back. I picked a log out for a distance marker, then lost him behind a tree. The next move he made was a big jump on the log! A cluck on the diaphragm, a stretch of his neck and the pull of a trigger ended my 2003 season. When I returned to camp, I was tickled to see Joe had taken a nice gobbler also.

If I had to say one thing that stood out this year, it's the way birds responded to shock calling, especially crow calling. It was truly a good spring for me and I thank the Creator for such a wonderful bird to hunt in such beautiful locations.

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