A November Gearhead-Gear to Take on a Deer

So just shy of one week out from the start of the open gun season here in many areas of Ontario, and my inbox is loaded (okay five messages…) with requests from across North America for a Gearhead post.  So here it is.  Same standard Gearhead disclaimer applies, but even more vigorously in this sense, since of all the types of hunter I profess to be, ‘deer hunter’ is the area in which I have had the least (statistical) success.  That is, I guess, if you are one of those people who measures success in body count.

Firearms & Ammunition

On the Thanksgiving weekend when I was fifteen my Dad took me back up to a hollow behind the farm in Lion’s Head.  In the early fall woods we walked to the forest’s edge with a piece of split firewood about twelve inches long and six inches wide; we sat the would-be target on its narrow end up against the base of a tree.  Then we walked sixty yards or so up the shallow grade of a hill and I sat down on an old tire.  With my legs crooked up and my elbows on my knees  I used my gangly , teenaged arms to line up the peepsight on Dad’s Model 14 .30 Remington pump-action rifle with a knot just right of center on the target.  Dad had put one shell in the gun; I clicked the safety off and tightened my finger around the trigger.  With a POW! the round-nosed bullet split the still fall afternoon and I watched the piece of wood all at once jump, shudder, and slowly fall forward.  With silky smoothness the recoil had already worked the pump action a quarter of the way back and I completed the motion, savouring the smell of burnt powder and the metallic “sna-chink!” of the gun’s action.  We went up and looked at the wood (which was almost split in two) and Dad remarked something pleasant like “If you can hit that from where you were, you ought to be able to hit a deer in the front shoulder.”  Then I got off the tire and Dad put a broken down cardboard box inside it.  He told me to go halfway down the hill, which I did, while Dad carried the tire to the top of the hill.  He arrived at a spot perpendicular to me and well out of my line of fire, at which point he called down for me to put three shells in the gun and that he was going to roll the tire down the hill.  I was to shoot for the piece of cardboard and keep shooting until the gun was empty.  Dad started it rolling with his hands and gave it a kick as it got away from him and at about thirty or forty yards I opened up, working the action smoothly and evenly…but again that action is so worked in that I think it leverages a lot of the recoil to do the lion’s share of the pumping for me.  I think I hit the tire once and the cardboard twice as the target hopped and bounded along unevenly down the hill.  With that Dad and I were satisfied that I could handle the power and kick of the gun.  A few weeks later, on the second hour of my first ever deer hunt, the .30 Remington swatted down a yearling doe and I was officially a deer hunter.

That Model 14 is all mine now, and it has come with me on every deer hunt I’ve made over the last seventeen years.  I have an unhealthy affection for that gun.  Its early 20^th century vintage, smooth, glowing lines, and ease of maneuverability in the heavy brush I sometimes find myself in have never failed me.  I may be tempting fate to boast that it has always shot straight (even when I haven’t) and that it has never jammed or acted up on me.  Simply put, I love that gun, and the fact that ammunition for it has been off the market for many a year only means that the hand-loaded, 180-grain rounds I sift through it once in a while are all the more meaningful.  It is a brush-gun and it wields that title proudly and performs-as-billed with some aplomb.

I also have a synthetic camo-stocked, scoped, bolt action Stevens in .243WIN that I won at the Barrie District Anglers & Hunters annual wild game dinner and fundraiser in 2009, and this gun (alongside the .30REM) makes its way up to my second week of hunting in the Spence Township area, where there are a few more open hardwoods and moose meadows to hunt and the luxury of a scope is a welcome advantage.  95-grain Hornady SST Superformance fly out of the muzzle on this lean little number at some pretty high velocity (and it is a nice little crossover varmint rifle) but to date I’ve never had the safety off during deer season, let alone let slide with a shot bearing any kind of deadly intent at a white-tailed deer.  But maybe this year is the year I break that run.

Clothes and Outerwear

My outer layer is a Remington 4-in-1 coat (actually the same type of coat that I take waterfowling, just in the requisite blaze orange) that I picked up in 2008.  It does the trick nicely as it is plenty warm (even when only wearing the outer shell) and has plenty of deep, easy to access pockets.  For the last three deer seasons it has been reasonably dry and surprisingly burr-resistant (which where our group hunts is a nice luxury).

Under that I’ll usually have a hooded sweatshirt or long sleeve shirt, slung over a synthetic sports shirt (either from Under Armour, or a recycled soccer jersey) that wicks moisture nicely.  Unless it is unseasonably mild (as it was in 2008) I’ll also have on some long underwear; I prefer Stanfield’s two piece top & bottom ensemble, although my sister got me one of those thermal unitards (in fire engine red, no less!) with a rear flap for ‘evacuation’ for Christmas in 2008 and I used them the following year after my Stanfields got a bit damp in a rain…I was literally soaked the nuts!...but I digress.  I think she got that unitard for me as a ‘joke gift’…I’m okay with that because they were nicely comfortable, and I liked them so much I’ve continued to include them in the annual packing list.

I usually wear the same camo pants that I multi-purpose with all year long, although I also pack some ratty jeans that I don’t mind getting mud and blood on, and a pair of lined pants in case it gets extra-frosty some morning (and since 2011 boasts the absolute latest date that deer season can start in Ontario, it may actually happen when I’m hunting not far from Orrville on November 19^th).

I double up on socks (since I don’t want my toes to freeze while I sit on stand…I do a lot of sitting) with a synthetic thermal sock underneath a wool sock.  I have two pairs of gloves, both in blaze orange; one pair is just light cotton for days when the temperature is nice, the other pair is Thinsulate lined for rain, snow or just a bitter November wind.  I likewise have a blaze orange baseball cap and a blaze orange Thinsulate toque, so that I can wear one or the other (or if the weather is changeable…both!)

The key to all these clothes is flexibility and layering.  But I’m sure your grandmother already told to dress in layers so I won’t belabor that point further.

Footwear

Rubber boots.  (If you’ve been following these ‘gearhead’ posts this should come as little surprise.).  What can I say?  They’re comfortable, cost-effective, insulated, lightweight and they don’t carry much in the way bells and whistles.  My cousins and my brother have adopted the modified hiking boot style of hunting footwear (what with scent control on a molecular level, cutting edge waterproofing, and similar upgrades) and they all rave about it, so one is just as good as the other in my eyes.  I just like spending around $50 on my boots, while some more ‘advanced’ footwear can run to four times that much.

Accessories

Just like it is for my wife when she goes shopping, deer hunting for me is all about accessories (again, no surprise to any loyal follower of this blog).

We party hunt in our camp so it is vital that we all keep in touch.  For that, we carry some short-wave handheld radios to keep in touch.  Mine are from Motorola, and although they came in a pair (I got them in 2001) one of them gave up the ghost last year and is completely non-functional.  Its mate is still going strong though!

I have a bag of sticks and plastic rods from Quaker Boy that I can use if I want to try to rattle up a buck, and I use a Knight and Hale doe bleat can.  This year I received the Quaker Boy Brawler buck grunt call in the mail for re-joining a conservation organization here in Ontario but before that I used the Knight & Hale E-Z Grunter Plus.  My cousin, and other hunting acquaintances have had success with calling deer.  Me, not so much.  But I keep trying though, maybe this will be year that an old bruiser buck comes galloping to the call.  I’m not brand loyal and accumulated these calls in a piecemeal fashion; I can’t pretend to be one of those highfalutin, corporate-sponsored types of writers…although I secretly long to be one.

I use the same combination of Buck 110 Folding lockback (with a clip point) and Gerber Magnum LST folding lockback (avec drop point) knives that I use year round.  Both are wicked sharp, but the classic look, feel, and weight of the Buck has made it my favourite go-to blade.  I almost cut the tip of my left thumb off with it a few seasons back, but that has more to do with operator stupidity than with any flaw in the knife.  The moral…don’t let me sharpen a knife unsupervised.

I have various and sundry other toys on my person during deer season including a compass, toilet paper, matches, a rope, a plastic bag to keep items dry (and to pack out a tasty deer heart if I’m so lucky), a little folding packet for my licenses and tags, another folding pack for extra rifle shells, a water bottle, a candy bar, a Heat-a-Seat, maybe and apple or two…

This year I bought a Rocky backpack for all this, as before I was always forgetting which pocket held certain items, and I tended to rattle a bit when I walked…which is never good for a deer hunter, whose primary aim should be a stealthy silence.

So there you have it…another Gearhead post in the books.  I recommend you try out any of these items that you feel like and if you want to adopt some of the same gear as me, go for it.  If not, that’s fine too.  As long as what you use is comfortable and leads to success (no matter how you define success in the deer woods) than that ought to be good enough.

The Return of the Gearhead-Waterfowl Edition

Aaaaaand we’re back.

After an interminable summer of heat, dry conditions, and no hunting, I am glad to announce that I am once again ready to write about chasing animals.  To those of you who emailed during the period when my blog productivity (or blogtivity, as I call it) was basically non-existent, I thank you again for your dedication.  I’m going to honour a couple of requests right off the hop here by answering those of you who were asking about my choices and recommendations (a concept that still doesn’t fit quite right with me) for duck and goose hunting equipment.

My list of waterfowling paraphernalia is not quite as extensive as my turkey hunting gear, but slightly more detailed than my list of deer hunting equipment.  So as not to offend, please do not use my dedication to buying equipment as an indicator of my dedication to respective branches of hunting.  For example, I don’t own a pair of waders, but please don’t think me a waterfowling neophyte for that reason…trust me I’ve been after ducks and geese for a long time; just in fields instead of swamps.  As with the turkey hunting versions of this institution, I’m not sponsored by any of the brands I buy, and do not take my endorsement of any equipment or gear as a guarantee that it will work for you or that you’ll even like it.

Firearms

I use the same Remington 870 for waterfowl as I do for turkey hunting.  The only changes are in choke and load.  I remove my turkey choke and go back to the modified choke that it came with.  I also make the switch over to steel shot.  Since the lead shot ban took effect (1999 in Canada, I believe?) I’ve been experimenting with all sorts of loads.  The past couple of years I’ve used Federal Black Cloud 3 inch BB for Canada geese and plain old 3 inch Federal steel #2 for ducks.  For a few years prior to that I used 3 inch Kent Fasteel exclusively in BB and #2 for geese and ducks respectively with no problems at all.  Before that I had a brief flirtation with Hevi-Shot (when it was still a Remington-affiliated product to give you an idea on how long ago that was) and they were the most effective shotgun shells I’ve ever purchased…they were just cripplingly expensive on an unemployed university student’s budget.  Maybe if I had a sponsorship deal I could go back to using them.  Shameless, I know.  I use 3 inch because that’s the biggest shell my gun will hold; I’m not even going to get involved in the debate over shot size, because reams of paper has been written about it; some if it legitimately scientific, some other purely speculative.  All I’ll say is this.  Shoot the biggest shell that you can effectively handle the recoil on and still be reasonably accurate with.  I like BB over BBB or T because I’m a fan of pellet count (the same reason, coincidentally, that I use #6 instead of #4 in my turkey gun).  If you, however, define yourself and your worthiness as a hunter by how big a shell and pellet size you can spray around the marsh…then I guess you’ve probably already scoffed at this and went onto the next section.

Clothing

Waterfowl hunting in general is a multi-seasonal pursuit.  Some days are pure bluebird, others downright sleety and nasty.  The vast majority of days fall in between those two extremes so for me versatility is key.   I have a three-in-one coat from Remington in Realtree AP camo that I use interchangeably for turkey and waterfowl hunting.  It takes me through the whole run of waterfowl season.  When it is hot during the early September resident goose hunting, I can wear a t-shirt and the light outer shell or put on a camo long sleeve t-shirt and leave the coat at home altogether.  Into October and November, I can choose to layer with the shell and insulating liner of the coat, or I can go with more base layers and wear just the shell again.  It all depends on how cold, rainy, windy, sunny, or snowy things are looking to get.  In December, I go with both the insulating liner and the outer shell and layer appropriately.  It has plenty of pockets for licenses, shells, knives, and the other accoutrements that a waterfowler is known to have on hand (Mars bars and Gatorade anyone?!).

I hunt fields almost exclusively so I don’t own anything that would resemble a wader (hip or chest) and I own exactly zero neoprene.  Sorry, but I can’t give you any insight into that type of gear.  That said, one of my closest hunting buddies got a retriever last year, so hitting the marsh may be in order now that we have a reliable means of recovering anything we may happen to shoot.  This may be just the excuse I need to get some waders.

Since I lack waders, and since I generally prefer to stay as dry as possible (I can hear the masochistic camp of hardcore foul-weather hunters decrying me as a fraud as I write this) I wear camo pants and rubber boots.  I have long-espoused the merits of the Welly and I don’t intend to change.   That said I do need a new pair because my faithful rubber boots of the last four years gave up the ghost late into turkey season this past spring.  I may go with another pair of Bone Dry boots from Redhead, then again I might not.  It all depends on what tickles my fancy on that day.  My advice here (as with all footwear from hunting boots to bedroom slippers) is to get a pair that is light, warm, and fits properly.  Do not (as I have in the past) show up wearing your thin cotton dress socks and start trying on boots thinking they’ll fit you when the season rolls around.  Bring the heaviest socks you would wear hunting to the fitting and get it right.  Blisters from improperly fitted boots ruin a day of hunting faster than almost anything else.

In terms of other clothes, I like to be comfortable and not at all stylish.  A moisture-wicking base layer (usually a retired soccer shirt of mine), a wind-breaking middle layer and a wool, or other natural fiber top layer would be what I have on from mid-October onward.  Early in the season I usually just have a micro-fiber long-sleeved camo shirt on.

I do my fair share of the calling when I’m hunting so for this reason I do wear a mesh camo facemask, but I almost never wear gloves.  I don’t use a lot of back pressure when I call (more on that below) so I’ve found I have more call control with my bare hands.  Unless it is really, really cold, I won’t have gloves on.  I also find that the best way to make sure you’re making the right sounds on a goose or duck call is to be able to watch the birds all the way in, so that’s why I have the mesh facemask.  I can blow through it into the call with no problem, and I can watch for the subtle changes in the bird’s flight that may tip me off on when to change up on a sound or keep pouring it on.  If the shine of the sun on a human face is like a flashing beacon to you at a distance, imagine what it is to a duck.  If you can’t or won’t wear a facemask, please keep your head down so that the birds don’t flare off for the rest of us.

Calls

Much like when I’m turkey hunting, I love to do some calling.  Unlike when I’m turkey hunting I do not have a vast number of calls.  I have one goose call, and (now) one duck call.  I used to have two duck calls, but my two year old son claimed one for his own, and I don’t have the heart to take it away from him when I go on a hunting trip.  My duck call is a Buck Gardner Fowl Mouth II, and it is just a nice polycarbonate duck call that does everything I need it to.  It hails nicely, is good and responsive for when I need to get soft and raspy, and does a feed chuckle easily and realistically.  It has been out on some very cold days and has not frozen stuck on me once, and to top it off it was really well-priced.  I’m not a contest caller for ducks, so I don’t need anything other than an effective “meat” call, which is what I have.

My goose call on the other hand (and if you’ve been following this blog, you already know this) is a Tim Grounds hand-turned, custom-tuned acrylic Super Mag and some would define it as an expensive, competition-caliber short reed goose call.  That may be true, but luckily, it is also a dandy, durable, all-purpose hunting call that has led more than one goose to the stew pot or the sausage grinder.  I have and will continue to sporadically compete in goose-calling contests so it is nice to have a good-sounding call to start with, but it does take some practice and commitment to get reasonably proficient with it.

What can I say…it is not a call for everyone, but it should be.  I have a couple of hunting buddies who can run it okay, but it does take a fair amount of air to get it breaking over crisply, and I have it set up a little stiff.  A lot of manufacturers are going with the tag-line of ‘easy-blowing’ goose calls which is fine, but since there’s nothing soft or subtle about anything I do, I like having to huff some wind to get a call singing.  I also use a lot of back pressure when I’m doing moans and murmurs so a stiffer reed suits that too.  I learned the short reed basics on some cheaper mass-produced polycarbonate short reed calls, but in those days (as now) I’m always over-blowing them and squealing them, so the Super Mag just works for my style now.  Other than mechanics it also just sounds darn good.  The top end of the call is almost cackling-goose high, which is good for really reaching out to geese on windy days or when they just don’t want to respond to flagging (more on that in the next section), the reed, with effort and practice, breaks over quickly so you can lay double clucks or even ‘hiccup clucks’ on top of each other rapidly to sound like multiple geese, and the bottom end is just dirty, nasty, and lethal.  I have not blown a call that does moans and murmurs as well as this one does.  Period.  Geese just seem to respond to it, which is good, because I shoot so badly that if they didn’t give me a close look I would never kill a single one of them.  I sent it off for a tune up recently and Tim & Hunter Grounds (both World Goose Calling Champions) were great to deal with, they did a fine job on the tuning, and got it back to me very quickly.  Customer service excellence and just good, down to earth guys to deal with throughout the whole thing; can’t argue with that.

There are other top brands of goose calls out there including calls by Sean Mann, Fred Zink, Buck Gardner, GK Calls, and Foiles just to name a few (there are literally dozens out there).  I’ve tried all of those named above and the Tim Grounds Super Mag suited me best.  As I’ve said before with calling, as with almost everything else I mention in the Gearhead posts, you need to shop around and try them out to get one that you are satisfied with.  Then practice until your wife threatens to leave you (she’ll come back, really.)

Extras

My calls hang on a lanyard that I won in an online contest back in 2006.  I don’t think the company exists anymore, but I seem to recall them being called Black Dog or something to that effect.  It is a durable lanyard made from braided parachute cord with five call drops on it.  I used to fill them all out, now not so much.

I have a flag that I started using just last season, and it is pretty good I must admit.  Not the ‘magic bullet’ that some would have you believe, but certainly effective at getting a flock’s attention from distances that a call just won’t reach.  Remember though, all the flagging and calling is wasted if you don’t sit still and stay covered up when the birds are within the last 100 yards. 

To that end, this year may be the first year I hit the fields with a layout blind.  Once again, I’m sure I’m late to this party but then again, my group was killing a stack of geese every year without the aid of layout blinds so why would I spend the money.  This year, some other friends who hunt closer to me basically require them for me to come along (their fields lack ditches and tall grass) so I’m going to break down and drop the cash.  The positives are well documented; low-profile, portable (although I don’t have a truck so fitting one of these into a family sedan or worse, a commuter compact, should be an interesting feat of engineering) and versatile in that they can be ‘grassed-up’ to almost disappear into the background.  Some negatives though do exist, so just consider the following.  If you are a senior with limited mobility, or someone who is not physically able to do a sit up (or like me, selectively lazy) you may not like these.   Also, the interior space may not accommodate you if you are of above average height or, uh, robustness.  Once again, best to try out some models before you drop the cash.

We have a ‘community’ approach to decoys, and I personally do not own any.  We usually pile together some shells and full-body duck and goose decoys into a truck bed, get to the field, un-pile them in some sort of pattern, hunt over them and then pile them back in a truck bed.  It has worked so far.  If you are looking for sophisticated decoy placement strategy (and this could be a whole other post) my advice is this.  Put the decoys out close enough together so that they look realistic, but not so close that they look nervous.  Do not face them all in the same direction (ducks and geese tend to do this naturally when they are alarmed or about to get up and leave), and whenever possible, try to make them look like flocks you’ve naturally observed in the wild before.  All this other stuff about prevailing winds, landing zones, arrowhead patterns, X-patterns, J-hooks, and horseshoes…that is all beyond my ken.  I do not have a MOJO decoy, but I secretly lust after one.

So there you have it, my return to more productive blogging in the form of a Gearhead post that really tells you nothing of value.  Hope you like it, and I promise, the future holds more lunacy, lies, groundless conjecture, and Taboo’s of the Day.

Return of the Gearhead

Saturday past saw me driving at a very early hour from Cambridge to Barrie so that I could go hang out with my in-laws and pick up my son (they had taken him off my hands for a few days.

Now no drive along Highway 400 North is complete with a stop at BassPro Shops.  So that’s what I did.  See, last week I was sitting in my basement blaring away on my Tim Grounds Super Mag (as is my habit) and it made a couple of funny, squeaky notes.  Since this call has been money for me (and plenty forgiving too) I chalked it down to operator inadequacy, which is usually the case so early in the pre-season.  After a half-hour or so, my wife came down to inform me that I ought to consider making practice time over, or she’d make it over by force.  The call was full of all sorts of condensation, so I took it apart to rinse it out when I noticed a couple of cracks starting to form at the tip of the reed.  This call has seen me through almost five years of hard-hunting, constant practice, and even a couple of contests, so for the reed to make it that far was great, frankly.

I would be remiss if I don’t also mention that in my haste I once accidentally slammed it in my car door in the morning darkness…since then it has had a mean chip and crack in the end piece, but it still sounds great.  Still, the small cracks in the reed and the slightly out of tune squeal were flimsy enough pretenses for me to stop in at BassPro and peruse their waterfowl calls, decoys, and gear.

I tested out some layout blinds, priced out some dekes, and attempted to try some goose calls.  I’ll be posting later this week on my findings in the blind and decoy fields, but this post is really about customer service.

I won’t be slagging BassPro; all I will say is that I can’t believe they weren’t able to find “the guy” who had the keys to the acrylic and exotic wood goose calls.  Also, they didn’t have any replacement reeds or parts for my Super Mag, so I decided to look into repairing it through the dealer instead.

In this case, the dealer was Tim Grounds himself.  I went to his website, and gave him a call that Saturday.  I got his shop voicemail, so I flipped him an email with the details on what I need.  Not only did I get an email back from Juda Grounds first thing on the next business day (i.e. today) but I also got a personal voicemail from the man himself.

Not to gush, but I’ve read a lot about Tim, watched him on TV and in hunting videos, and used his instructional tape that came with my Super Mag to nail down some pretty good sounds.  All the testimonials on his site indicate that he’s just a humble, nice guy who is passionate about hunting and hunting calls.  In that vein, the goose call he made that hangs on a lanyard around my neck has lead to the demise and preparation into delicious food of many, many Canada Geese in the last five years, and it has also been hanging around my neck during the creation of some lifelong memories; some of which I’ll be sharing with you the reader in the next weeks and months.  This phone message is about as close as I’ve come to being associated in any way with a real hunting icon, so forgive me my rock star adulation.  My wife doesn't understand it either.

The outcome?  I’m getting a true craftsman that will personally repair and tune my call, a good story, and I don’t have to break the bank.  That’s a triple-win for those of you who are counting.

The Right Tool

The inspiration for this post came from a stapler.

I have a cheap, generic black stapler at work, but that bland corporate appearance masks the fact that in reality this stapler is a beast.  It is not very big, but it tears through paper with two powerful steel fangs.  I’ve stapled as many as forty pages of together securely with it, and I think some of my coworkers are getting stapler envy.  It consistently succeeds where lesser staplers would undoubtedly fail.

The stapler is an outwardly simple design, with a humble lever and a couple of springs operating in unison with the sole end of fastening together papers.  I think many inventors would be hard pressed to improve on the stapler, although without a doubt I’m sure many have tried.

So there you have it ladies and gentlemen.  The stapler.

Where is this going?  Good question.

I am not a craftsman so I lack any ethic of intrinsic appreciation for the finer points of mechanics or manufacturing.  Like most of my ilk, I’m just concerned with what works.  Yes, I am aware that the craftsman’s life is much richer than mine.  Stop bragging.

But to that end, in honour of my desk stapler, here’s a brief list of items that hunters can use that offer the esoteric pleasure of pursuing game with tools that are simple but almost flawlessly effective.

A Break Action Shotgun

My first youthful rabbit hunts as a teen were carried out with an absolutely gorgeous 20 gauge Ruger over-under shotgun with a break action.  Even for a gangly and awkward fifteen year old it swung like a dream.  Now that I’m a grown man, it is the most balanced gun that I’ve ever had the pleasure of pointing at game.  I’ve shot it at grouse as they exploded out of snow drifts and rabbits that made mazy runs through bottomlands.  I’ve never gone after waterfowl with it, but I think it would make an exceptional gun for decoying mallards, and at this very moment I am picturing a smooth left to right swing on a plump greenhead as it drops into some secluded backwater and then pulling the trigger crisply as I move the barrel past the drake's beak with a deft, painter’s brushstroke.  Beauty and handling aside, there is a ritualistic satisfaction that comes from loading and unloading this gun, thanks to the simple machinations of the break action.  Pop two shells in, snap shut, fire twice, and pluck two shells from the extractor while savouring the pungent aroma of spent gunpowder.  Also, when I shot that gun I somehow found myself a better and more focused shooter, likely because I knew that I only had two shells in the gun.

A Fixed Blade Knife

I do not actually own a fixed blade hunting knife; my two knives are clean, compact lock-back folding jobs.  I have however used the fixed blade knives of friends and I can say that I am a fan.  A reasonably sized (no need for Crocodile Dundee here) fixed blade knife has clean classic lines, possesses exactly zero moving parts, and when a sharp, gleaming blade is fixed atop a smooth wood (or better yet, bone or horn) handle…well, you can’t get any more simple or effective than that.  Period.  Full stop.

Rubber Boots

They go by many names.  Gumboots.  Wellies.  Rain-boots.  Barn-boots…call them what you will: I am a devoted, and shameless, rubber boot enthusiast.  Perhaps we’ve all been fooled into believing in the scent-proof, space-age fabric, elaborate lacing systems, moisture wicking, $250 a pair voodoo that we are sometimes told, and those products certainly have their merits.  After all, I don’t think I’d like to hit the high Arctic in a pair of Wellies, nor would I want to go chasing Mountain Goats in the Rockies without some real mountaineering footwear.  But for the rank and file of us, do we really need anything more than a pair of well constructed rubber boots?  I say no.  For the average turkey hunter (except perhaps for those in heavy rattlesnake country) rubber boots offer exactly what is most needed; light, un-insulated, reliably waterproof footwear.  Fall waterfowl hunts?  Outside of hip or chest waders for the deep water crowd, I can think of no better boot to have than a rubber boot.  But what of the late season deer hunter?  Not warm enough for November and December you say?  I think rubber boots are great then too, especially quality name brands that won’t freeze, rot, and crack in the cold.  Still worried about insulation, eh?  Well then, just layer up and put on some wool socks.  What?!  You don’t like wool socks?!

Wool Socks

How can you not like wool socks?!  They’re great.

A Compass

I suppose that before compasses hunters determined direction by the sun, and so long as you know what time it is, the sun does give a general bearing on east versus west.  Still, a simple compass (and the know how to use it) is not only a great, self-satisfying way of finding your way around, but a sight cheaper and easier to use than even the most basic of GPS units.  I fear that in some ways, good old fashioned woodsmanship might be dying out thanks to the advances in GPS units, that now not only tell you where you are, but how you got there, where to go to get out, the location of nearby eateries, history on interesting tourist attractions in the vicinity, the time of sunrise and sunset, the corollary calculation of minutes of daylight, the number of days until the next full moon, and so on and so on.

Open Sights

I won’t spew on this too much, because I’m not of the mind that progress has no place in hunting.  I did have a pretty upbeat conversation with a man once who thought the use of scoped rifles was tantamount to cheating and that the widespread use of rifle scopes only contributed to extending a hunter’s idea of “range” into untenable territories, leading to an increase in unethically distant, longer is better, “hero-type” of rifle shooting.  I haven’t really seen evidence of this in my circle of hunting amigos but, like everything, I’m sure there is an element out there that views themselves less as hunters and more as special-ops snipers.  So be it.  But still, open sights are pretty great.  By “open sight” I mean any kind of iron style sight, whether that is a bead, a peep-sight, a tang sight, or a buckhorn.  Of course, even open sights have made the technological leap forward into the world of fibre optics.

There are dozens of other simple, effective tools out there for all types of hunters including wooden snowshoes, natural blinds, single reed duck (or goose) calls, bolt action rifles, and turkey box calls…but to espouse the benefits of all the gear out there that is both useful and elegantly simple would take posts upon posts.

Confessions of a Turkey Hunting Gearhead—Part Two

Having covered the apparel and outerwear aspects of what I take into the turkey woods, let’s talk about the fun stuff: equipment, ordnance, and accessories.

As I said in the earlier post on this topic, I take an unbelievable amount of equipment with me when I go turkey hunting; the challenge is deciding what to use and when.  Sometimes you have to just go with what is working on a given day, and other times I find that I need to switch tactics and be agile.

Shotgun, Choke, and Shells

The item I can say that I use the least is perhaps the most important; my shotgun.  I carry my first shotgun with me into the field every season.  It is a Remington 870 Express chambered for 3” shells.  I received it for Christmas many years ago when it became apparent that I was going to take up hunting.  It was the best Christmas ever.

Last year I broke down and bought a new aftermarket synthetic stock and fore-end from Remington in a Mossy Oak Break-Up pattern.  I had previously experimented with a variety of other camouflage options, including the no-mar gun stock tape that many retailers sell.  In my experience, even after following the package instructions meticulously the tape left residue on my gun.  Clean up of this residue was lengthy and at the expense of some very minor damage to the finish of the factory stock and fore-end, so I decided that in the name of convenience to make the switch.  I’ve attached a Rhino-Rib sling from Kolpin as well.

I find that my shotgun patterns Federal’s 3’ 1 ¾ ounce #6 Mag Shok shells with the Flitestopper wad the best.  Using BassPro Shops Redhead turkey pattern board I found that at 40 yards I still had slightly over 90% coverage in a 30” circle, with no major holes or gaps in the pattern.  This all comes out the business end of my 870 through a Hunter’s Specialties Undertaker extra-full choke tube.  I got lucky in a way because I chose this set up arbitrarily and it just so happened to work out.  Since I’m not a competition shooter and don’t really feel inclined to stretch my gun out past 40 yards at turkeys (although I’d have at least two more birds in the bag historically if I felt differently about that) I have not had to spend additional money on testing a variety of choke/ammunition combinations.

Calls

This is my favourite part of turkey hunting.  I love owning calls, practicing on them, becoming semi-proficient at them, and then using them in the field.  One thing that will become immediately apparent below is that I show no brand loyalty in my calls.  I own calls out of necessity, obsession, and based on what I think sounds the best.  Your choices may, and likely will, differ from mine.

I went about turkey calling all backwards when I decided to get into the sport.  Almost all turkey publications and turkey gurus (self-professed or otherwise) would recommend that a beginner start out on a box call, a simple push-pin style call, or a the most a single-reed mouth call.  I can say that I agree wholeheartedly, primarily because I, in true masochist style, suffered for a year of trying to master a raspy four-reed Old Boss Hen mouth call from Quaker Boy that barely fit in my mouth.  I ended up trimming the tape and finally found a good fit.  Luckily the year in question was the year before I went out and got my turkey licence, so by the first day I went afield I had gotten pretty good with it.  The year after that I bought a four pack from Hunter’s Specialties that also had to be trimmed to fit.  Once I had the sizing down, they worked really well, and I called my first turkey in to 25 yards with an HS clear double-reed.

Right now I carry four mouth diaphragms.  Three of them are from Knight & Hale because I find that those fit my palette most comfortably without requiring the tape to be trimmed.  I carry a clear double-reed, which I find is good for soft tree-yelping and plain yelps; it is also a call that I can crank the volume on indefinitely and this versatility makes it the one call that I most likely have between cheek and gum for most of the season.  I also carry one Knight & Hale triple-reed call and another four-reed, both with various cuts and notches.  The four-reed has a bat-wing cut and I like it for calm days when volume is not as much of a concern but long-distance cutting is my priority.  The triple reed has a V-cut and it has a higher pitch for slightly windier days.  I also find that I can purr like a fiend on this call, so when I want to switch things up and throw a fighting purr sequence in my calls, I pop this one in.

The fourth call is a M.A.D. calls Billy Yargus Signature Series four-reed cutter call that a friend won and subsequently donated to me, although I almost never use it.  It is plenty raspy, and I did use it in a competition in 2010, but it is just slightly too large for the roof of my mouth.  On the plus side, this call is ideal for gobbling on so I do carry it in my vest in case I find that one day when I need to gobble challengingly to a hung up gobbler (safely and on private land of course).

I carry a Primos Wet Box box call and cannot say enough good things about it.  I only have limited hunting days in a year, primarily because I don’t live in a rural area and the landowners immediately near my house in Cambridge, Ontario are not fussy on allowing permission to people who show up at their door in February or March.  This all means that I’m travelling to hunt so if it is raining, I’m still going out in basically any weather short of a full-on thunderstorm.  I’m not fussy on chalking box calls and then putting them in Wonderbread bags so I picked up this waterproof box call, and waterproof is an understatement.  This call has been so soaked that I thought it would float away, and through it all it has never slipped or squeaked once.  I’m not famous enough to have a binding endorsement deal with anyone (Hello, Primos?  Call me…) but I would certainly recommend this call to anyone.

In 2009 I finished second in the men’s open division at the Strathroy Great Canadian Turkey Call and won, as part of a large bag of swag, a Quaker Boy Trifecta friction call and a Quaker Boy Easy Yelper push pin call.   The push-pin is great for close in finishing work to any gobblers that I know can’t see me.  It took some off-season practice but I can now run this call in my left hand while having my shotgun ready.  If I was more mechanically inclined I’d probably rig up some pull-string contraption and affix it to my shotgun’s fore-end, but I’m not so I haven’t.

The Trifecta has three surfaces (aluminum, slate, and 'cordy') that all make different tones when played.  I found the factory striker that came with it was a bit of a uni-tasker so I picked up a three-pack of strikers from Primos.  I find that each works best with a specific surface (aluminum surface/acrylic striker, slate surface/purple heart striker, etc) but what I like best is the option to make many different turkey sounds with one call.  I lost the small square of conditioning paper that came with the call so I use a medium/fine-grit sand paper to rough up the surfaces of the strikers and the call.  In 2010 I finished third in the same contest (clearly my calling skills are on the decline) and only won Quaker Boy mouth calls, which as I said don’t really fit my mouth very well.  I used them as Christmas gifts for some hunting buddies…my wife refused to accept them as her stocking stuffers.

In terms of locator calls…let’s just say that I may have become a victim of marketing.  I have three locator calls, all of which have never worked once.  The HS Palmer’s Hoot Tube sounds just as it should.  Just for fun last year I used it on a squirrel that was puttering around my set up: the squirrel’s reaction was one of the funniest things I had ever seen and reinforced my knowledge that it in fact did sound like a barred owl.  No early morning turkeys have responded to my owling though.

My Primos Old Crow call does a great job of calling crows, but to date has not made a single turkey gobble, even when I know there is one nearby.  Most frustratingly, after I’ve called in crows, I’ve had turkeys shock gobble at the real thing, but not my imitations.  Can’t say my self-esteem wasn’t a bit dented by that.

I bought a Quaker Boy Screaming Hawk call that also has done nothing except call in Red-Tailed hawks.  I used it once on public land in the Simcoe County Forests near a Northern Goshawk nest.  Big mistake; I’m lucky to still have a scalp.

I have so far resisted the temptation to buy any gobble-shaker calls, gimmicky hen-calling contraptions, or anything so handcrafted and expensive (think very attractive exotic wood pot calls or box calls) that if I lost it I would need to consider filing an insurance claim on it  in order to recoup my financial losses.  But I’m still young, give it time.

Accessories

The following items all find their way into my turkey vest at one time or another throughout the season: water bottles, handheld pruners, camera, small headlamps, and sunglasses.  In terms of accessories I only have three mainstays.

The first is my knife, or more accurately, two knives.  I have a classic Buck 110 folding lockback knife that was a gift for my 15^th birthday; just in time for deer season.  It is a timeless piece of cutlery and it has done everything for me from notching out tags and cleaning waterfowl to gutting and skinning deer to taking the beard and tail fan off a turkey.  It is as sharp as ever and a large scar on my left thumb from skinning a buck in 2008 is testament to that.  If it has one knock on it, it is that it is slightly too long for most turkey hunting applications.  With that in mind in 2009 I bought a Gerber LST drop point that is slick as all get out for precision jobs.  Like the Buck 110 it is also wickedly sharp, but I know that my clumsy hands will one day lose it in the forest because it is camouflage patterned.  At least I won’t be surprised at this eventuality.

The next is a small blaze orange wallet that holds all my necessary licenses, registrations, permits, tags, and identification.  I usually wrap this in a small zip-top baggie because I want to keep it dry before I bury it in some godforsaken pocket in my vest for the season.  This is obviously of vital importance, and the color reflects my fear of losing it.

Lastly are my decoys.  I bought a Flambeau Breeding Flock set in 2008 at the Toronto Sportsman’s Show consisting of two hens and one jake.  The hens are upright and feeding respectively, while the jake is frozen permanently into what is called an “Intruder” pose.  If I’m only carrying one of them I stuff it into the back “game pocket” of my turkey vest.  If I’m bringing the whole crew, as I am sometimes apt to do, then I have a Redhead decoy bag that they all fit quite nicely into.  I’ve had these decoys be completely ignored, and I’ve had them generate some interest, so I can’t make any claims at their efficacy.  What I will say is that relative to a strutting tom decoy (which I have never hunted over so I have no opinions on that front) they were a cost-effective, three-for-the-price-of-one kind of deal.  Which, based on the amount of calls I need to budget for, is a good thing.

So there you have it, as requested that (in two parts) is what I take with me into the forest and fields each spring.  I know I may have skirted the “what would Shawn recommend?” portion of your question on most fronts, but that is only because I can’t say my choices in gear are any better than your own or that what I say will lead to success or failure in your turkey hunting career, especially since I’ve failed far more often than I’ve succeeded.  But I looked good doing it.

Really, all I’ve done is find the things that work the best for me and then stuck with it, which is really my best advice for anyone doing any kind of hunting.  So this, in the end, is a bit of a cop-out cliché I guess.  Sorry…and good hunting.

Confessions of a Turkey Hunting Gearhead—Part One

So…it has come to this already.  This blog, still in its infancy, has received its first fan mail, and to boot it is from someone who does not know me personally and someone that is not (I think) being ironic.  Before I go any further, I will say “thank you” to this particular reader who emailed and asked me what gear I would recommend for a first time turkey hunter to pack in their vest.  I can’t say I’m not a little flattered that a newbie would ask me for advice.  It also still leaves me a bit stunned that people read this at all.

Since I’m not a self-professed expert, I’ll try not to screw this up.  If you want to purchase any of the items I wear/use, I will include some links for each item with this, and future, posts on the subject of equipment.  If you don’t want to purchase them, by all means don’t or you might end up like me with a vest full of goodies that you feel obligated to use regardless of how effective they are.

Let me begin by adding this good-natured disclaimer:  I carry a tonne of gear into the woods so in the interest of making this as readable as possible, I’ll break this down into parts.  Today I’ll talk about all the stuff I wear.

Vest/Outerwear

I do recommend a vest, although it is far from a mandatory item for any turkey hunter whether a beginner or expert.  My father has never worn a vest and he has killed many a gobbler with nothing more than a fanny pack, a box call, some effort, and a shotgun.  However, based on the question, I can assume the reader that contacted me already has one.  For my money, I’ve tried on many turkey vests and found that the Primos Gobbler Vest was the best for me.  Pros?  It has a pocket for everything, fits well across the back (a must in my opinion), and has the comfiest seat of all the vests I tested out (also vitally important).  Cons?   It is a bit pricey (although not the most expensive on the market) and I found at first that it had too many pockets; so many that I forgot where I had placed certain valuable items, such as my license, left glove, and knife.

Prior to owning my current vest I started out with an entry-level model from Redhead.  While it was more than sufficient; the only two knocks on it were that the seat was prone to getting soaked by dew and leaching into my pants (a quick blast of ScotchGuard took care of that problem) and the wide-mouthed pockets, while handy for digging around in, had a tendency to let certain items escape forever…such as my facemask and two (much needed) shotgun shells which all made a break for it when sun-dappled afternoon and were never subsequently recovered.  Call them archaeological artifacts for future generations to discover.

For the entire spring turkey season I always carry the waterproof shell from my Remington 4-in-1 hunting jacket in a Realtree AP pattern.  It is warm enough for any really unpleasant days, it keeps me dry (which is of paramount importance) and it has extra pockets, which are always helpful.

Clothing

Weather in the Ontario spring turkey season can run in extremes.  I’ve been on opening weekend (read-late April) hunts that were hovering delicately in the near-freezing area and I’ve likewise been out on late May hunts that threatened to melt me, and vice-versa.  2010 was great for examples this wacky weather.  In the first weekend of May 2010, I was lucky enough to experience five seasons (yes FIVE!) in one truly nightmarish Saturday of turkey hunting in the Barrie area.  That day began in a clammy drizzle, calmed down a to dull-gray but reasonably warm mid-day, became a sunny and balmy double digit early afternoon just before turning into a freezing windstorm accompanied by three kinds of snow.  With this in mind, I have gotten into the habit of wearing more than I need and then being able to strip down if necessary.

For most of the season I put on an Under Armour mid-weight base layer for hunts, and some polyester long underwear that breathes; this usually suits me fine for the morning hunts.  If in the mid-day and into the afternoon I find things are getting too warm, I strip down to just my shirt and pants.

My shirt is a long-sleeved, breathable synthetic t-shirt from Columbia in a basic, splotchy earth tones camouflage pattern.  My pants are Redhead Stalker Lite in a Mossy Oak Breakup Pattern.

Boots

My boots are just plain old Redhead Bone Dry rubber boots boots from Bass Pro Shops in Mossy Oak Breakup and they were the last pair they had in stock and therefore a bargain.  But best of all they’ve lasted twice as long as any other pair of more expensive rubber boots I’ve bought.  Some folks I’ve talked to have had durability or blister complaints about Redhead boots, but to date, I’ve had no problem.  I think the key, for blister control at least, is proper socks.  I wear a light wool sock that comes up to my knee.  They are snug enough not to slip, rub, and bunch up, warm enough for a cold morning and light enough so that I don’t sweat.  In fact, they are my all-season, all-species hunting socks.

Accessories

To round out the look I have a ‘ninja-style’ camouflage face mask and some mesh camouflage gloves.  I like the ninja-style facemask because I wear glasses and they stay in place more consistently than they did when I used to have a ¾ style, elasticized, pull up/pull down kind of mask.  I cut about half of the index finger off each glove so that I can better run my pot calls and pull the trigger, but other wise I don’t make any other modifications.  I also wear a baseball cap in Realtree AP camo that my cousin had custom made for our hunting group of friends.  It is also my lucky hat.

So that’s what I wear.  Next week, I’ll post what I carry in terms of calls and equipment so if you're still interested, then stay tuned.