Indiana Sportsman - Your Indiana Hunting and Fishing Resource

11/24 Jasper County

Hunted a picked corn field south of Jasper-Pulaski. Saw a good amount of Canadians but was really surprised by the amount of Specks we saw. Had to see 3 different groups of 50-75 birds, which is rare for us. Also saw some random snows flying with Canadians. We had two groups of Canadians land short of our spread then had a flock of specks come right into our faces and we were able to drop 4 of them. That was the first group of specks we’ve ever had come into our spread and they came in hot. Fun times.

Birds were very weary. They’d circle a field for a while but never commit. They did that to us and other non-hunted fields. Clearly not local birds who dive bomb into the areas they know aren’t hunted. We put some confidence decoys down wind of our spread and that seemed to help.

Oddly enough though, we only heard one gun shot all morning from the neighboring deer hunters.

My...

frisbee3557 Nov 26, 2017 Read More Replies: 3

T9 fell to the black rifle

A buck that I called T9 (Tall 9) crossed paths with me for one final time this Saturday. I have watched this buck for at least two years. By the teeth wear my taxidermist believes him to be 4 1/2. I have pictures of him last year as a high racked 8 and I actually let him walk one day last year due to a questionable shot angle. This year he grew longer G3's, longer beams, mass, and a 9th point. I was getting pictures of him pretty regularly, but all at night or right at the end of shooting time.

Sunday, November 12th, he came in 5 minutes into legal time at 25 yards, but it was too dark that morning to get a clean shot. So I videoed him and had to painfully let him walk away. The next evening, he came back out and for 90 minutes I watched him dog a doe, finally breeding her. 65 yards was as close as he would get that evening. I hunted this deer every day except for Thanksgiving after that encounter. I spent 24 out of 28 days in...

DEC Nov 27, 2017 Read More Replies: 14

Sydney made a perfect shot

Nothing big, but we didn't care. It was about the continuing father/daughter memories and for Sydney to keep gaining experience to build upon. Sydney has been ate up with hunting since she could walk and talk. She has killed her share of animals over the years using virtually every means of gear. Last year she gave up the crossbow in favor of her compound had success. She loves bow hunting. So this Saturday morning when this button came through, she asked me what to do, and I said, "kill him if you want to". At 25 yards, broadside standing in a small opening in the corn, she let an arrow fly out of her 40# setup and made a perfect heart shot, with the arrow buried in the ground. A short 40 yard tracking job later and there was her prize. We joked that those small deer are a more challenging target. I was pretty proud of her shot that she put on that deer. All those hours of practice paid off.

DEC Nov 6, 2017 Read More Replies: 8

Cornhusker bird!

I had a pretty good hunt this morning in Nebraska. After an unproductive roost hunt i backed out of the area to get to high ground so that I could do some glassing. I located a gobbler a few hundred yards from me so i used the terrain to move on him. They are so covered up with hens right now you are wasting your time trying to call to them. I ended up going past where that bird was at and by the time I got back to where i needed to be he was gone. I started walking back to the big hill that I was glassing from when i spotted 4 birds about 75 yards behind where I had been sitting. It was the bird that I was set up on earlier that morning! I made a move and got in front of them and had to crawl on my belly to close the distance. After awhile i saw the tom cross the fence and head my way. A hen popped up 15 yards in front of me so I lifted up a tail fan to put her at ease. Right behind her was a big strutter. I pulled my gun up and dropped him at 20 yards!...

ddoss May 14, 2017 Read More Replies: 3

Blog Turkey Prep - 2

Now that you have started getting that done you need to consider how do I call the turkeys in?

This can be a daunting task, but if you don't get overwhelmed by the commercial side of turkey hunting you can be successful. It takes some practice to call turkeys in and is not something that you do overnight. There are 4 types of calls that seem to work best. In order of ease of use they are; Push button, pot call, box call and mouth call. Why do you use these calls? Simply we are playing on the males, or toms, instinct to breed in the spring with available females or hens. She will use a series of sounds to attract or communicate with the tom; yelps, clucks, purrs and cackles.

The push button is the easiest to use. It is a small rectangle shaped call that has an open top and a peg and paddle inside. As the paddle is pushed across the peg friction is created and a sound is made. By varying the speed you can create sounds similar to that of a hen.

Pot calls are a round bowl shaped...

FireLt72 May 22, 2017 Read More Replies: 0