Hunting & Fishing 2025 Filled Tags / Grip & Grins

[Anb618]

2025 is here boys.

No Grip & Grin here, hunting by myself.
Punched my IL turkey tag.
250mm beard, 22mm spurs. Unknown weight. Having BBQ pulled turkey for dinner.

IL assigns 5-7 day “seasons” beginning April 14th in the North zone. I’m working Mid shift right now and drew the short straw in the tag lottery; wound up with a 1st season tag and scheduled to work all 5 days of the season. Sat on Monday morning but there wasn’t much for gobbling so I quit early and went home to bed. Yesterday was rainy and super high winds, so I didn’t go out and went to bed. I got off work this morning, changed into my camo in the locker room, and rushed out there angry I was missing first light/fly-downs. While I was getting out of the truck I heard a gobble, looked over and saw this Tom crossing the road about 200 yards down. Tossed out my Jake/Hen decoys 60 yards from the truck sat down and hit a few cuts and a yelp. Didn’t even have time to load my shotgun before he came sprinting into the decoys. I got out of the truck at 6:40, he was beating the hell out of my Jake decoy and flopping on the ground by 6:45.

Good luck all in 2025!

 

[Kayakfish1]

Shot my first ever turkey this morning hunting with my soon be father in law, we hunted almost every day this week trying to get on them……we have a real nice gobbler we’re trying to get on but for a first I’m thrilled with this one. 1 3/8” spurs, 11” beard, the good old 870 loaded with Kent’s ultimate turkey molly-whopped him at 21 yards.

 

[zeroz]

Nice work boys. Took the old lady down to Bama and she whacked her first eastern. She's gonna do some collage thing with it. Had me boraxing all the pieces instead of just the fan and beard. It'll be interesting to see what it turns into. We were going to finally get out in CO this weekend but we got 8-10 inches of snow yesterday.

 

[Kayakfish1]

Nice work boys. Took the old lady down to Bama and she whacked her first eastern. She's gonna do some collage thing with it. Had me boraxing all the pieces instead of just the fan and beard. It'll be interesting to see what it turns into. We were going to finally get out in CO this weekend but we got 8-10 inches of snow yesterday.

View attachment 8667858

Let us know how it turns out! I am drying out my fan, wings, and feet, also I’m going to clean the skull up.
Haven’t decided exactly what I’m gonna do with it, I plucked all the feathers from his breast, neck, and around his fan….i might do one of these when I get everything done

 

[zeroz]

Let us know how it turns out! I am drying out my fan, wings, and feet, also I’m going to clean the skull up.
Haven’t decided exactly what I’m gonna do with it, I plucked all the feathers from his breast, neck, and around his fan….i might do one of these when I get everything done

I think something like that is what she has in mind. She said something about doing it in a shadow box to keep some depth to it.

I think the skull adds a cool accent to a fan mount. I did hers when she got her first Merriam years ago.

 

[RPN]

 

[hlee]

28” Red drum of the jetties in Galveston.
Fathers’ Day 2025.

 

[zeroz]

Tagged out in CO. Kinda sad it's over but I have a few folks I'll help out the rest of the seasons so I'll still be in the woods.

 

[shields shtr]

Nice critters all, but that is a dandy mule deer. Even sweeter with a bow. I sure wish MT would get their mule deer figured out. Years and years of general tag rut hunts and massive amounts of hunting pressure have not been a good combo for the buck population.

 

[zeroz]

Nice critters all, but that is a dandy mule deer. Even sweeter with a bow. I sure wish MT would get their mule deer figured out. Years and years of general tag rut hunts and massive amounts of hunting pressure have not been a good combo for the buck population.

Thanks. He is a pretty dang nice deer. Not the widest thing ever but he has good mass, great brows for a mulie and beautiful forks. Rear forks are bout 12".

Wish I could say it was an epic hunt for him. Seems like every time I shoot something big, the hunt/story was fairly lame. Of all the critters Im most proud of, pretty much none of them are the biggest ones on the wall. That doe antelope was the toughest hunt I had this year. My knees felt like a hookers on Sunday morning when the hunt was over.

 

[trob]

‘25 rifle cow tag for my wife
6.5prc

 

[hlee]

Does she know that you call a hunt with your wife a “cow hunt?”

Congrats.

 

[zeroz]

Nice work! Where are you that there is a rifle elk season this early? There are a few spots for private land only cow hunts in CO that I know of but most rifle cow hunts here don't start until mid October.

Unless you're bringing them out for the dogs, you might consider boning off those bottom leg bones/hoofs. Not a ton of weight but It makes it less awkward/floppy to carry. Only takes a couple minutes per leg. The fronts take a minute to learn the anatomy but a little knife work in the right spots and a twist pops em right off.

 

[trob]

Nice work! Where are you that there is a rifle elk season this early? There are a few spots for private land only cow hunts in CO that I know of but most rifle cow hunts here don't start until mid October.

Unless you're bringing them out for the dogs, you might consider boning off those bottom leg bones/hoofs. Not a ton of weight but It makes it less awkward/floppy to carry. Only takes a couple minutes per leg. The fronts take a minute to learn the anatomy but a little knife work in the right spots and a twist pops em right off.

Some units started cow hunts months ago

 

[762 ULTRAMAGA]

Great day on the Idaho opener

 

[DetroitRearView]

Nice meat bull in my gen season NF hunt 45 min from my place, hunted until I could get a good broadside double lung as I was trying out my Seekins Element Hunter 6.5PRC. 1 and done, no pass through but he dropped about 10 yards after the shot. 20Th season here, 9 bulls, 20 cows. Love those animals and the Country.

 

[powdahound76]

@DetroitRearView

What bullet/speed did you run in your 6.5 PRC?

Nice meat bull!
Antlers are fun.
Full freezer is where it’s at!!

 

[zeroz]

Nice.
Interested in the above as well as range and if the entry punched a rib or was clean.

 

[powdahound76]

Great day on the Idaho opener
View attachment 8785367

Color out yer face

We can still tell yer ugly!!


Nice bull man!!

 

[Ranchhand]

Nice little buck this morning

 

[db2000]

Blue marlin
000

 

[DetroitRearView]

@DetroitRearView

What bullet/speed did you run in your 6.5 PRC?

Nice meat bull!
Antlers are fun.
Full freezer is where it’s

Just got the rifle a few weeks ago, have the components to load 156 eol’s but didn’t have time so just bought berger 140 eol factory. Element hunter nailed it out to 500 yds which would have been my limit for elk within setup. Bull was 350 yds perfectly broadside. I hit the first rib behind the shoulder mid lung. Scattered some bone obviously - but I do gutless so did not recover bullet. The factory 140 in my 20” element hunter ran right at 2700.

I have a cow tag and will either use my 300 win or my 338N

Accuracy is final.

 

[TheJeanyus]

Pronghorn buck killed 10/8 a little ways southwest of Gillette, WY. Tikka 6.5 Creed with a 143 ELD-X at 260 yards.

 

[BravoSector1]