Home Forums Birds & Dogs Turkey Hunting WV Fall Hen

I spent most of early October chasing several decent bucks withy my crossbow. I also had a desire to attempt to punch a fall turkey tag. My dad and I had seen several birds during October and he even killed a bearded hen. So I took a break from deer and decided to hit the turkey woods. I got lucky early one morning right before Halloween. It just so happened I picked the spot the birds had roosted the evening before. I literally made 2 calls and this nice Hen pitched down in the early gray light. At about 30yds, I put the crosshairs on her neck, and shot. The 2 3/4'' 1.25oz load of Winchester Rooster XR #5 was too much for this hen. Almost instantly she folded, and in a grand total of about 35 minutes, I had punched a fall turkey tag.

Nice turkey

Tell us a little about your firearm . How close do the 2 barrels hit in shotgun range?

Gotta Love turkey hunting!! Nice----Bob

Nice!

Nice hunt...congrats!...Hb

WPA,

That gun is a Baikal IZH 94 combination gun. It was made in Russia and imported through European American Arms. The top barrel is a 12ga and the bottom barrel is a 223rem. The shotgun is threaded for TruChoke threads and I have a few tubes to use in it. I have to sight the rifle barrel to where I want it to impact. Typically that means the bulk of the shotgun pattern is about 4 inches high at 40yds. I just compensate by aiming appropriately lower when I use the shotgun barrel. When I turkey hunt, I aim where the skin of the head meets the feathers of the neck. Here in WV its legal to use a rifle for turkey seasons. I try to put myself in the position to use the shotgun barrel everytime, but there have been a few times where I have killed a few birds that hung up out there past shotgun range. All my rifle shots have typically been between 50 to 75yds. Ive heard all kinds of opinions on it, and personally feel like most of the people who bash rifle hunting for turkey have never actually tried to kill one with a rifle. Its not as easy as one would think. I also believe that me killing one with a rifle out to 75yds isnt much different than these people who brag about killing one with TSS out to 60 or 70yds. I say to each their own.

As to the camo on it, the camo is a vinyl kit that I bought from GunSkins.com . Its pre cut vinyl kit that is applied with a heat gun and if I ever decide I dont want it on there any longer, Ill just take it off and there wont be a residue because its not really a sticker per se. A little time consuming to apply, but so worth it. I always wanted this gun to be camo, and I toyed with the idea of painting it, but I was afraid to do it. Underneath the vinyl is a set of walnut stocks.

Here is the same gun before I applied the camo. As you can see its a multi purpose gun. Ive used it for coyotes, turkeys, squirrels, and I even killed a deer with it once.

Well done. I thought those Baikal combo and double rifles had a screw adjustment system to help POI & POA ?

Nice work.

Don’t listen to the haters, a rifle is perfectly fine for turkeys. I would personally draw the line at sniping them like big feathered groundhogs at long range, and because I want to eat them, also would use a load that doesn’t do too much damage to the meat. Shotgun purists spend small fortunes trying to extend their range with custom chokes and clever shells, and probably wound a lot of birds at long range (and frankly, close ranges as well). A clean rifle kill is just fine in my book.

Looks like pretty country where you hunt. In a former life, I spent some time near Naoma and Sundial hunting grouse and also killed my best buck there. Pretty rough in spots, but nice woods. Sadly, the mountain-top removal bunch did their usual best on that spot. Last time I was up there, the whole back side was gone, and a big lake created that hovers over the folks below like something out of a disaster flick. I need to check the recent sat images of that.

There is a rivet / pin of some sort between the two barrels but doesn't turn, at least mine doesn't. There were several generations of this gun and I have no idea if mine was early or late production. I can say thankfully there is no drift left or right in POI between both barrels. At this I've learned to hunt / shoot with it as is.

Pappy, I agree with your thoughts. I'm currently using a Sierra 55gr SP under 23gr of Bl-c2. It acts about like a 222. It runs about 2650fps. I've even had good success with a 52gr matchHP and reloder7.

I work near beckley and I've been through western Raleigh a time or two. I've never hunted over there. Mt Top removal could be done in a proper way but more often then not they ruin the landscape.

I live in Hinton and hunt in the summers / Monroe County area.