Home Forums Birds & Dogs Turkey Hunting Tips for hunting in the rain

I'm hunting again Friday. Forecast is cloudy and a 60% chance of showers and scattered thunderstorms throughout the day.

I think I'll wear my rip stop nylon camo pants and shirt, and my gore-tex boonie hat. I'll take my Perfection glass slate in a laminated pot with an acryllic striker, and one of my waterproof box calls. My shotgun can handle a downpour.

Anyone hunt in rain or t-storms? Any observations or calling tips?

In 2016, I parked my 1 ton pickup and sat drinking coffee as the truck rocked in the wind.
When I got out, it began to spit rain. I should have loaded up and gone back home right then!.😖⛈ But the gobblers were hot! Everytime there was a thunder clap, I got shock gobbles from all over the bottom!
I set up in my "spot" and called, immediately interrupted by gobbles, thunder and lightening ... and the rain increased.
Three birds crossed the creek about 70 yards away and sprinted for the pecan grove, ignoring my calls, offering no shot.
The rain picked up.
I was using a wingbone yelper, everything, including me, was sopping wet!
Did I mention it was raining?
Lightening flashed.
Thunder clapped.
Wind blew.
Rain fell.
I finally just sat back and wondered what I was doing sitting in this thunderstorm! "Just get up and go home!"

A dark blob approached my "hide" through a curtain of rain!
As the bird approached, I had to look hard for some sign of "tom".
Finally, I spotted his beard at about 20 yards, blew the rain drops off my nose and shot him!
When I picked him up, he resembled a drowned rat.
The majority of his tail was missing. I'm guessing coyote or bobcat. He had exactly THREE tail feathers he was dragging in the water behind him.
I tried to "pose" the bird and take some photos. Finally, I just dropped him on the ground, took a couple of shots, gathered up my dripping gear and bedraggled bird and sloshed back to the truck!

Advice?
Just stay home ... or go hunting!
You NEVER know! LOL!

Get between roosted birds and a field or clearing if possible and keep friction calls in the truck. Birds tend linger towards places they can kindly air some. I know it’s all situational but I have found success in doing this in the past. But these birds were in the timber far enough we had room to get in between them and a pasture field that butts up against the ridge we were on. Got set-up and hit some soft mouth calls and they came running and almost doubled up on them but one bird lingered behind the other. And believe it or not this happened in what I’d call a “community hole” on some public ground.

Have hunted before a big rain and gobblers would shock gobble as martinstrummer described. I was luck and killed mine before the rain it, but just as I got back to the truck the bottom fell out.

Oh, I'm going, good Lord willing. Season ends on 5/14. I've had this day off for over a year for just this reason. Tomorrow's rain chance has gone down from 68% to 42%, and instead of T-storms throughout the day, they are predicting them now for the PM. So it's looking a bit better.

I have next thursday and friday off, too. Too far away yet to see what the focast for those are.

Good luck and keep your powder dry

We’re open through the 22nd. Haven’t heard a peep since the opener. If I get desperate enough, I can dig out the milsurp Gore-Tex and give it a try, but might carry an SS revolver in that case.

Keep at it and good luck

Fields they frequent. Don’t personally know if calling is better than no calling. Probably depends on intensity

I have had great luck hunting in the rain. The sound of the rain seems to mess with their hearing and I usually seen them in the middle of fields. If the rain breaks and sun comes out you will see them hit the fields to dry out feathers in the sun. Hopefully you can set up a blind near a field so you don't get soaked, but stick it out they seem to move well in the rain. Good Luck.

No fields for me. These are forest and swamp birds. I'm sitting here now overlooking a dam, the only dry land bridge that I know of connecting the tract I hunt and private property on the other side. There's a tom on the other side. He's called several times but he's not answering my calls. I saw two hens on the other side so he's gone silent now, likely henned up. I'll start hitting the calls again in a couple of hours. That's worked before. I think they either get tired of the hens they're with or their hens wander off and the tom looks for a new one.

Anyways, no rain. It's over cast and cool. Pretty pleasant except for the mosquitoes.

I've seen only one eagle fly the length of the swamp. Hopefuy he won't come back.

This is the way it is for me. Hard hunting skittish forest birds on public land. Some years I'm lucky, some not. But it's always better than working

And no Go Pro today. I wore a lighter vest and there's no where to clip ir.

Eagles taste good too, almost as good as whooping crane.

But neither are as good as California Condor.

Forgot about those. Yum!

Worst trip to date. There were two gobblers on the other side of the swamp on private land, one to the left and one to the right, both sounding like they were a couple hundred yards away. They gobbled to about 6:45 AM. About 6:30 AM I saw two hens on the other side of the swamp heading towards the sound of the gobbler to my left. I never got a response to any of my calling. I headed down swamp to the left towards the nearest bird and waited until about 10AM before trying to call it it. Nothing. At 2 PM I decided to work a mouth call and a box call and work the leaves to see if anything would respond. Nothing. Can't blame it on eagles, either. Saw only one. I did see it twice, but it looked like the same juvenile bird both times, probably the same as last week.

The toms are obviously roosting on the far side of the swamp this year. In some years they are on my side, some years on the far side. I have no idea why they choose what they choose. I've gotten birds to come over the swamp before but its not easy.

Through the woods on the far side is a crop field. Not sure what they are growing, but it's a grain of some kind and it's already brown with grain heads on it, so they are probably eating that. Some years its just corn sprouts and that doesn't provide any food at this point in the year. There are still plenty of nots on the ground on my side. And turkeys must be feeding there, too, since I am seeing scratch marks.

Lots of squirrels, lots of other birds. And I this guy as I was heading out of the woods.

hopefully you will have better luck with the birds and fewer snakes around