Our plan to light out of NJ at 4AM was hampered by a surprise snow. Woke up to 2" of wet heavy snow, and drove through it on 80W in PA for another 2 hours. Once we got past that it was pretty smooth sailing until we hit South Dakota the following day and the 50MPH winds kept things interesting. Arrived in Wyoming to sunshine, high winds and warm weather. I'll take it! While there our weather was, as April in Wyoming does, all over the board. From 70's to 20's with snow and everything in between. We did lose part of a day of hunting to the snow, and I lost 1/2 a day because of some FTA obligations. The first picture is from the little town we stayed near... they are population 116, but I think they have 100 turkeys that live in town and basically can't be hunted because of lack of land access.

Lots of birds in Wyoming and Montana, unfortunately most were on private land. With it being calving season, permission was hard to come by. Our friend who was with us and had never harvested a bird in Wyoming got a real show as her bird had a hen, and we spotted them at 1000yards away across the flats. That hen then came RUNNING, long beard following her, straight 6 yards to my husband before Donna could get a shot at the longbeard. The hen was not angry or aggressive, I think she was looking for a friend to unload the gobbler! He was a BEAUTIFUL bird, double bearded, and at least 25 pounds. A dandy public land Wyoming Merriam to be sure. This was a spot I had checked out last time I was there, but hadn't hunting. Lots of birds on the roost, but as merriams do, they went far and wide from the actual public land. We spent a day or two trying to make magic happen, and just couldn't. We dipped into Montana, worked a gobbler with two hens across the road and he got 75 yards from me, but then didn't like something and was never seen nor heard again.

One pretty neat thing at our first sit the first morning, we watched a fox 75-100 yards out who had the most beautiful tail I have ever see. It was pure white for a solid 8-10" on the tip. It's how we noticed him in the sage brush, I thought it was a dang plastic bag waving in the air. We tried to get him to come closer, but he just hung out there hunting. We saw so many antelope, mule deer, TONS of whitetails and a few different elk herds. Oh and a handful of coyotes.

This trip for me was more about being back out west and just soaking it all in. No cell service, hot coffee and beautiful views.

Hit the road early Saturday morning, headed east to arrive home Sunday afternoon... I should mention, we did on the way out and back see turkeys from the highway in every state we drove through. Anyhow, unpacked the truck, spent some time with our two black labs, loaded the truck up and Monday morning my husband and I were back in the turkey woods at 4:30AM. I was able to tag the beautiful long beard you see below. 23.5#'s, 7/8" & 1" spurs and a 9" beard. A few more weeks of turkey hunting here in NJ, so we'll see what happens.

Sounds like a long, rough trip as far as turkey killing goes, but you’re right. That’s mighty cool country.

Nice trip

In the last couple of week it’s been blowing hard most of those days just another SD spring.

Congrats