Oceola Turkey Draw Failure Groundhog Day

[beaglegun]

I have been lucky to draw a few elk and deer tags out west but I cannot ever seem to draw a special opportunity tag for Oceola turkey for 1st week in Florida. Outfitters are really proud of their hunts!$!$. Wondering if its worth it? Recommendations appreciated

 

[dmandoes]

Do u put in for spring quota hunts in November for spring hunts?

 

[beaglegun]

I put in for quota and SO hunts for first week for north. Didnt draw again

 

[Mudranger1]

Is there a reason you need to go first week? If not ,Just go buy a tag and go... Plenty of places you don't need a quota permit

 

[beaglegun]

First week is best chance to harvest birds that havent been educated . If I pay to hunt private it doesnt matter

 

[dmandoes]

How many points do u have?

 

[timbrhuntr]

When I decided I wanted try for an osceola I applied to the latest season available which was in April. I applied twice ( two separate years ) and killed a tom on both hunts first was on the second day, second one took a little longer day 4 !

 

[beaglegun]

I have only applied for special opportunity hunts so I dont think you get pp's. I applied for quota this year and failed so I assume I get 1 pp. Not sure I want to drive to Florida for a turkey hunt on public thats open to anybody but maybe I'm underestimating it.

 

[timbrhuntr]

I applied to the special quota hunts. This was on a wma near Tampa! It had I believe 3 time slots with April being the last . On my second hunt out of 12 possible spots only 6 were filled. It was a great hunt on awesome property that I never saw another hunter during my actual hunt after leaving the check station. Sure the birds were a bit more wary but still you could find many birds to work with. They still gobbled on the limb but once they hit the ground they shut up much like many birds I hunted in late season in places like Georgia or Alabama! I should add that before this I applied several times to the first hunts but never got drawn so gave up and decided to try later which everyone said you wouldn’t be able to get any birds to act right that late . I’m glad I didn’t listen . I should probably also add it wasn’t easy they didn’t just come running in but with 14 days to hunt I figured I could get some birds to work ! I should say not to brag I guess that I have hunted wild turkey from Michigan to Florida and from North Carolina to Montana and many states in between probably 15 to 20 so I had a fair bit of experience. If I had been new at it I probably wouldn’t have had the patience for these birds and would have given up .