Ok, so i have had probably my WORST year ever. have only been able to get on two birds that would gobble. one should have died but it was kinda early and i wanted him to come in all the way to the decoys, he got spooked. the next, well jakes beat him up.

on to my question. two days ago i lucked up and got permission to end the season on another tract of land. i drove by wednesday afternoon and spot 15-20 birds exiting a field walking right into the property i can hunt.

i show up yesterday morning and ease down a logging road to listen about 500 yds from that field edge. well about 6:15 a bird hammers like 50 yds from me. when he gobbles 6-7 more light it up all within 100 yds of me. they are ALL out in some very open cut pines. BIG pins with some huge old oaks. well i have nothing but thick wall swamp behind me so i just slowly sit down. when i do i hear clucking. i look up and about 20 yds from me i see 4-5 super jakes on the limb. i know they had to of seen me. anyhow, they all pitch down at about 6:25 and then super jakes join in on the gobbling. so now i am hearing 10-11 different birds just hammer down and i can't do squat. so i basically wait until they move off a bit so i can try and move (keep in mind i have be at work at 8 and it's a 40 min drive). well they never do. long story short, they would never come in turns out there was some brush between us. i ended up sneaking out and just leaving them to get to work. The road i have to drive in on is like 100yds from where all these birds pitched down to. so i know they had to of seen the truck leave

i go back this am and set up at lik 515 pitch black dark where they all pitched down. NOT A SINGLE TURKEY WAS ANYWHERE!

i

so my question is, where the heck did they all go?!! i didn't hear a peep. i mean heck when i was locking the gate behind me leaving yesterday morning they were still gobbling at every noise in the woods. i have no clue. maybe they just eased off deeper in the woods and didn't gobble bc of the crappy weather this am. but i got really happy my season was about to turn around really quick, but now back to wth i am cursed!

Stay in there...

Some far better hunters than myself should chime in shortly.
Im thinking they will be back. I have spooked my birds unintentionally, they did leave, but most came back in a few days. Some days I will go up the mountain and hear multiple birds. I go back in a few days and nothing. You just got to hit it right. I've seen over thirty hens, and ten long beards in one day, then a few days later nothing. I'm no expert, just my experiences

Don't forget that gobblers have a spring range of some 2500 acres. They could have moved a mile and it would be perfectly normal. And some days they just don't gobble. I'd keep hunting the area. Good luck!

If you can hear the birds from the gate, why did you drive through it?

they will be back. go in there before daylight, set up, and do not leave until a tom is flopping

Best advice you're gonna get right there. Don't ever assume that there are or ain't turkeys in a place based on what happened the last time you were there. They have a brain about the size of a grape and they wake up in a new world every morning, you have to be able to do the same thing.

Gobblers won't go anywhere, if not spooked off, until all the hens in that area are breed. Then they'll go to a different area, gobble and if nothing shows up, they'll move to a different area. That's why late in the season you'll hear turkeys gobble in places you never heard them before.

Gobblers come and go constantly. I have game cam pics of one double beard turkey that I will get pics of in a few different fields for 1 or 2 days then he will be gone for a week or so and then will show up on camera again who know where he goes or why but so far he has eventually come back safely a few times

Go back to the same area. Get there early and be patient. Good luck. Post some pics of a dead bird!

That is the best advice! My philosophy exactly! If they ain't gobbling there, they may not be gobbling or they may be gobbling somewhere else you can't hear. Just sitting where birds were gobbling a day or week before is an exercise in futility. If you don't leave until one is flopping, you may sit there a couple days! Go find em - they move quite a bit on their own... like miles!

NOT picking on anyone but I love this:

Bc I had never been to this property before. The land owner told me to just drive to the trailer and park there. That's why I drove through the gate.

Some mornings they just don't gobble.

I love that! It makes a ton of sense and has a comical ring to it. I have spooked birds in the morning and came back a couple hours later and killed one. Not sure it was the same birds but I felt like it was. My advice is to go back to that spot confidently. At some point they will be back.