Full Strut: Are You Ready for Turkey Season?
Daniel Xu 04.15.14
After a winter that many doubted would ever end, turkey hunters are among those most ready for spring. As if the anticipation was not enough, the team behind the award-winning show Heartland Bowhunter and CarbonTV have partnered up for one of the most unique and ambitious outdoor television offerings this season.
“Full Strut is a new video series focusing completely on turkey hunting,” said Heartland Bowhunter’s Mike Hunsucker in an interview with OutdoorHub. “We’re in our seventh year of Heartland Bowhunter, and we’re working with CarbonTV to produce something special for our fans.”
The show will focus primarily on bowhunting turkeys across the Midwest. Although Mike didn’t want to give away too much, he hinted that viewers will be in for a surprise.
“[In] the very first episode in Nebraska a bird got into a river, and started flowing down the river before it got frozen to a tree,” Mike recalled. “It was so close to being gone. We would’ve never known what happened to it.”
The idea for the mini-series, which is divided into six episodes and can be watched for free online at CarbonTV, came from Heartland Bowhunter‘s fans.
“We had a ton of people asking us to put out more turkey footage,” Mike shared.
You can watch a trailer for the show below:
While the crew behind Heartland Bowhunter may be more well-known for their whitetail pursuits, Mike added that they have some turkey fanatics on the team as well.
“I got started in turkey hunting with a shotgun, and then I graduated to a bow. It didn’t take me long to realize that I didn’t want to use anything but a bow anymore. It’s so much more rewarding, and the fact that it is more difficult adds to that.”
For their first episode, the crew braved the frigid temperatures of Nebraska for a chance to bring back some birds. Mike admitted that it is among the coldest hunting trips he could remember, but that didn’t stop the turkeys from being very vocal and even a little bit aggressive. As the episodes progress, Mike’s team eventually finds themselves in the warmer climates of Kansas and their home state of Missouri. It is there that Mike was able to have the once-in-a-lifetime chance to harvest a 29-pound state record bird with a bow.
“It’s a pretty funny story actually,” Mike said. “And we caught it all on film.”
But you’ll have to see it for yourself on Full Strut.
New episodes of the show will be airing on CarbonTV every Sunday. You can watch the first episode here.
