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My ear might be untrained, but I'm wondering what exactly makes for a good call sound.

I noticed that my calls sound very different when I record myself playing them from a distance of 50 yards or more. Makes me wonder if I shouldn't judge a call on how it sounds as a whole when I'm playing it, but if I need to hone in on one attribute, like vibration or pitch dynamics. I've heard some videos of calls that don't sound great on the video, run by very good call-makers on hunts, that elicit great responses from gobblers.


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Only a turkey knows what he wants to hear. So of the worst calling you will ever hear comes from real turkeys.

Hey I've seen some and talked too foxie looking chicks and there voice didn't blend in with the body. You know what I mean .........

Sometimes the ones that sounds the worst are the ones that hunt the best... it's all in your ear and what the turkey likes .. but sometimes they just don't like anything you play ... that's the game of hunting turkeys ...

Some of the worst sounding calls I have ever heard have turned out to be hens.

Agreed with some of the other posters here. I have heard some live hens talking that will just blow your mind with how bad it sounds.

Agreed

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Pitch is not near as important as cadence and rhythm. Putting emotion into you calls add realism. All hens sound different so you can get by with not so great sounding yelps as long as you have that correct cadence. Contest callers put live hens to shame.

Agree with all the posters that some of the hens in the wild sound awful. I remember hunting in the NC woods earlier in my hunting days and about 150-200 yards away I heard what sounded like someone's kid playing a box call from Walmart for their first time. It was super loud and super ugly.  I immediately thought that there was a poacher on my property.  A couple of minutes later, I heard it again and was convinced that it was a poacher because there was no way that a live hen could sound that bad. But when I heard the unmistakable sound of a mature Tom gobbling from exactly where the hen was and I knew that she was the real thing.

We all sit and practice and search for the perfect turkey call and the perfect sounds. Recognize that hens in the wild have all types of tones, pitch and volume. I like to find calls that sound like the middle of road hens that are common to most flocks. Not too high and not to low. But who knows what that gobbler might be looking for on that given day, that's why I carry other calls.

RRR

The callers that work best are those that match turkeys the gobbler knows or sound like what the gobbler is looking for. Some hens sound awful to us, but it doesn't matter because the gobbler has been in contact with the source of that sound. Some hens sound like commonly used callers and are ignored by gobblers because that hen isn't there when the gobbler hears it and goes to look. A box caller that makes the classic yawk can sound exactly like a hen, neither you nor the hen will be in good shape for calling gobblers because gobblers have gone to look and not seen a hen too many times.

I started hunting a new area a couple of years ago. The birds over there sound like some callers I have that I don't like. I have lots of quality handmade callers. I really like most of them, but I'm using those two I don't like more often than those I do like because they match those birds over there.

Similarly if the age structure of the flock changes you would be wise to use callers matching the age of most of the hens. For instance toward the very end of the season, the birds in play are gobblers and jennies. That's what you want to sound like.

I have a pot call that really isn't very good. If it weren't a gift from my wife I'd have sent it down the road a long time ago. Another hunter I know has a box call I think sounds awful. We went OOS state and those birds sounded like those callers. Oh, well. It pays to carry a selection of different sounding callers.

That makes a lot of sense. I just guess by the time you know what the hens sound like in a given place it can easily be a "Minerva's owl flies at dusk" situation, or maybe I should say "Minerva's hen clucks at dusk."

Once she opens up the tom has heard the real thing already and knows where it is when you hear it. Seems it would be hard to compete at that point, unless you heard the hen while scouting or on a previous hunt.


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I wouldnt over think this, they have a small brain right?  Any given sound on any given day. Mike

Another thing to think about , yes hens are vocal but they don't go around just yelping away all the time. Most of the time hens are pretty quiet..

I had a hen go crazy once. She didn't take a breath in-between all the cutting and helping she was doing as she came to me. It took her about 4 minutes to close the distance and she cutt and yelped the ENTIRE way. To add, she sounded terrible. I just knew I was gonna have some guy and his mouth call were gonna walk up on me, but sure enough, it was a real hen.

Quote from: Pluffmud on May 18, 2020, 10:19:29 PM
I had a hen go crazy once. She didn't take a breath in-between all the cutting and helping she was doing as she came to me. It took her about 4 minutes to close the distance and she cutt and yelped the ENTIRE way. To add, she sounded terrible. I just knew I was gonna have some guy and his mouth call were gonna walk up on me, but sure enough, it was a real hen.

Maybe turkeys have an asylum, and you were in it!


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I've got a glass over aluminum call Garrett Fowler made that sounds like absolute hell. Or rather it plays well but doesn't have the tone I'd normally associate with turkey. Sounds like the top of a box call. A high, HIGH squeal. Anyhow, last year I was calling a bird for a buddy and I ran through about four or five different pots and never heard a bird. I got to squalling on that glass and he hammered on the ridge. Wound up that was the only call that bird would answer. He came down and hung up on a strut zone, back and forth, back and forth, just hammering at each end when I'd hit that call. It wound up calling a second bird up from the bottom of the mountain and when that bird came up the other bird came down. We doubled that morning on a pot that sounded half bird half siren. That to say things like tone, pitch, frequency seem to be really unpredictable in terms of what they're going to respond to from one day to another. But the desire for the right rhythm and the right context seem to be unwavering.

Quote from: ChesterCopperpot on May 27, 2020, 07:50:11 AM
I've got a glass over aluminum call Garrett Fowler made that sounds like absolute hell. Or rather it plays well but doesn't have the tone I'd normally associate with turkey. Sounds like the top of a box call. A high, HIGH squeal. Anyhow, last year I was calling a bird for a buddy and I ran through about four or five different pots and never heard a bird. I got to squalling on that glass and he hammered on the ridge. Wound up that was the only call that bird would answer. He came down and hung up on a strut zone, back and forth, back and forth, just hammering at each end when I'd hit that call. It wound up calling a second bird up from the bottom of the mountain and when that bird came up the other bird came down. We doubled that morning on a pot that sounded half bird half siren. That to say things like tone, pitch, frequency seem to be really unpredictable in terms of what they're going to respond to from one day to another. But the desire for the right rhythm and the right context seem to be unwavering.

Yup,...Seen the same thing happen umpteen times over the years.  The problem many of us have is that WE have an idea of what WE think a gobbler should like and therefore are reluctant to switch to calls that WE are convinced won't work.  Personally, I get a kick out of the guys that believe that turkeys will only come to "perfect" calling (and I unfortunately have tendency to get into that rut myself). 

I have said this the proverbial "million" times,...its's the TURKEYS that decide what calling they want to go to.... and that don't necessarily match up with what we TURKEY HUNTERS think they should go to!

If anyone needed a justification for their pot call addiction, I suppose this thread is it.


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Quote from: AppalachianHollers on May 27, 2020, 10:56:32 AM
If anyone needed a justification for their pot call addiction, I suppose this thread is it.

Brother, I carry more pot on me than Cheech and Chong. I usually got five in my pockets  :TooFunny:

Talked with Billy Bush when he called me that my Beggin Machine was in the mail. He said a customer stopped using his Beggin Machine, didn't like the sound. Mr Bush asked him, 'kill turkeys with it?' he said ya. Mr Bush asked him why stop using it, the turkeys liked it. It what happens to us sometimes, we have a good call, kill turkeys with it and we stop using it 'cause we have one that sounds better to us and not the turkey......

Quote from: GobbleNut on May 27, 2020, 10:07:37 AM

Quote from: ChesterCopperpot on May 27, 2020, 07:50:11 AM
I've got a glass over aluminum call Garrett Fowler made that sounds like absolute hell. Or rather it plays well but doesn't have the tone I'd normally associate with turkey. Sounds like the top of a box call. A high, HIGH squeal. Anyhow, last year I was calling a bird for a buddy and I ran through about four or five different pots and never heard a bird. I got to squalling on that glass and he hammered on the ridge. Wound up that was the only call that bird would answer. He came down and hung up on a strut zone, back and forth, back and forth, just hammering at each end when I'd hit that call. It wound up calling a second bird up from the bottom of the mountain and when that bird came up the other bird came down. We doubled that morning on a pot that sounded half bird half siren. That to say things like tone, pitch, frequency seem to be really unpredictable in terms of what they're going to respond to from one day to another. But the desire for the right rhythm and the right context seem to be unwavering.

...Personally, I get a kick out of the guys that believe that turkeys will only come to "perfect" calling (and I unfortunately have tendency to get into that rut myself). 

I have said this the proverbial "million" times,...its's the TURKEYS that decide what calling they want to go to.... and that don't necessarily match up with what we TURKEY HUNTERS think they should go to!

This is the call I was talking about. This thing sounds like absolute hell. But all I know is that on THAT morning on THAT mountain with THOSE gobblers it broke one off a strut zone and wound up bringing two within gun range. My buddy shot the one come off the top and I shot the one come up from the bottom.

Sound file: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uIhDBiFmu4

Quote from: ChesterCopperpot on June 14, 2020, 06:10:28 PM

Quote from: GobbleNut on May 27, 2020, 10:07:37 AM

Quote from: ChesterCopperpot on May 27, 2020, 07:50:11 AM
I've got a glass over aluminum call Garrett Fowler made that sounds like absolute hell. Or rather it plays well but doesn't have the tone I'd normally associate with turkey. Sounds like the top of a box call. A high, HIGH squeal. Anyhow, last year I was calling a bird for a buddy and I ran through about four or five different pots and never heard a bird. I got to squalling on that glass and he hammered on the ridge. Wound up that was the only call that bird would answer. He came down and hung up on a strut zone, back and forth, back and forth, just hammering at each end when I'd hit that call. It wound up calling a second bird up from the bottom of the mountain and when that bird came up the other bird came down. We doubled that morning on a pot that sounded half bird half siren. That to say things like tone, pitch, frequency seem to be really unpredictable in terms of what they're going to respond to from one day to another. But the desire for the right rhythm and the right context seem to be unwavering.

...Personally, I get a kick out of the guys that believe that turkeys will only come to "perfect" calling (and I unfortunately have tendency to get into that rut myself). 

I have said this the proverbial "million" times,...its's the TURKEYS that decide what calling they want to go to.... and that don't necessarily match up with what we TURKEY HUNTERS think they should go to!

This is the call I was talking about. This thing sounds like absolute hell. But all I know is that on THAT morning on THAT mountain with THOSE gobblers it broke one off a strut zone and wound up bringing two within gun range. My buddy shot the one come off the top and I shot the one come up from the bottom.

Sound file: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uIhDBiFmu4

That's unbelievable. Purr sounds somewhat normal, but my gosh. One of them local hens  near where you were hunting must have found a helium deposit or flyaway birthday balloon before she went a'courtin'!


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Yeah, it don't sound like a turkey at all. Matter of fact, it sounds absolutely horrible. Which tells me that the rhythm and call sequence were the only things that possibly could have made those birds respond. If someone else played that call and told me they killed a bird with it I'd swear they were lying.

The grandpa at the gas station getting a biscuit and coffee opening morning usually has a crappy trough call in his pocket that sounds more like a cricket than a turkey. I guess he somehow makes it happen.


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