I was watching a YouTube video earlier and a comment was made how this person doesn't put the cluck in his Yelp sequence until he is responding to a gobbler. Made me think about what I do and question if I was hurting myself in how I call or act in those quiet mornings. What are y'all's actions or what call sounds are you relying on with success when the woods are quiet and you're searching for Mr. Tom?
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What am I doing with no gobbling? Wiping my tears!
In all seriousness, am hunting a property I'm familiar with?
It ain't the back of your hand. But you have some familiarity with it.
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I take a nap, eat a snack, bobcat around, repeat.
If I'm somewhat familiar with it and I'm back there again it's because I know the area holds gobblers. If it's quiet I'll be slowly moving between places I feel are prime for turkeys to hang. Mostly I'm just listening on the way. A few steps here and listen, a few steps there and listen. I may pause for few secs to a couple mins depending on what I'm hearing around me.
If I feel and area might be a decent location to call from I'll pull up a tree for a few. Mostly again I'm just listening with some light calling. I'm listening for anything that might indicate turkeys are nearby. Could be as simple as a quiet gobble or as insignificant as crows returning to the same area and cawing. What ever I do, I try not to spook anything including other animals like deer and squirrels.
When I get to my locations I choose a set up wisely. I'm in no rush. There's no hurry to start calling. I'll let everything around me calm down for a bit before I begin with some softer lost type yelping. I'll hang around for maybe an hour, calling sporadically before moving off to the next location in the same manner as the previous location. Take a few steps and listen. I'll play this out until I run out of locations to check than I'm off to a new area.
And like guess who says. Prolly throw a couple naps in the mix.
Sometimes I sits and think; sometimes I just sits.
I set up on an area that I know well, have had success before, know turkeys frequent the area, and most of the time I am there before first light and waiting for that first gobble. If I hear a gobble I will try to cut him off with a cluck, hoping he responds back. I sit there and listen for any sounds of a Tom or a hen for a while, throwing in some soft clucks and purrs. Many times I have killed a bird mid morning doing this and sometimes he comes sneaking in. I do not move around much because he can see and hear me a lot better than I can him....getting busted not what I want to do.
No gobbling.... I'll burn that boot leather and go find one that will.
My first inclination is to keep covering ground trying to strike a gobbler,...IF I am hunting somewhere that has enough acreage that I can keep doing that. The call combinations I have had the most consistent success in striking gobblers are either aggressive cutting and yelping sequences or just plain yelping.
If I am hunting a small property where that is not feasible, I will assess the terrain and habitat on the property I am restricted to, the visible sign, and all of the surrounding properties that I can evaluate from the one I am restricted to, and make my best judgement as to where the best place is to set up. That will likely be a combination of where I have seen birds or fresh sign, where I can hear distant turkey calling as far as possible (and where turkeys will be able to hear my calling), and/or where I think turkeys are most likely to travel through.
As far as calling goes in the case of the above, I usually mix in both soft/passive calling and loud/aggressive stuff at intervals. As to which of those has been the most successful for me personally, I have found that I have more often been able to strike distant gobblers with the louder, more aggressive stuff than I am sticking to soft stuff. I would assume that is the result of turkeys wandering within earshot of that calling and responding to it.
I am also not one to spend much time sitting around waiting for a silent gobbler to show up. Not that I think that is not a productive way to kill one at times, but I just do not enjoy hunting turkeys that way. My mantra from day one has always been,..if they don't want to have a conversation with me, they can just stay in the woods. ...And I will readily admit that there have been a few times and places where, much to my dismay, they have just stayed in the woods! ;D :angel9:
If I'm somewhat familiar with the land, I'm going to where I saw scratching in the fall and winter and I'm doing excited cutting. If I don't hear anything I'm putting miles on the boots until find one that'll gobble. If none do, I'm gonna hit another piece of National Forest and do the same thing. I'll either find one that wants to play or I'll head home and try again later or the next day. I won't deer hunt one
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I have a few spots where I'll set up and call after I've exhausted my run&gun options. Turkeys have areas they like to travel to mid-morning after the initial early courting rituals. I have had success in these spots even after mornings of no gobbling......
Go fishing and try again the next day.
Keep trying in hopes one will gobble in the future. If your one of the old turkey hunts back in the day we were just glad to hear one or more gobbles during the season.
Quote from: Candyman on February 18, 2023, 09:34:37 AM
Go fishing and try again the next day.
Amen brother, I am right behind you. Silence fishing means nothing except there's no other idiot in your honey hole.
"A bad day of Turkey Hunting is better than a good day at work".
Quote from: Clayback on February 18, 2023, 12:31:37 PM
My favorite days to hunt. The "non" turkey hunters have gave up and gone home by 8 am, because they didn't hear a single gobble at daylight. I get the woods and all gates to myself. Killed a lot of turkeys on days like this, and not a one of them was "deer hunted" ;) It is what separates Turkey Hunters, from just most spring turkey hunters, in my opinion.
;)
Well I'm certainly not not clucking.
If they aren't gobbling I'm usually trying to find one that will or covering ground and scouting for the next day. Sometimes I'll take little breaks and set up and do some soft calling for a while but I'm always gonna get aggressive before I move on. To date I can only think of two birds I killed that didn't gobble. One was a bird I had been trying to kill all season on some heavily hunted public land. The other was just a nasty windy and rainy day over a decoy when I was a kid
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If i know the ground holds turkeys, I stay there. Have a snack, play a game of solitaire on my phone.
Sooner or later he'll come. Maybe silent. But then I hunt small parcels and can't "run and gun"..
I go where I know they often hang out, usually on high ground where my calling will carry a long distance. I set up, have a snack, call sparingly and listen a lot.
Similar to what most have already said here.
If I have other places to go, which I know I'm fortunate to have, then I leave and cover ground looking for a hot bird.
But if I'm "stuck" in a small area...
I go to a spot where I'm confident turkeys hang out at. I'll then call pretty aggressively, but not for long. Two-three long, aggressive calling sequences spread over the course of 5-10 minutes. The point being to let any turkey in earshot know that you are there and you are 'wanting'. Any gobbler that hears it will take a note, even if he doesn't acknowledge you verbally. Then... just wait them out. This is when having a comfy chair that you can be still in for hours comes in really handy. It only takes one or two times when a gobbler appears out of thin air hours later that you will gain confidence in this technique.
That's just my experience.
Mainly I keep moving & trying to get in the bubble of a stray tom. There's just some days they won't talk, at all, unless you can sneak up on em without them knowing. There's been plenty of times where they only talk in the first few minutes at sunrise & then go completely silent the rest of the day. No matter what you throw at them from a distance. I love when I can sneak in that bubble & let out a soft call to get struck back by the thunder less than 75 yards away. Surprise, surprise, surprise.
I feel like I have better luck covering ground mid day to earlier afternoon after they get bored with each other in the flocks & all kinda wander around on their own for a while. One thing I don't do is just keep calling non stop as I'm walking. More just a every once in a while to see if I'm close to anything wanting to say hey. I'll hit it hard occasionally just to check the temperature for one in the distance. Usually though, if they aren't talking, it will stay that way & pointless to loud locate call.
I also like to make it a point to change habitats & search things out. Some days they like the open timber, sometimes the hardwoods or swamps. Sometimes they like the thickest nastiest stuff they can get into. I'll try & hit several different kinds of ecosystems in hopes of finding what they are preferring at that given day. If I have been struggling to find them in the easier areas, I'm putting on some hip waders & going in the swamps or briar pants & Brer rabbiting it through the heavy brush. I'm always searching for water sources. It's crazy how often they'll hold up in a swamp on a piece of dry that has just a few pockets only a few feet wide. Made me realize how often I covered a lot of hardwoods only to find out they were right there 50 yards in, hold up in a swamp pocket while I'm out there doing a half marathon wondering where the little bobble heads disappeared to.
Either way, there's a lot of times I just feel like giving up & no matter what I do isn't working. It's usually when I just decide to keep at it & not give up, regardless of the outcome, that I randomly have one respond like thunder, out of somewhere unexpected & he gives me a shot. At that moment all the frustrations I had prior completely disappeared. I choose to remember & hang on to the reward feeling after not giving up over how painful & frustrating things can seem when they don't wanna cooperate.
I have several areas around here that are known for the turkeys taking pride in not talking. I also learned those same turkeys have an amazing calendar that has been passed down for generations. They know the day before the season starts & the day after it ends. They often mock me several days after the season by flying right in front of my truck as I'm driving out & throwing parties around where my truck is parked.
Gotta just keep at it!
Looking for a good spot to take a nap! ;D
Go where I've been recently successful in locating birds and plop my butt down and call.
I need some evidence of birds... Gobbling is my favorite evidence... Spotting one is good as well. Fresh poop, foot-prints, strutting tracks... I might sit for a while if I see those signs in quiet woods.
Opening weekend here, and I could not go yesterday, and could not get out early this morning... Late morning, and I had a couple of hens respond to my calling, so I assumed there were some "gobblers" around somewhere?
Set up on a saddle, did a little series of calling, and was setting up to each lunch... And I notice that bright red head pop up over a knoll... Came in, in strut, completely quiet. Unfortunately, I never gave him a chance to gobble.
If I know there are birds around, and I have covered some ground (or am hunting a smaller area)... And I am not hearing gobbling. I look for a good location (I like saddles), and make an occasional series of calls, whilst "relaxing." The older I get, the easier it is to relax. Binoculars help keep me entertained looking at all the spring wildlife.
I have killed a fair number of birds eating lunch and quietly relaxing after calling.