So you get in the woods before daybreak, waiting for the birds to wake up on their own. At daybreak, or soon after, you hear birds flydown and a little ways off you hear Ol' Tom gobble once or twice on his own.
Once you run (or stay where your at) to get into position, whats your first move with regard to calling? Do you let out a couple soft yelps? A cluck and purr? Or do you just choose one and eventually get to a call sequence that the bird reacts to?
Thanks!
Some questions:
What is the terrain? Are you using any decoys? Did you hear any hen yelping before fly down?
Whether I'm using deks or not, I will almost always give a real soft tree yelp. If he answers I shut up until he flies down. Take his temp with a few soft calls, if no answer maybe get little louder and more aggressive. If he likes it he will let you know. If you hear hens close to him, then mimick the hens, good chances your not going to call that gobbler away from live hens. Make the ole boss hen mad or get her vocal and she will investigate and possibly drag ole tom in too. Wait to go into your calling sequence until he hits the ground, then you can tell what he wants to do. Goog luck
I hunt Georgia, where the terrain is mostly pine woods with logging roads, and a few small fields. I might use a Primos Killer B decoy if I hunt a field, but MOST of the time its in the pines.
Yeah, its usually a mistake to call much when he's in the tree, just make that tree call and you're throwin your hat in the ring, lettin him know you're there. When he hits the ground i like to give him a nice flydown with my hat and a cackle. If he gobbles at that, i get my gun up and go silent for a few mins. If he doesnt respond within a few mins or sounds further away or same spot, i give him excited yelps with some cutting thrown in. Tak his temp again. If he has hens closeby, usually they make themselves known when i cutt. Perfect scenario, he's alone, rips back at my calls and comes in on a string. More likely he's got hens, drifts away, and goes silent and thats why they call it huntin, friend. Either sit tight, take a nap and wait him out, or get up circle around and try to get ahead of the flock or u may succeed in callin in the hens with him in tow if u can get them ticked off enough to hunt you down. That should get you started, but each bird is unique and each new day could be totally different.
Each hunt and each bird is different but generally, I don't call while they are in the tree.
I like to let their feet hit the ground and by that time you can generally start getting an idea of how strong you need to call based on how fired up the bird is, are there hens with him, etc etc...
If he's gobbled pretty good from the limb and I feel like he can take a little more fired up approach then alot of times I'll do a fairly loud and aggressive fly down cackle.
It's hard to give generalities though cause it depends on a number of different things. If I don't like where I'm at relative to where he is or if I don't think I can call him to me from that location because of hens, a barrier like a fence or just not a good set up then I might not call at all and instead try to figure out where he wants to go on his own and then try for a better set up based on that. I'd rather not call if my set up isn't good cause that's just bringing attention to me and making it harder for me to move when that's likely what I'll have to do anyway if I can't get in a good setup right off the roost. It happens more than I would like if I'm hunting on unfamiliar land or for any number of reasons but I'd rather not try to push a bad set up and give myself away in the process if I can help it.
we all wanna make them gobble but sometimes it hurts you if you ramp it up too much
I've made single birds gobble over 300 times and gone home empty handed and Ive killed birds on less than 5 clucks and 2 gobbles
Quote from: DeadEye09 on March 12, 2012, 12:09:53 PM
So you get in the woods before daybreak, waiting for the birds to wake up on their own. At daybreak, or soon after, you hear birds flydown and a little ways off you hear Ol' Tom gobble once or twice on his own.
Once you run (or stay where your at) to get into position, whats your first move with regard to calling? Do you let out a couple soft yelps? A cluck and purr? Or do you just choose one and eventually get to a call sequence that the bird reacts to?
Thanks!
If your in his normal strut zone, yelp a couple times, and get your gun up. If he flew down and is going away, you had better get in front of him or you'll be kissing his fan all day long. :anim_25:
If he's vocal I'd get in tight. Then cluck and scratch (walk) my way to a killing spot. Once I'm comfortable with the spot I'll feed him just enough of whatever he likes to kill him. If it don't work out I haven't boogered him and I can regroup.
Quote from: turkey harvester on March 12, 2012, 12:29:25 PM
Whether I'm using deks or not, I will almost always give a real soft tree yelp. If he answers I shut up until he flies down. Take his temp with a few soft calls, if no answer maybe get little louder and more aggressive. If he likes it he will let you know. If you hear hens close to him, then mimick the hens, good chances your not going to call that gobbler away from live hens. Make the ole boss hen mad or get her vocal and she will investigate and possibly drag ole tom in too. Wait to go into your calling sequence until he hits the ground, then you can tell what he wants to do. Goog luck
Calling the boss hen, good tip. :icon_thumright:
If he has hens with him, and you know where he usually likes to strut, you will probably be better off trying to sneak around and cut him off. Once there, call very little if at all. Put a decoy out in the strut zone for him to see.
If you don't know where he's going and he has hens, you may be better off like these guys have said to get aggressive and try to call in the boss hen. This isn't an easy thing to do, but when it works it works well!
The main thing most people run into in this situation is that when you call at the gobbler, the hens will take the gobbler the other way in an effort to keep him away from you, the competing hen. You will often find that he will strut near the roost with his hens while answering you every now and then for maybe 15 minutes to a half hour without coming any closer. He wants you to come to him because he dang sure isn't going to leave multiple hens to try to find one that may not even be real. Eventually he will shut up and follow the hens away from you.
start with a soft tree yelp, then when he hits the ground get him interested with some soft yelps and clucks, when hes coming hit him with some soft purrs and yelps then when you see him and know he's coming shut up,