Hi everybody, I don't know if I am doing this correctly, so please let me know if this is the wrong way of doing this, but I wanted to introduce myself and ask for advice.
A little about me: I've grown up turkey hunting all my life with my dad and uncles. I was raised on hunting the tight lipped eastern gobblers in the mountains and valleys of southeast Oklahoma, where the wild turkey is almost like a ghost in the woods. I've learned many lessons, especially with patience and controlling my excitement when I hear that phantom gobble two ridges over. I was raised on the rule of once that tom cuts you off, you shut up and wait, which is the rule all my family lives by, and has always seemed to work for them. It is because of this that I fell so in love with learning everything I could about calling in these birds. Once I learned about turkey calling contests, all I wanted to do was become the greatest I could. I however had only ever used my fathers Lynch World Champion Box Call that he has had since he was a boy, which to this day has to be one of the best box calls I've ever heard and has never let me down while in the woods. I also have used mouthcalls ever since I was young, but they were only ever a HS Strut or the occasional primos call. Starting around my freshman year of high school I started carrying a few mouthcalls in my pocket everyday, but it wasn't until about last year during my freshman year of college that I began to realize that there is so much more to the calling industry than I ever knew before. Since then I have competed in three contests now, and spent more than my parents would approve on various calls, all in the search of trying to become better. Long story short, I just feel so behind in the calling world, and I need advice.
I want to learn as much as I can about anything that can be shared. I have probably over 100 different mouthcalls, everything from woodhaven to kluk, and Gulvas calls to Beau Brooks power calls. I only have a few friction calls; David Halloran glass over aluminum, a copper over glass from harmony game calls, and a Roger Parks Jake Slate, with various strikers both custom (such as those that came with the Roger Parks call) and others like Woodhaven. I want to become the best I can be. I have bought materials to start trying to make my own mouthcalls, and I have so many ideas and questions about pot calls, and I want to get box calls but again, I am so behind on all of this.
To make a long story short, I need advice, whether that is specific call makers, what striker wood types work best with what, how to figure out a gulvas call or become better at mouthcalls in general. I just want to know as much as I can. I see all these great callers on the grand national stage, and I see their calls and I have so many questions. I am also of course your typical broke college kid, so learning which calls I should start saving my money to buy is something I definitely need to do. Sorry that this is so long, and I will be so appreciative of any advice if you read all of this! Sorry if this is the wrong place to ask this.
Thanks for your time, hope you kill a boss tom this spring.
- Titus
