Cold calling advice request

[Michaelm]

I am reading alot of conflicting info about cold calling. Do you do a few yelps every few minutes or every 15-20 minutes like others advise. I am a little confused. The birds in my area are not responding to any aggressive calling and i wanted to try a different more subtle tactic. Any advice people could suggest would be appreciated.

[jakebird]

Every fifteen minutes is plenty, if you are cold calling. Some days turkeys just dont talk much, and ive found that when i try and crank it up on those days it just sounds unnatural. My rules of thumb is that the quieter the turkeys are on a given day, the less i call. An exception is when i'm running and gunnin. I will make sharp aggressive calls, but only a series or two in each location before i move on. If i find a very appealing area to set up, but still havent got any responses, i'll spend some time here, maybe an hour, and i will tone the calling back while i'm "cold calling."Check yourself on a watch from time to time. Fifteen minutes is much longer than it seems when you are trying to reign in your calling. Funny how that works in the woods, yet my half an hour lunch break at work always seems to be over before it starts!

[Turkey Call Maker]

Try different types of calls....  sometime, a little different type of call gets them going...  (maybe your area has been hit hard  ) 

[Michaelm]

Thanks for the advice. Killed a 22 lb this morning using these techniques, got hung up coming in, used a gobble shaker to coax him in. He jumped right on my Zinks decoy and pounded it. Awesome hunt

[stinkpickle]

Read somewhere some time ago from a well known turkey authority (May have been Mr. Williams himself) that a turkey can walk into and right on out of your hearing range in the span of less than 10 minutes. That being the case I call at least once every 5 to ten minutes.

Cold calling I use one of two routines normally.
I'll do a short cutt of about 5-7 excited clucks and follow with a yelp and another yelp seconds later then trail off with a few clucks.

If it's at a spot with pressured birds as you describe I'll just usually cut it shorter with 2-3 clucks and a 3-4 note subtle yelp.

Mix in a few feeding clucks and purrs every once in a while, sit still and keep your eyes moving. If you decide to move wait 10 minutes after the last call too.  Most guys around here just keep making the mistake of not waiting long enough for a turkey to get to them.

+1