Here’s a theory

[Rzrbac]

Just thinking about hens and how they sound, especially since I'm rebuilding my call arsenal.

This year every hen I heard was very clear sounding. I never heard an aggressive hen and only heard one cutt a few times. I've been calling turkeys for a long time and like most have heard them sound coarse with a lost of nasal, medium pitch with a lot of rasp or as previously described, clean.

Including myself, have always heard the variations associated with the age of hen. Young tend to be high and clear with older hens gaining rasp and getting deeper in tone. 

I'm beginning to believe that's not quite the case. I'm thinking hens change their tones to match their emotion. People change their voice based off emotion, it's easy to find examples of a person uttering the exact same words but different tone based off situation and emotion.

Over the years, I've called in many hens all the way to my boots using aggressive cutts and the hen responding in kind. When I've done this later in the morning, it would be just me and the hen going at it with no other birds responding. The hen was always alone and had some serious rasp. After the encounters I would move on and within 100 yards or so flush the hen off of her nest. I'm certain that's why she responded the way she did, it was her territory and I was intruding. I can think of this happening on 5 or 6 occasions and the hens always sound the same.

I've also noticed hens with gobblers tend to sound more aggressive but don't always crank up and come in. Hens going to gobblers with few hens in the area have seemed to sound more passive and call sparingly on their way to a gobbler.

I'm not saying every situation always dictates how a hen will sound. I'm just thinking that the chances of these situations having the same age class hen is not likely.

I would like to hear folks thoughts, especially those who have a few decades under their belt.

[Greg Massey]

I've seen and heard hen get aggressive especially with someone on the ground calling like a hen. I've seen hens respond and come stay 1/2 day with me .. just sitting and feeding, i guess you could say they were in a relaxed mood etc... now seeing a hen in a field or woods going to gobbler most of the time I've never seen them get all that excited , they just may there way to the gobbler , now i have seen them get all excited if several hens , couple Jakes and gobbler are all together ... i don't pay that much attention to the hens and sounds , I'am more interested in what the gobbler is telling me because he's the one i'am hunting ....

[Paulmyr]

One mourning this spring in MO I had a couple Toms roosted less 100 yds from me on public land and about a dozen roosted across a small pasture on private land. Pretty sure of the group on private we're a 3some that I always seen in the pasture. Guessing one of the 3 ruled the roost. Well these birds flew down from the roost, I'm  going by sound of gobbles, gathered thier hens and worked down the clearing towards another small clearing about 200 yds away. Everytime I hunted that roost that's what seemed to happen. A week earlier I was able to shoot a 2yr old by calling aggressively to birds out in private. This time I played it cool because I could actually see one of the rooms roosted on private and he was only about 80 yds from me. Quietly let him know I was there, he responded and I waited for him to fly down. When he did fly down he quickly made his way to the small pasture on private that the boss and his 2 buddies just vacated. I was able to get him to respond and I'm pretty sure he was moving towards me when I heard what thought was another Hunter cutting loud on a box call. I mean really loud. Buy as I listened the cutting was moving fast through the private pasture below. When it got close to where Tom was gobbling it stopped. Couple mins later I could hear clucks and short quiet cutts. A couple attemps at some standard yelps from me we're fruitless as the woods went quiet. She came running in cutting,got to him, started talking real purdy, and led him away.