I just listened to a turkey get killed over the property line...with some truly , genuinely awful yelping. In all sincerity, my 3 year old son can call better on my box call than this dude. This dude who just shot a turkey.

You get where I'm going here? I'm not merely poking fun at another hunter. I mean, yeah, I'm doing that a little. But the point is this: he couldn't call worth 5 cents and he killed a turkey this morning. Ever wonder if your calling sounds like crap? Good. You can still kill turkeys. You just have to find one "in the stupid phase" as GN would say. And it helps to actually be in the woods. In the right spot of course. And that's the real key isn't it? Be in the right spot and you will kill turkeys. Woodsmanship trumps calling every time.

Yea I have wonder things in the past. But I have heard, in fact just this morning had the granddaughter out for a couple of hours and heard what I thought was another hunter. This calling had squeaks, and no rhythm to it. But it continued towards us and low and behold it was a hen (only the second one I heard this year). Now whether this hen called in other turkeys to it with that voice I have not a clue.

But I have always and will say calling is the most important to consistently kill birds. Yes woodsman ship is important in as looking at the terrain and using it to your advantage or know where a bird may want to travel coming to a call. Especially when hunting new ground for the first time and striking a bird.


Earl

Sometimes calling is completely irrelevant in a turkey hunt. It is my opinion that with full strut decoys in fields a hunter who has scouted the field can consistently kill a bird with zero calling if the set up is correct. Freddy says , shaking his head, you could wrap the hen decoys in aluminum foil and still kill one with a strutting decoy. Not every time. Not under all circumstance. But yes when they are in the stupid phase. Bushwhacking? Not to me. If you have scouted and done your background it is no different than calling one in with no decoy over a ridgetop. One approach plays on the gobblers sense of sound. The other plays on a gobblers sense of vision. Is one dead old bird more prized than the other. Not to me but each to his own.

PM- once l was n the woods and heard the worst hen calling l have ever heard. It kept coming up the ridge where l was set up. Frankly i became concerned the other hunter was very inexperienced and might take a quick snap shot at me thinking l was a bird. When l could hear footseps getting ready to cross the crest below me l said ""DONT SHOOT ME""...at which point the hen and the goobler behind her flew off the mountain. True.

Ben, how was his cadence?
I tell beginning hunters that sounding like a competition caller is not necessary as long as the cadence in their calling sounds natural...
...but what do I know, I haven't had a bird answer me since opening day!

Called n a hen wed am. She sounded like the hunter pm described. I thought it was another hunter til I saw her come up on my left. Called up and seen prolly 15 hens this spring. Several were the worst callers I've ever heard...

Maybe his decoys are really handsome falla's.

Every bird I've killed has come to bad calling except a couple I walked creeks and belliecrawed fields and bushwacked.

I've had a few public land hunters turn into hens, the dead give away though is the guy in one spot for a long time and just over and over and over same stuff.

the dead give away though is the guy in one spot for a long time and just over and over and over same stuff.[/quote]


Bingo, great point. Dead give away also I believe to gobblers or hens.


Earl

Sounds very analogous to duck hunting, which would make sense.

The idea isn't to sound like the guys in the competitions, but to sound like the birds themselves. Some of the worst duck callers I have ever heard were actual ducks.

Gives you a sense that you might be working too hard!! Still fun to practice and sound pretty