March 21, 2008 — Just a Little Patience

Fielding "Freddy" Watts, Tes Jolly and I paused after making our way through a field into a tree row. We had timed our arrival to be about 20 minutes before sunrise.

"Let's just wait here for a few minutes," said Watts, owner of Black Belt Lodge in Sardis, Ala. We listened, intently. "He should be right over in that tree line there," he added, pointing to our left. Less than five minutes later a gobble rang out, far away.

"Just wait," encouraged Watts. "He'll get cranked up in a minute. That one's a long ways off."

An owl hooted, and another far gobble rang out. Two minutes later, the same gobbler sounded off a third time.

"That's it," Watts announced. "We'll go to that one." We had tromped three-quarters of the way through a stand of thinned pines when the gobbler he'd expected to hear in the first place sounded off.

"Well, let's just get right in the middle of both of them and see what happens," Watts suggested. We turned around and headed back in that direction, and by the time we'd moved to about the middle of the pine stand, we saw hens pitching down just 50 yards away from us. All three of us piled against pine trees when the first gobbler sounded off again. He was obviously on the ground and nearing those hens.

He strutted and turned, and strutted and turned for 15 minutes about 70 yards out. The other gobbler was closing from the side, when a boss hen cut loose and sent the hens with the first gobbler fleeing back to their original places, and turning the second gobbler into the heavy woods away from us. He too obviously had hens with him.

We talked amongst ourselves and decided we hadn't been patient enough at the start. We needed to regroup, let the gobblers work with those hens for a while, and then give it another go.

We sat at the edge of the forest near a creek for close to an hour, calling occasionally, but really just letting the morning and the birds calm themselves. Then we started back after them.

We checked the field where one gobbler liked to hang out during the day. No luck.

Next was a food plot, somewhere near our early morning listening station. There were no birds in the field.

Once Watts and Tes joined me, Watts said, "Wait a minute. Let me try my box," as he pulled out an old Lynch box call and cut loose with some of the sweetest, high-pitched yelps I've heard. It was answered by a gobble down in the pines on the far side of the food plot. We headed that way.

"Whoa, stop!" Watts said suddenly. "There he is!"

When the bird went behind some trees, we all ducked into the first line of pines off to our left. Watts and Tes moved backward about 50 yards along the tree line while I found a tree to set up against.

We all watched three hens skirt off to the right, and to my dismay, I saw a bigger bird, presumably a gobbler, follow them. Watts and Tes saw them, too, and kept their eyes on them as they moved up the wood line on the opposite side of the food plot. About that time I noticed a white head bobbing up and down, moving up through the pines in front of me and to my left. He was definitely looking for the hen that had called. When he stuck his head out from behind a pine, I settled my sight on his wattles and let him have it with a load of Winchester Extended Range No. 6s, anchoring him immediately.

Watts and Tes never noticed that bird approaching, but when they walked down to see what in the world I was shooting at, they were impressed. The gobbler weighed just 19 ½ pounds, but it sported a rather impressive 11 ¾-inch beard and 1 ¼ spurs.

While our lack of patience early that morning might have cost us one opportunity at those gobblers, by waiting for mid-morning and giving the gobblers a chance to breed the hens with them, we were able to turn that mistake it a successful hunt for a mature bird.

March 20, 2008 — An Evening Hunt

My first foray into Alabama to hunt wild turkeys took me just outside of Selma. The area is renowned for its rich wildlife habitat and ability to hold large numbers of white-tailed deer and wild turkeys, so to say I was excited about the trip is nothing short of an understatement.

Ron Jolly with the Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, previously a videographer for Primos "Truth" series, has been trying to get me to come down and hunt with him since we met at the Southeastern Outdoor Press Association conference in 2006.

In Alabama, nonresidents can purchase one of three licenses to hunt wild turkeys: a three-day, a 10-day, or an annual. Because I had opted to purchase a three-day license online at the Outdoor Alabama Web site and had it activated at 4 a.m. on March 21, I couldn't hunt, or even call, the afternoon I arrived, so I tagged along with Fielding "Freddy" Watts and Ron's wife, Tes Jolly, to watch them hunt that evening.

And what a show they gave me!

Watts has the patience of Job. We sat on a hardwood/pine forested hilltop overlooking a cattle field for nearly two hours before he even picked up his slate call for the first time. Even after that, Watts waited 15 minutes between calling sessions, and when he called the third time, his patience was rewarded with a gobble. My watch read 6:30 p.m., but that was just the start of the show.

For nearly an hour, the gobbler worked the bottom of the hill with a batch of hens. As the sun began to pull behind the western horizon, it became obvious that these hens had every intention of roosting in a tree close to whichever tree the gobbler chose.

The tom worked his way back and forth, strutting and drumming a good 80 to 90 yards downhill from us. Finally, at 7:15 he started to make his way up the hill, following the hens acting as sentinels.

It didn't stop Watts. At 40 yards, he folded the gobbler sending the hens off in panicked flight. As I replayed the evening's drama in my mind, a major lesson occurred to me — Watts patience was the deciding factor.

First, even though Watts could see that gobbler for close to an hour, he rarely called. That bird knew there was a hen up the hill waiting for him, but since he already had hens with him, there was no rush. Watts understood that another hen wasn't going to convince that gobbler to move any faster up the hill.

Second, he knew where that bird wanted to roost at the apex of the hill, right where we were set up. So, he didn't force the bird to move any faster than the bird wanted to go.

Third, Watts demonstrated his understanding that it isn't likely you'll convince a gobbler to go where it doesn't want to go, and that it will go where it wants to go when it's darn good and ready.

Patience ruled the hunt.

March 17 — Do You Give a Hoot?

We often hear the term "shock gobble" used by veteran turkey hunters, but what exactly are they talking about? Here's the quick and short of when to give a hoot.

Spend any amount of time during spring in the woods or fields where wild turkeys live, and you'll hear the unmistakable sound of the male wild turkey gobbling. It's the turkey's way of communicating his location to females of the species, and it goes something like this: He gobbles, struts and fans out his feathers, and she comes running to his side, ready to be bred. Yes, it's a crude summation of the process, but really, that's about the extent of it as far as wild turkeys are concerned. (For the teens reading this and thinking how cool it must be to be a male turkey, please keep in mind that it's the mature gobblers that do most of the breeding.)

Breeding females, however, is not the only reason for a wild turkey to gobble. Sometimes a tom gobbles because of a loud noise, the presence of one of his natural enemies, or something else that is out of the ordinary. This is what we refer to as a "shock gobble," as in he was shocked, or surprised, into gobbling.

Once he gobbles, his position is given away, and we can go about our business of pursuing him. So easy, right? Wrong! While we have figured out a few things about these birds that help us turn the tables on those gobblers, nothing is as simple as it might appear at first blush. Because a turkey's eyesight is so very keen, it's virtually impossible for a hunter to slip up on an old tom the way a hen would do. Besides that, it's just downright unsafe for a hunter to stalk a bird that way. So that idea is out. Instead, what we want is to reverse the natural course of events on a gobbler. We want him to come to us — and we play the role of a coy hen to do it. And because this is a rather unnatural order of business for turkeys, convincing a tom to just begin a conversation with us sometimes requires special tricks of the trade.

One of those tricks is to get him to shock gobble. That is, we fool the bird into betraying his presence and location to us without giving away the fact that we're in the woods, which gives us time to move closer and then set up to call him toward us. Now is not the time to yelp like a hen or make other turkey sounds because that could start a conversation between gobbler and hen that you're not yet ready for.

What we've learned over the years is that gobblers might gobble at just about anything that creates a racket in the spring woods. A car or truck door slamming, the call of a crow, a coyote howl, or even the snapping of a tree limb in a windstorm can surprise a tom and cause him to gobble. I've heard hunters yell at birds (I won't tell you what they yelled!) and get a gobbled response. And on a south Florida hunt this past March, a turkey gobbled at the clicking sound I made when lighting a Thermacell unit. Who would have thought?

We refer to the instruments used to elicit shock gobbles as locator calls. These come in a wide variety, but the most common are crow calls, owl hooters and coyote howlers. There aren't very many crows flying a half-hour before sunup, but you will hear a noticeable increase in the calls of barred and great owls during that time. And depending on your geographic location, coyotes could be announcing a return to the den about that time. As male turkeys wake up on their roosts to these early morning noises, they will typically respond with gobbles.

Owls and turkeys are enemies in the woods. Owls will harass turkeys any chance they get. The same goes for crows. They will circle above and land in the trees over a gobbler and let every critter in the woods know of their displeasure with the big birds. And coyotes join a long, long list of predators that target turkeys, so it's only natural that their howl would create a disturbance a tom would respond to.

Sometimes Mother Nature provides this service for you. If you hunt an area where you know there's a healthy owl population, let the real critters start the show for you. Otherwise, you can hoot, crow or howl yourself to get things started.

Of course, this is where things get interesting. While dozens of manufacturers make calls for these activities, it seems that we hunters like to mimic natural sounds with our voices. I haven't heard but a couple of people in my lifetime who can match a crow or coyote, so those sounds are typically replicated with some type of commercially made call. But owl hooting is different for some reason. Everyone, or so it seems, wants to speak owl with their natural voice. The problem is, not every one of us has the voice to carry it off, and no one, until now, is rude enough to say anything about it. OK, I'll be the bad guy here. I guess it's like listening to the person singing behind you in church. There are just some things you should let go...

But if you want to hear something funny, go to your nearest public land hunting area where turkey hunters gather each spring, and give a listen about 20 minutes before sunrise. You'll think one of these two things: Geez, we sure have a lot of owls in these woods; or, boy, that's some of the worst owl hooting I've heard in my life! It really can be comical. Shock gobbling isn't just an early morning tactic. It can be an effective tool for locating gobblers later in the morning or at midday, too.

One last thing: You don't want to make that tom gobble his fool head off. Once you've located him and identified a safe, huntable area to set up, there's no need for another hoot, caw or howl. The last thing a gobbler will do is move toward one of his natural enemies. Now's the time to set up and switch into faux hen mode to coax the gobbler toward you.