There's something about a tom turkey all puffed-up and shiny
on a glorious spring morning that makes him seem bigger than life. Turkey
hunters love to tell stories of the toms they have shot and the ones that got
away. Some of these stories lead to myths that we've heard and
shared so often, we take them as gospel. Here's a look at four popular myths
about spring turkey hunting and a thought or two about how you can turn myth
into the method.
Turkeys are smart?
Foxes and coyotes are clever. Deer are cagey at best.
Turkeys, for all the hype that has been written about them and all the lore
that turkey pros preach, are dumb as rocks.
With a brain the size of a cherry, there is not a lot of
room inside a turkey cranium for thought. What turkeys are, however, is wary.
Turkeys are under attack by predators from the moment they
pop out of the egg. Owls, hawks and all manner of mammalian predators eat young
turkeys. Even adult turkeys fall prey to coyotes and bobcats.
A turkey's senses are acute. They can see and hear as well
as or better than a deer. It's been said that if they could smell, we'd never
kill one.
Turkeys spend every waking moment watching out for trouble.
If something doesn't look quite right to atom, he will just walk the other
way.
Many a turkey has picked out a hunter who thought the bird
was looking in a different direction. With their eyes mounted on the sides of
their head, they can see just fine out of one eye. When a tom's beak is pointed
at a 90º angle from you, he's looking right at you!
You don't have to outsmart a tom - you simply have to avoid
being seen or heard for what you are. If you can sit tight when you need to and
make only the sounds of a hen, you'll kill your share of longbeards.
You can't move on a turkey?
Every turkey hunter has had a bird show up when his gun is
out of position. Try to swing around for a shot, and the bird invariably flies
or runs before you can draw a bead on him.
There are two situations where you can usually get away with
moving, if your timing is right.
If a tom is strutting in front of you with his head tucked
and his tail fanned, wait until he turns his back to you. When you can't see
his head, he can't see you. At that moment, move your gun into position and
wait for him to come out of his strut. A sharp cluck or cut will usually make
him do it. When his head comes up, shoot.
This trick works even when several birds come in together.
When one is displaying with his back to you, you have about three seconds to make
your move. The others will see you and start putting and moving away, but the
displaying tom will usually come out of his strut and lift his head to see what
the commotion is about.
One, two, three... Boom!
If a lone tom comes in, but doesn't turn his back to you,
you can sometimes get your gun up if you move at glacier speed. With your eyes
on the bird, try to keep all your movement directly in front of you. If he is
not alarmed, he will often stand right there while you lift your gun ever so
s-l-o-w-l-y.
Move too fast and he'll bust you. Move slowly enough so he
doesn't notice, and you should get an easy shot.
Adriana Fischer, of Saukville, shot this big tom during a
Learn-to-Hunt event in 2006 in Ozaukee County with the help of her brother,
Jesse. Photo by Ted Fischer.
Hunt the boss gobbler?
Gobblers develop a pecking order, and every tom knows where
he stands in relation to his fellows, but this hierarchy is less important to
you than it is to the birds. If you choose a good location and call like a hen,
you should get a tom to respond and give you a crack at him. Do you care if you
shoot the boss tom or a bird lower on the totem pole? I sure don't. Besides,
the biggest tom with the longest beard and spurs is not always the boss.
The boss hen is the bird to watch for. She is the one that
passes the other hens, the one the others listen to, and the one all the other
birds follow. The warmest of all turkeys, she will lead the tom you hope to
kill away from your set-up.
When you encounter atom with one or more hens, one of those
hens is usually more vocal than the rest. That's the boss hen. You can
sometimes call her in by imitating her every call. When she yelps, you yelp.
When she cuts, cut back at her. You may get her worked up enough that she comes
in to show the upstart hen who's boss. If that happens, the tom will almost
always follow her right to you.
Spook atom and it's over?
We've all been busted by a bird that came in silently, one
we stumbled on when we got up to move, or one we were trying to get closer to
before trying to call him. A spooked bird will run or fly off, but he won't
leave the township. Chances are he will go only far enough to feel he has
safely eluded whatever it was that spooked him. He knows his territory and will
not leave it for good.
Consider two case histories.
Several years ago on the first day of a Learn-to-Hunt
program in Ozaukee County, Jesse Fischer called in a big tom for his sister,
Adriana, who got off a poor shot and wounded the bird in the foot. The next
day, hunting in the same woodlot, Jesse called in that same tom. This time,
Adriana killed him.
The bird was a little more hesitant the second day, but
Jesse was still able to call him close enough for his sister to kill him
cleanly with a 20-gauge. OK, so Jesse is a former state turkey-calling
champion, but my point is that even with a few pellets in his foot, this bird
was still in the same woods the next day and still looking for hens.
Another time, two friends were hunting the bluff country
along the Mississippi River. They heard a tom gobbling from his apparent strut
zone atop a bluff and tried to sneak close enough to work him. They spooked the
tom off the bluff, so they decided to give him up. Before they got back to
their truck, however, they heard him gobbling once again from the same spot.
They could tell it was the same bird because he had the same long, high-pitched
gobble.
It was close to quitting time that day, so they did not try
for him again, but they learned a valuable lesson. Had they moved right to the
bird's strut zone after spooking him off, they might have been able to kill him
when he came back.
Some hunters actually use that strategy of running a bird
off his strut zone, then setting up and calling him back to it. It's similar to
the fall strategy of scattering a flock of young birds, then calling them back
together.
These methods may not work every time, but you only need one
trick to work once to make your hunt successful. Let me know if you are able to
turn a myth into a method this spring.
Dan Small is host/producer of Outdoor Wisconsin on Public
Television and Outdoors Radio. He is also contributing editor of Wisconsin
Outdoor News. He has written several thousand articles for national, regional
and state-based outdoor publications since 1972. Listen to his syndicated
weekly radio show on stations throughout Wisconsin
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