Show Him What He Wants To See - Or Hide
(Originally
published in HuntOnlyMagazine.com)
©
By Othmar Vohringer
“The
tom came over the crest and then just stood there about a hundred
yards away and kept looking in my direction. No matter how much I
called he
wouldn’t come any closer.” This and similar
complaints I hear quite often from
turkey hunters. It’s frustrating when you call for hours and
finally a big tom
comes in and then hangs up just out of shooting range.
There
is a simple remedy to fix this dilemma. Try
to put yourself in the turkey’s position. How would you act
if somebody were
calling out for you but when you followed the call you found out that
nobody
was at the location you expected him to be? Wouldn’t you get
just a tad
suspicious that someone might be playing a prank on you? Sure you
would! It’s
the same with a gobbler, especially the ones that survived a hunting
season or
two.
When
a tom hears a hen calling and follows the
sound he fully expects to see a hen at the location the call is coming
from.
Turkeys have directional hearing, meaning they can estimate fairly
accurately
where that sound is coming from. The reason why a tom reacts to hen
sounds is
because he is in love and desperately wants to find a mate. In other
words,
when a tom follows a call he will look over every inch of landscape
with his
eagle-like eyes, fully expecting to encounter a hen.
Then
he arrives at the location and sees nothing.
There are no other turkeys anywhere near the location. The tom will
instantly
become highly suspicious, hang up and scan the area carefully for any
movement.
The worst a hunter can do in that situation is to call more. At
precisely that
moment all the calling will do is to rouse the bird’s
suspicion even higher and
eventually he will turn around and walk away. The only thing you
achieved at
that moment is to educate the turkey and the next time he hears a hen
call he
will ignore it. These birds are referred to as “call
shy” and they are almost
impossible to hunt.
There
are two simple solutions to toms that hang up
out of shotgun range. Give the tom what he came to see. Use a few hen
decoys
and add a tom or a jake decoy to the set up. That will make the tom so
jealous
he will forget all caution. Setting up decoys adds to the realism of
calling.
Now the gobbler can see who was calling and that will give him the
confidence
to come closer and investigate. It’s like calling ducks
without decoys. It
doesn’t work because it is unnatural. There are no invisible
ducks, or turkeys
for that matter.
However,
decoying turkeys it not always possible, and
if you hunt on crown land (public land for my American readers) where
you have
to share the woods with other hunters it can be downright dangerous to
use
decoys. But don’t despair. Even without decoys you can call a
gobbler within
shooting distance. The solution is to hide from the tom’s
view. Set up in such
a way that the gobbler will not be able to see what he expects until it
is too
late.
I
am aware that many hunters have a problem with
not being able to see an approaching tom until he is thirty to forty
yards
away. I used to think the same way. The urge to be able to see for a
long
distance is in our nature. But what good is it if you can see a tom
approaching
your set up a hundred yards away and he is not coming any closer? The
simple
fact is that if you can see the tom from a hundred yards away he can
see that
far too, and if he can’t see a hen at that distance then
…well I think by now
you know the answer to that.
If
decoys are not an option for you simply stay out
of sight from an approaching tom. Set up on a corner of a thicket, a
woodland
or field edge that will force the bird to walk around the corner to see
where
the call is coming from. An ambush just below a ridge or over a crest
works
very well too. It will force the gobbler to walk to the top of the
ridge or
crest to see. Just make sure you have some sort of solid background
behind the
turkey so you’re not firing the gun into open space. Shotgun
pellets can travel
quite far and even if they can’t kill a person at 60 to 70
yards they still can
inflict injury. Try these tips in the coming spring season; show him
what he
wants to see – or hide and I guarantee you, your turkey
hunting success will go
up considerably.
###
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