[Greenhead_Slayer]

Forgive me if this question is stupid, it's my first season chasing turkeys. So far it's been a blast. We've got 5 flocks of birds that we put to bed each night, they all roost within 300 yards or so of each other and take the same trail in the morning to where they go feed. Our strategy opening day was to get as close to the roost as we dared on the trail itself and set up. We hit the slate call once the birds left the roost and had a good grundle of jakes and hens at 20 yards for a good 10 minutes or so. The big tom walked by at about 40 yards in strut, but we could never coax him into us. We had 1 strutting tom and a submissive hen decoy out. He didn't want to come into us so we just let him and all the other birds pass by, and had the same thing happen with the next group. The jakes and hens came in, but the tom stayed out about 40 with his hens and kept going.

So yesterday morning we braved the storm and decided to go set up where they've been going to feed instead of on the trail itself and had the same results. Plenty of jakes and hens in the decoys, but the strutting toms just wouldn't commit. We called pretty aggressive to him to try to get him riled up but it didn't work.

Long story short, my question is what else do we need to be doing to get the big toms to peel away? I highly doubt they are seeing us, we are full camo, face paint, and have plenty of cover in front of and behind us. I'm certainly not against shooting a bearded jake if it comes down to it, but it'd be nice to get a mature tom doing his thing at 20 yards. Thanks.

 

[horkingmidget]

I'm no expert but one suggestion that I picked up during the Turkey Hunting seminars was to face your decoy towards you. They said if the decoy was facing in the direction that the tom was coming from and he sees this. That he expects the hen to go to him so he would stop and wait.

Also same idea with your calls, you want to throw the sound behind you. Otherwise the tom thinks the hen is coming to him.

 

[taxidermist]

Don't put out the Tom decoy, and put out a couple more hens. Have a buddy stay behind the decoys to call, and the shooter sit 20yds. Beyond where the Tom has been walking. That should put you in the line of success.

 

[whitepd01]

Kill him at 40 yards :grin:

 

[ram2h2o]

This early in season the hens are going to the Toms and will keep him henned up. Sometimes the Tom will be gobbling real good and then shut up due to the submissive hens right near him, why go off looking for a hen when you got them all around you. You might try some aggressive cutting to see if you can bring in some curious hens that may bring the Gobbler along with them. Also stay put and do some soft calls later in the morning or early afternoon. After the hens have been bred they will go off to their nests and the Gobbler will be looking for more receptive hens and will come looking for where he heard the hen calling earlier. Have taken quite a few using this method early in the season.

 

[tigerpincer]

All good advice in my view. 40 yds is absolutely within Turkey killing range. As long as you hace a clean clear **** shoot him at 40 yds.

 

[hawglips]

Your killing range all depends on what your pattern is doing out there.

You determine that by shooting a big paper (3' or so) and seeing how far you get 100 pellets in a 10" circle (assuming pellets of adequate energy). Then make that your max range.

Ditch the dekes and make the tom come looking for you.

 

[Greenhead_Slayer]

All good advice in my view. 40 yds is absolutely within Turkey killing range. As long as you hace a clean clear **** shoot him at 40 yds.

I should have been a bit more clear, he had hens all around him at the 40 yds. One of those deals if you shoot the tom there'd be a few other dead ones too. We drew blood on Saturday, thanks for the tips. We ended up using 2 hens and 1 jake all faced away from the birds and it worked great.