Summer 2023
by Wm. Hovey Smith
I ran into two hunters set up in the woods yesterday. The lease owner had outfitted his employees with new camo clothes, guns, calls and a full fan strutting turkey decoy. They were sitting exposed on the edge of a small food plot directly behind their decoy which made them instantly visible to any approaching turkey. If a turkey saw the decoy, it could certainly see them because neither of them was wearing face masks. If a turkey came into the plot they would have had to shoot in a hurry, because I suspect that he would not hang around very long.
The author with a gobbler taken with a Brown Bess Musket. Photo courtesy of Hovey Smith.
On another occasion, the hunt was over and the hunters were back at their cars playing with their turkey calls, and a gobbler sounded off from 40 yards away. At times gobblers have flushed when hunters were just walking through the woods, and I have taken them on random walk encounters. Chance, rather than skill also counts in turkey hunting, which means that sometimes even wrong methods will work.
The flip side is that many times the hunter does his best to do absolutely everything right and nothing happens – no gobbles, no turkeys, absolutely nothing. Our hunter would have cause to suspect that there weren’t any turkeys and never had been.
The author also bagged a bird with a Young Blunderbuss! Photo by Hovey Smith.
How to you increase your odds of being successful?
1. Hunt where the turkeys are. Even on properties that you know, turkeys will sometimes be in one location rather than another. If the adjoining land owner has set out feeders that he stocks all year, the turkeys will concentrate around these areas. You may hear them every time you go hunting, but it is difficult to pull them away from feed.
2. Conceal yourself. Camo clothing works, but it is better to find some shade and sit behind thin cover that will help hide movement. Use a face mask or dark face paints to cut the shine off your face.,
3. Know your gun and load. It is more important to know where that load shoots from that gun, than to own the most expensive turkey gun and choke combination available.
4. Go often and hunt long. On your hunt days, plan to spend the day at it. Even if the morning hunt is a bust, stay through at least the early afternoon. Often the best activity can start as late as about 11:00 a.m.
5. Take a seat cushion. You can hunt only as long as your butt can stand it.
6. Know your basic turkey calls. Mimic the calls you hear. Call in the hens and the toms will follow.
Wm. Hovey Smith is an expert on hunting with primitive weapons and a member of the Georgia Outdoor Writers Association. He makes his home in Sandersville. Contact him at hoveysmith029@gmail.com.