Patterning Gobblers

By Freddie McKnight

The boss birds are already sounding off in my neck of the woods, but the season is still some time off.

Having the urge to get out and listen to the morning musical each spring, I spend numerous hours in the woods. Listening to and following these birds around, while they are not being pursued by hunters, allows one to actually pinpoint some weaknesses that can come into play later on.

I vividly recall one late season spring hunt that was successful because of paying attention to details nearly two months prior. This boss bird was typical of late season turkeys. He would sound off from the roost, then hit the ground and not be heard from again.

Having kept his neck free from shot on a heavily hunted tract of land, the gobbler had obviously learned his lesson.

Since I’d watched and photographed several gobblers in this vicinity, I played a hunch that morning that this gobbler was one that frequented a little hilltop nearby.

On the west side of the hill was a tree stand that someone had used many seasons ago. It was now nothing more than a few rotted boards desperately hanging on to the white oak tree, but it served as a landmark. I had sat near this very spot earlier this spring, and watched a gobbler use this location as a strutting zone. The bird never sounded off, but he sure liked to hang out here early in the morning.

Right on key, when the first crows hollered that morning, the boss gobbler bellowed out his whereabouts to the rest of the world. Also right on key, another hunter tried his best and gave a few soft calls from a location at the other end of the ridge.

He might as well have tossed in a hand grenade, it would have drawn about the same response. I sat tight, not making a sound, but just kept aware of my surroundings.

I don’t know how long I sat there, but all of the sudden there was a boss gobbler doing his morning ritual within five yards of that old dilapidated stand. I must have been a bit excited because I missed the bird with the first two shots, but the third one was the charm. The three-year-old turkey had made but one mistake two months earlier and now it had cost him.

On another occasion I was witness to four or five two-year old gobblers that used a certain small field on a state game lands near my home. These birds rarely would gobble once a call had been made by a hunter, but they would show up and strut all morning long in a reclaiming field. Try as we might to call and decoy these birds into gun range, they would hang up in the wide-open field with some hens. Once the morning sun grew too warm for their liking, they would exit the field via the fence opening.

Hunting with two good friends who like nothing more than to bring the birds into the calls, we finally conceded that we would have to set up an ambush to get these smart birds. With a light rain falling the very next day, we were able to sneak in to good shooting distance of the fence opening. The birds surprised us by being roosted near the field. They flew down out into the open meadow and went about their business. We just kept still, knowing that sometime prior to the noon quitting hour that these birds would be in our laps. We left the area about 10 am as I recall, each of the brothers carrying a good bird over their shoulder. Without the preseason knowledge of this area, we may have never taken those birds.

I often carry a video camera in the woods with me. Keeping tabs on the birds, I am often able to get ahead of the small spring flocks and film them. What I have been able to put on film has often given me invaluable knowledge of specific gobblers. Noting behavioral characteristics of how a particular gobbler acts to a certain call, where a certain turkey likes to roam, and how the birds react to each other are but just a few clues that have led to their demise.

In noted earlier about the old gobbler and his preferred strutting zone. These spots, once you find them, are often key places to scout out and hunt each year. The spot I mentioned has seen three or four more turkeys taken in the last half-dozen seasons by family and friends. We have located about a dozen such spots over the years, all found during the pre-season.

Once the pressure has been put on, the gobblers will often tend to catch a bad case of closed beak. Some days you just can’t buy a gobble. Most hunters simply give up and go home, waiting on a better day, but if you have done your scouting, you know several places where you might just catch up with a boss bird.

Travel routes are often established and followed by gobblers from late March almost to the early part of June. They may not walk the same footsteps, but they certainly travel the same general areas much of the time. Knowing how a bird covers the ground he has claimed allows you to set up an ambush at one of the bottlenecks you have located. Just like you would do when hunting whitetails, you set up and wait for your quarry to move within gun or bow range. It is not the most glamorous of hunts, but it takes persistence and patience to sit there and outwait a turkey. You just don’t find spots like this without some preseason observance.

Just like anything in nature, nothing is for sure, but having the knowledge of your findings during the preseason will surely help go a long way towards filling your tag during any portion of the hunting season. Other hunters may take a bird or two you have been following, but keep in mind that other gobblers are liable to repeat the steps of their predecessor once they have claimed that area, but you wouldn’t know that unless you were out there scouting.