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What do you use - mouth calls, box calls or slate calls?
I'm trying to use slate, but I have a problem with it - moisture in the morning, mostly.
I've had the most success using box calls, but I want to be more versatile. So I end up taking both a box call and a slate call.
Mouth/diaphram calls -- I just never put in the time to learn calling this way.
I'm relying more and more on mouth calls, but I love the tone you can get from a slate pot, especially clucks and purrs. If you are having trouble with moisture, get a glass pot call, and my faves are Black Widow and the Woodhaven calls. Use a plastic striker.
I've never used the traditional box call, but do use a homemade scratch box to good effect. My dad taught me how to make them.
How you gonna kill all them turkeys and catch all them sheepshead at the same time?
I'll try the plastic striker. Thanks for that tip!Quote:
Originally Posted by Haywire
Unless I come across a really disoriented turkey, I'm not going to be able to pursue both at the same time. Given the choice, most of the time I opt for Sheepshead and Spanish. Occasionally though, it's fun to try to get a turkey to respond to my call and decoys. The good thing about hunting turkeys is that you can usually hunt the fly-down and still have time to do other things.
There was an article in the paper a week or so ago that confirmed my observations that turkeys are getting scarcer across the south. I don't think I'm seeing a third as many turkeys as I saw four or five years ago. Adjoining landowners concur. I think I'm going to be spending more and more time fishing.
It's time for Old Swamp Gobbler to chime in. I know he makes a fine slate pot call. Come on and talk to us, Doug.
My birds aren't near what I use to see in the past.....but with the issues with the neighbors dogs then ,both the deer and turkey have been scarce till this past season.....hopefully the spring turkey hunting will be good now too......although I would just assume be fishing down there then!!......I use both slate and box,never tried a mouth one yet.
George, what reason(s) did they give for the downturn in population?Quote:
Originally Posted by Haywire
Over hunting, depredation, disease, loss of habitat, natural population cycles?
They don't know and are fitting turkeys in several different states with transmitters in an effort to see what happens. The most popular barber shop opinion is predators like coyotes and coons, but turkeys have been dealing with predators for thousands of years. The game biologists think that weather has had the strongest impact with cold rain affecting the newly hatched birds. Probably a combination of things. Everybody wants a simple answer, but there likely ain't one. I may do my part by not killing any this spring, but, then again-----
Woods Wise Mystic Wet Stick. - Game Calls : Woods Wise : Bowhunters International, Bowhunters Supply Store, Archery Supplies, Archery Equipment, Bowhunting Supplies
This striker works good on any slate but I especially like it on glass.
I like the carbon striker on a Rocky Top copper friction call.
Woods Wise Mystic™ Wet Box™ Calls
By far the easiest box call I have ever used-no chalk needed.
HS Strut split v mouth calls sound good and are easy to use, if I don't choke on it.
I have been out scouting for them turkey birds....few of em have begun to clear their throats....the older I get the less I use a mouth call....in saying that I keep one in my jaw for close work....I spect I have called more turkeys with a box than anything...I have always liked using a box.
I carry a lighter and turn my slate upside down and let that lighter suck that moisture out before i leave the truck.
Haywire...our numbers are dwindling here also...I understand the biologist in 6 southern states are trying to figure it out
Great tip with the lighter. Good to hear from you.
Very few trappers anymore. Coon population is exploding....egg suckers are everywhere and big as Trash can lids. Anybody with a feeder and cam knows it. It may be a cycle, like the squirrel population....one can only hope. Disclaimer: I'm not a biologist.
I have temporarily wiped out entire raccoon populations in my hunting area, but it doesn't seem to do much good, except to keep them off my bird feeder. Turkeys, as a species, have been dealing with predators for a long time and have been very successful. When you read accounts of the turkey population before we started killing them for market, away back when, it sounds like you had to kick them out of your way to walk through the woods. I hope it is some sort of natural cycle, but I hope it passes quickly because I don't have a whole lot of hill climbing years left to chase after them. They are hugely adaptive creatures, just ask the suburban dwellers in NJ where they are chasing people back into their cars and becoming the apex street thugs.
Yep Haywire...Age is creeping up on me too....back in the early and mid 80s we had turkeys on every hill and in every golf course...then it crashed....one particular road in our local WMA that I have heard as many as 15 gobbling in the past I only heard one in there the entire season last year....I have the guys in our club on a one bird limit this year...we have been trying to "bank" some each year so we would have one or two to hunt....
BTW...not to change the subject but...I read the article on your Dad in Earl Mickel's book...it you have never seen it I will mail you a copy....just let me know
i use a diaphragm exclusively. our Tennessee population is also down. it is being attributed to flooding in West Tn but i don't know why the eastern state birds are down. just 5 years ago, we had 7 different gobblers sounding off opening morning on our little 22 acres. this past season, we saw 1 tom(he got killed) and 2 jakes and only 5 or 6 hens.
It's probably part of a prey/predator cycle regarding reports of declining turkey stocks. Raccoons, coyotes, foxes - all capable of impacting the turkey population. Of course, as the turkey population declines, those predators have to move on to other local wildlife and even into suburban areas to try to find food.