I stood on the top of the hill an hour before sunrise along side a hardwood forest in a four inch high alfalfa field in north western Wisconsin waiting for and hoping for a gobble. This is the final day of my spring hunt and the turkeys in the area seem to be roosting in a different spot everyday. The previous days have been slow. The only tom’s I had seen were with hens all day. I had set up a blind with decoys in several locations including strutting zones, resting areas and feeding areas with no luck. They simply wouldn’t leave the hens. Now it was time to run and gun or as I call it, stop and go.

The tactic is simple. You go when you here the toms gobble and you stop when they stop gobbling. You get as close to the tom as possible without spooking him or the birds that are with him. I usually use this technique as a last resort. It can be very successful on any day of the hunt, but it does require a lot of running / fast walking. I personally would rather use the traditional method of scouting a strut zone, set up a couple decoys, call in a tom and shoot him on opening day, but it isn’t a perfect world and when the toms won’t leave the hens and the hens won’t come to the calling, other methods must be used. This is one such method. It’s a great tactic but get ready for a work out. Of coarse this is mainly a morning tactic but still can be used during the day.

Many times the tom will sound off before light. This is what you want. It’s much easier to move through the darkness without being seen than in the daylight. Listen for the first gobble and go. You’re not waiting for him, your going to him.

If another bird sounds off after you’ve moved don’t be discouraged. That’s ok; just stick with the bird that gobbled first. You don’t want to be running back and forth on the hunting grounds. If the first bird stops gobbling for ten or fifteen minutes, only than should you consider moving in on another bird.

If daylight approaches than you stop and hunt from there. If the bird is on land you don’t have permission to hunt on than you stop and hunt at or near the fence line. Just get as close as you can to the bird. In the past I’ve crawled right under the tree they were roosting in as they were gobbling their heads off. They hear noises all the time in the woods and if they don’t see you the turkeys might just think you’re a deer or squirrel.

When you’re within fifty yards of the roosted tom don’t take it for granted he’s by himself. Scan every tree for birds. You want to know where every turkey is. One time I was convinced a tom was alone when a hen come zooming over my head at blazing speed. I’ve also been busted by jakes and hens that were roosted near the tom sending him screaming away.

Wait until the turkeys fly down and than make only very soft subtle clucks and yelps. You want them curious. Many times they will be in range as soon as they hit the ground. I personally don’t shoot turkeys while roosted in trees, and it may even be illegal in some states. If you’re hunting Wisconsin and you’re stealthy enough to get that close to a tom and its legal shooting hours, it’s your decision. There are a lot of states where the turkey season is several weeks long. In Wisconsin we only have five days limited almost entirely too private land.

If its starting to get light out and you haven’t heard any gobbling see if you can get them started. Use a barred owl call to alert them. If the toms still don’t respond try a lonesome hen call.

Back to the story in the beginning. It was still pitch dark when a distant owl sounded off. The thunderous sound of a mature gobble soon followed. I took off at a dead sprint across the field. By the time I reached the other side, some five hundred yards away, I was totally out of breath. I hit the ground gasping for air and waited. Than he gobbled, and another tom gobbled. There was more than one bird roosted together.

I crawled into the woods so close to the ground I could smell the decayed leaves of the previous fall. I slithered under a barbed wire fence and slowly looked up. I began to recognize silhouettes in the trees against the now turning blue sky. The closest bird appeared to be a hen only ten yards away. She let out a medium putt. Not to loud to scare the other birds off the roost but loud enough to startle them. After a couple minutes of silence and me remaining completely motionless the turkeys began to relax.

As the woods came to life the hens started clucking and yelping and the toms continued gobbling. I could hardly hear myself think. All I remember thinking is "boy is this great". I now could see I had crawled into a flock of nine turkeys. There were three toms, three hens and one Jake. They ranged in distance from ten to fifty yards from me. They were roosted on the side of a hill next to a deep ravine. If they came straight down from their trees the big tom would be mine. The only way I couldn’t get them is if they sailed across the ravine. I contemplated whacking him out of the tree but decided against it.

One of the hens was the first bird to leave the roost. With the loud thrashing of her wings she flew across the ravine. "Oh no", I thought as I watched every turkey glide across the ravine and land some fifty to sixty yards away. I began frantically calling in a loud cutting fashion trying to get the birds back over, but as most veteran turkey hunters know, it simply won’t happen. The toms began neck wrestling and in fifteen minutes they would follow the hens down the ridge as they had done all week.

The stop and go tactic had worked for me many times but nothings a hundred percent. I went home without a tom but what an experience it was to wake up in the morning with a flock of wild turkeys.

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