Five Tips to Hunting Silent Tom’s
By Rick Spoerl
I was completely, totally, definitely bored out of my gourd as the sitting time approached ten and a half hours. This was in the evening and I hadn’t heard or looked at a turkey all day. We were on the forth day of a five day turkey hunt in north western Wisconsin and time was running out. On day three my Uncle and I were lucky enough to call in a silent tom after only a two hour sit that he dispatched with one well placed shot. He looked out of his turkey blind and there it was running full bore right at him.
I finished a series of calls, took a deep disappointing breath and pulled my facemask down to get a drink of water. I glanced out my rear window of my turkey blind. And there he was, looking right at me only ten feet away. The big tom started running and I quickly grabbed my Remington 870 and unloaded three #4’s, leading the bird as he disappeared over the ridge. It was over. Over thirty hours of hunting this week and in less than ten seconds it was over.
Back in the late eighty’s when I first started turkey hunting ole’ Zeke Bergman, the turkey master from Bagley Wisconsin said “if a guy found a good strutting field, made a good blind, placed a decoy properly, and sat every minute the season was open, he’d get his bird every year”. Those are truly words of wisdom for the beginning turkey hunter.
While at times you may be able to harvest birds quicker using other methods, this can truly work. Zeke left out the calling portion of the hunt because he felt a hunter could hurt himself when calling aggressively. One thing I’ve learned and maybe slightly disagree with him on is the fact that calling should help the situation not hinder it.
I’ve been successfully hunting silent toms for years but it came with a lot of hard work. The first thing you must do is scout. You must know that the area your hunting holds birds. Usually good strutting areas don’t change from year to year but the exact spot changes regularly. The “right spot” is what you need to find.
An alfalfa field that turkeys were strutting in last year may now be a plowed cut corn field that the birds have little interest in. Seeing turkeys feeding in a dirt field may be the result of fresh manure spread but it might not last until your season comes.
Tip # 1 - Early season scouting is great but it must be followed up close to your hunt. Try to get off work a couple days before the opener to get a head start on the hunt. Even with this knowledge it may take you several days to get a shot, so you want as much time in the “right spot” as possible. Tom’s follow the hen’s routine in the spring, and good feeding areas are usually also good strutting areas.
Tip #2 - Set up a blind to use as base camp. It should conceal most of your movement from the woods. You will be able to sit longer and be more comfortable being able to move around in the blind. If a silent tom sneaks up on you, chances are he won’t see you move. If you’ve sat multiple days and haven’t seen anything you can leave the blind and most of your gear to scout different areas. You can return for lunch later not leaving the hunting grounds.
Tip # 3 – Learn how to call like the boss hen as well as cluck like a tom. Turkey hunting as well as duck hunting requires good calling to be consistently successful. I use a mouth (diaphragm) call because of its versatility. Rarely do I use any other call. Not saying the other calls don’t work, they do. I personally like the mouth call because it keeps your hands free, it can make every call a turkey makes, it’s easy to carry and I can vary the loudness easily.
I call every five minutes. I start out with a high pitched lonesome hen call. This simulates a hen looking for another bird. If I don’t get a gobble I continue with a more excited high pitched hen response call. This will simulate her seeing a bird. Than I switch to a raspier deep call and begin a cutting sequence. This tells the young hen and any other bird to get her their butts over here now. If I don’t get a gobble from that I make a couple loud clucks ending the series with a few yelps and soft clucks telling all turkeys listening that everything is ok. Five minutes later, I do it all again. I want every turkey within hearing range to know I’m here.
Tip # 4 – Use multiple decoys (at least two). Use high quality hen decoys that look realistic. They’re more expensive but for a silent wary tom, it may payoff. If you’re on a fence line (which I love to hunt) put decoys on both sides of the fence. Position your decoys with a purpose. Don’t just throw them out there.
Guys I duck hunt with might question why I take a lot of time setting my decoys up. But when they’re set up right, it’s worth the reward of seeing convinced game march right into your spread.
Position the decoys so they’re spread out at least five yards (steps) apart. Turkeys close together are usually nervous. Put them out so the silhouette is sideways to where you think the birds are likely to come so the turkeys recognize the decoys as turkeys. Only place them halfway to your farthest shot. If your gun can kill a bird at forty yards don’t put the decoys farther from you than twenty. If your bow hunting put the decoys closer but at an angle so the tom is looking at them not you. Smart gobblers can figure out decoys aren’t real when they get ten or twenty yards away. Head them towards you. Turkeys intercept the hen decoys from head on. If your decoys are placed facing away from you they might head them off being out of gun range. And lastly don’t line the decoys up to where you think the tom may approach. Put them at an angle so the bird is focusing away from you towards the decoys.
Tip # 5 – Be ready for a quick shot. Don’t hesitate and always have your gun ready in your lap. A bird can show up out of thin air and you might only have a couple seconds to react.
I look at it this way. I always tell myself I’ll have at least one chance “don’t blow it”.