Turkeys silent after the " fly down"
04-21-2003, 06:35 PM
#1
Thread Starter
Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: Phoenix, AZ
Posts: 352
Turkeys silent after the " fly down"
Last weekend I was at my hunting lease in West Texas and the turkeys were gobbling like crazy while on the roost, but after they flew down they developed a severe case of lock jaw. I got one to respond to my yelps with three gobbles and he was getting closer with each gobble, but then he shut up and I didn' t hear another gobble that morning. There are a lot of turkeys on this lease and medium hunting pressure. Does anyone have any tips on dealing with this situation?
04-21-2003, 08:20 PM
#3
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: The Wild Turkey Capitol of the World......Missouri
Posts: 1,027
RE: Turkeys silent after the " fly down"
Hook, sounds like you' re dealing with henned up gobblers. That will happen when you have a big population of hens. You need to set up between where they are and where they wanna be, or try to call the hens to you, the gobblers will follow. Not a lot you can do to make them gobble when they are strutting for hens and don' t want to talk. Occasionally, you might get one to shock gobble but when they' re showing off for the ladies, they aren' t gonna make much noise!
04-21-2003, 08:23 PM
#4
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: asheboro, nc
Posts: 384
RE: Turkeys silent after the " fly down"
there is a good chance that there were some hens between you and that ole gobbler. i now that happened to us last week and then again today. we had him gobblin at about 5:30 am and he was gobblin his fool head off. but just before fly down we heard a couple hens moving across the field toward the gobbler, and when they got to him he flew down and shut up. a couple hours later we did get him to gobble again and he was right up on us but he caught us in the wrong position. but it was fun chasin him anyway. theres always tomarrow. but anyway back to your question--- make sure that you are between him and the ladies or you will have to catch him after the noggie.
04-21-2003, 10:20 PM
#5
Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: Auburn WA.
Posts: 1,396
RE: Turkeys silent after the " fly down"
Yesterday I had the same thing happen. I left him alone completely til 10am and took off after 2 others that I could tell were alone. Nothing happened with them so I went to the 1st Tom' s roost area @ 10 and immediately heard him gobble,after his hens had left him and i was bringing him to my truck by 10:30. Probably never work one in that fast again, but next time I get a henned up Tom I' ll try the same manuver again.
04-22-2003, 07:00 AM
#6
Thread Starter
Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: Phoenix, AZ
Posts: 352
RE: Turkeys silent after the " fly down"
Thanks for the tips everyone. I' m going to try to make time to get out to my lease this weekend and hopefully fill my remaining tags. I' ll let you all know how it goes.
