Keep Your Turkey Kit Simple

As I set this down, the countdown is passing exactly 8 weeks until The Opener. It has been a month since my last post. I was quite unwell– worst case of flu I’ve had in 20 years. It left me creeping around for weeks. It was just the wrong time, too. The new job really cranked up all of a sudden, and I’ve been whizzing about. This all set me back pretty much as far as my turkey preparations. I had already resolved to keep it simple this year–no big new projects. I just want to keep it simple.

Although I have even been working weekends lately, most of the work has been done from my dining room table. Building servers is a lot like watching paint dry, so I have had time to write. I just have not had the time to publish things here. I thought I would get going on a proper footing. For the past dozen or so years, I have had a lot of things rolling around my head about turkeys. I see a lot of guys who have not been at it all that long wondering how to get that first bird or get their first bird on their own, or get out of a slump. I have written about all this before. However, you would have to dig through years of posts to find it all.

Equipment — Keep it simple

Generally speaking, the less cargo you carry afield, the better off you are going to be, especially if you are just starting out. Some people feel that a full vest gives them an edge. No. It is mostly going to be dead weight. Think about this in terms of fishing. I have a tackle box that my father bought me when I was 17 years old. It is a Plano 747. I immediately started filling that thing with all my fishing tackle. When I was done, I had a 75 lb tackle box. Most of it was dead weight. If I was out fishing for bluegills, I had muskie spinners, saltwater jigs, and salmon rigs– just in case. I was young and strong and 75 lbs did not bother me. However, nowadays I have pared my bluegill fishing down to something that would fit in my back pocket.

I did the same thing with my first turkey vest. It’s true, some days having an extra couple box calls on hand made all diff– NO. I’m catching myself here. Granted, I’ve gone out plenty of times carrying a whole sporting goods section, but NO!!! It never helped me get a turkey.

I’m down to a small over-shoulder bag for my calls. It looks like this:

If it does not fit in there, it stays home. I rotate calls throughout the season. I have a monster-box of calls I bring to camp, but I keep it simple. One box, a couple of pots, mouth calls, etc. Why? Is it that I am getting to be an old fart who cannot lug all that stuff around anymore?

Well, partially. Fact of it is, all that lugging I did when I was younger built up my leg and arm muscles. Even though I am an old fat fart, I get up and down the hills pretty well. As age started to take its toll, all I had to do was lighten the load a little and I found I could keep going.

No, the big problem that I see is that if you take the kitchen sink with you, it makes you want to try it out on the turkeys. This is not like bass fishing in at least one key way. If you hit a gob with call X and call Y and then try to hit them with Z, chances are you lost them somewhere around X. With bass, you can throw twenty lures over the same hole and the 21st gets a bite. Too many calls, especially in the hands of a beginner lends itself to too much calling. At least that was what I finally figured out.

Keeping it simple also applies to everything else in your kit. An $800 shotgun with $7 turkey loads does not kill birds any better than a $300 shotgun and $.50 shells, at least not inside 20 yards. That is probably where you are going to see your bird.

Yes, I’ve gone out with a mess of decoys a pop-up blind,and a lounge chair and truth is that I have had better luck with less.

We Are Not Hunting Elephants

Some day go over on ChuckHawks.com and look up the recoil numbers on a 3″ 12GA 2OZ load– what I have been lobbing at gobs for close to 20 years. Then look up a .416 Rigby and a 30-06. 30-06 with a full-house deer load is about 20 Ft./lbs. The .416 Rigby loads are somewhere about 58 ft/lbs. A 1 7/8 3″ load is 54 ft/lbs. A 2 oz load would put it right there with the .416 Rigby.

Now, do not get me wrong. We are throwing that much mass at the turkeys, because they won’t let us use our 32/20 rifles anymore. Think of a target 38Special wadcutter, and that is pretty much what the ideal turkey load was considered back 100 years ago, before the modern season. My point here is that we are using some really powerful artillery when we go after turkeys. Is it necessary?

Largely no. My 3″ loads are just fine. My son’s 2 3/4″ loads are just fine. If you call them in to 20 yards or so, what passes for a turkey gun nowadays is really senseless overkill. The land I hunt is a combination of hardwoods, cedar thickets and pasture. Yes, I occasionally get opportunities to shoot turkeys at 60 yards. However, even in open pastures, I normally do not have a head and neck on which to aim until the bird is inside 20 yards. I did some figuring a few years ago. My average shot was taken at 17 yards. That was a good 8 yards closer than if you had asked me for an estimate before I sat down and cyphered it out.

Do I mean to say a 3.5″ thumbhole semi-auto gob stomper with $7 loads is useless? No. What I am saying is my $150 pump with spray paint on the barrel and #4 Federals is not a hindrance to my success. I am also saying that a nice full-choked 20 Gauge, patterned so you know where it shoots is not a handicap. Remember that in May, when you shoulder is still bothering you from sighting-in in March.

Turkeys Do Not Care about Camo

People care a lot about camo. Turkeys do not. An old M65 field jacket in Woodland and a face mask is about all you really need. That is about all I use for pre-season scouting. I really like British DPM better, but there are not that many British soldiers with the same dimensions of John Wayne (a rough approximation of my size). My son wears German Flecktar, and that does just fine.

When I get suited up for season about the only rule I use is to keep the brownish camo on the lower half of my body and the greenish stuff up top. What pattern it is not important.

Let me state, probably for the first time ever, a hierarchy of camo for turkeys. I do not mean this to be a hard and fast rule, but a general guide. I have had incredible turkey encounters dressed in jeans and a barn coat. I have had turkeys run like scalded cats when I was fully suited. The trick here is to break up the gestalt– fancy talk for turkey hunters that subscribe to

Psychology Today

. Make the turkey’s less likely to put the pieces together and come up with “human.” If you have one piece of camo to wear, I would say make it a shirt or jacket. Next, something for your head. That is usually what bobs up or twists and makes the gob run away. Pants come next. Gloves come in last. I know everyone joneses on turkeys seeing your hands, but I have shot several gobs with my gloves off.

The Rest of It

I have a pop-up blind that I used to use when the kids were little. I have decoys. Last year was the first year in 25 that I never put a deke out. I did not suffer for the lack. I do not think the less of any hunter that uses these modern inventions, but I believe they are largely unnecessary. Yes, you do have more bulk to carry. However, I see the biggest hitch in both of these so-called innovations is the way it keeps you planted in one spot. The less I carry, the more I am willing to get up and move.

There are a couple of pieces of extra stuff that I make sure I do carry. One is a 4X6 piece of die-cut camo that I can put up between two trees and make a quick blind when I do not have the time or the materials to blind myself in otherwise. That has been invaluable over the years. Sometimes I just drape it over my feet or throw it over my head. That has usually been enough.

The other is a pad for my butt. I keep a few camo boat cushions scattered around the property in likely places. I can pick them up and move them around to my various hides for serious long-term sitting. When I am mobile, I carry a foam butt pad on the back of my turkey purse.

Here is a good pick showing how it all nets out: