It looks like spring is finally here. Time to start thinking turkeys.

While much of our hunting is getting more restricted, turkey hunting opportunities continue to expand. Hunters can harvest three turkeys in the spring and two in the fall with over-the-counter tags. No draw required.

The nice thing about turkey hunting is that it is relatively low-key. The weather is usually nice. You don’t need a ton of equipment, and you can get in a quick morning hunt and have the rest of the day to work on your honey do list.

Serious hunters will go out in the evening to locate turkeys to hunt the next day. Toms getting ready to roost will respond with a “shock gobble” to a variety of noises. Commercially made crow calls, owl hoots, gobbles, or hen clucks all work to locate roosting birds. I have even had them gobble in response to a car horn.

Once located, you know where to be the next morning. If you don’t have a tom located when you head out to hunt, then spend your time traveling through likely areas, stopping to gobble or cluck every couple of hundred yards and listen for a response. Then get set up and enjoy the fun of calling them in.

Unlike big game hunting, it isn’t critical to pay attention to the wind, but turkeys do have phenomenal eyesight. You can’t get away with a lot of movement or they will bust you.

Calling turkeys is like calling elk or coyotes. There is no one recipe that works every time, and flexibility is the key to your strategy.

Once I have located birds, I almost never use gobbles to call them in. Instead I rely on hen clucks most of the time. I usually start off slow and judge how the tom reacts. If he is coming in hot, I call just enough to keep him coming.

It’s a good idea to have a variety of calls with you so that if he is being difficult, you can try different calls to see which one works better than the others, or so that you can pretend to be several hens all at the same time. I will also mix up the tempo of my calling to see how he responds.

Mouth calls are handy because they are hands-free (see what I did there?), so you can be ready with your shotgun and there is minimal movement. You can actually make some pretty good turkey sounds with your elk mouth call if you want to go cheap. Box and slate calls are easier for some folks to use, and give good tone, but require more movement.

In the fall you can harvest a tom or a hen. In the spring you can only harvest a tom, so make sure of your identification. Toms will typically have a blue or red head. Since I am blessed to be color-blind, I always look for the beard sprouting from the chest to confirm sex. When that big tom comes strutting in all puffed up and on display, you will be hooked.

Drop us a line at shootingthebreezebme@gmail.com.

Rod Carpenter is a husband, father and huntin’ fool.