One of the most difficult scenarios a turkey hunter faces is dealing with a vocal, henned-up tom. You know the type. He gobbles at your every call from his roost or on the ground, but he doesn’t close the gap, because the hens are leading him around like he’s on a leash. Understandably, he excites you with his gobbles, but he’s telling your bogus hen to come to him. You can’t do that, so you keep trying to change his mind, even though you know down deep he has no intention of coming to you any time soon.
My advice is to back off and let him have his fun — for the time being at least.
A few hours sometimes makes all the difference. For instance, if breeding season is well under way, chances are that any hen, or hens, the tom was with early in the morning will be visiting their nests by midday, and he may be quite lonely by then. I’ve had success many times in the afternoon for that very reason.
Or, while you were elsewhere, the flock may have been scattered in some other way. Perhaps the turkeys encountered a predator like a bobcat or coyote. Maybe something else upset their routine. It doesn’t matter how they got separated. What’s important is that you’re back to take advantage of the situation when it counts. Here’s how……