Don't believe it?

[L.F. Cox]

Read a NWTF article on gobbling birds on pressured land and unpressured land. Basically concluded birds learn to gobble less on pressured land vs. unpressured land, which I tend to agree. But have a hard time believing the last sentence of the article?

"The study suggests that the hunted birds negatively associate gobbling with seeing other turkeys being shot or learning that not all calling is coming from hens, but from hunters nearby."

A turkey is smarter than the bozo that made that statement.

[Gooserbat]

As a annual supporter of the NWTF, I say just consider the source.

[L.F. Cox]

If you look back far enough you'll see that's where the idea of shooting dove sized shot at turkey originated.

[GobbleNut]

"The study suggests that the hunted birds negatively associate gobbling with seeing other turkeys being shot or learning that not all calling is coming from hens, but from hunters nearby."

We've hashed this out on here numerous times before.  I think the statement is poorly worded, but I agree with the concept that turkeys will absolutely begin to associate turkey calling with danger,...and will learn to avoid it.  They will learn the same with decoys, as well.

Now, I am not so sure that gobblers are capable of associating how much they gobble with it being dangerous to them, but there is no doubt in my mind that they will cut back or stop gobbling to a great degree once they begin to associate turkey calling in the distance with a danger threat. 

Perhaps more importantly, I am even more convinced that older hens in a breeding group will keep hard-gobbling, uneducated toms from approaching calls.  Those hens, during their lives, have likely witnessed the demise of numerous gobblers that approached turkey calling.  Those hens will learn, over time, to move away from turkey calling they find suspicious,...and most likely, the gobblers are going to follow them. 

In my opinion, gobblers with hens are often difficult to call in, not because the hens in the group do not want to associate with some unknown hen they hear, but because there are probably hens in the group that are wary of unseen turkeys calling in the distance,...a wariness that comes from having witnessed their gobblers getting clobbered in years past.

This phenomenon is also the logical explanation as to why we often call gobblers without hens later in the day.  The hens have left the gobblers to go lay their eggs, leaving gobblers that may not have experienced the unpleasantness of approaching distant calling to fend for themselves.  Having no educated hens to lead them away from the calling, they wander on in to either meet their demise,...or have a very educational experience in the need to avoid going to unseen hens in the future.

[ncturkey]

You are dead on. Great reply.

It is simple really. Some birds really like to gobble, some not as much. On pressured land those that really like to gobble get killed. Less gobbling comes from less birds less competition and mouthy strains being killed out.

This, plus add in the time of the breeding cycle - early, middle, end - and that will influence the gobbler's inclination to gobble.  Even a bird you patterned, and know to be mouthy, will probably keep quiet when he wakes up with a half dozen hens or so around him in the roost tree.  After the hens go to nest, then he will likely get mouthy again.

Turkeys hear other turkeys 365 days a year cluck and purr softly, and cutt and cackle wildly.  To essentially suggest a turkey would hear a string of yelps and think to himself "oh no, sounds like a predator that learned to mimic our vocalizations, I'm going the other way" is absurd.

I hunted a bird this morning that has been called in 4x and shot at once last Saturday.  I only used a wing to simulate 2 flydowns while I was 75 yards from him and then scratched in the leaves.  He lost his mind to all of that but still knew to fly the other way and carry on his business by himself.

I yelped at him once he flew down 150 yards away from me.  He gobbled 2x on the ground and that was it.

They wise up once the pressure gets on them and I think some are conditioned to disassociate themselves with calling.

I don't disagree birds will respond to pressure, just like a mature buck will change his habits.

But that same gobbler you mention, if he's been around enough years, has also been jumped, chased and run down by countless predators, countless of times, while he was on his way to his brood hen yelping, on his way to his flock mates kee-keeing, and on his way to mature hens yelping and cutting for mating. 

One bad day isn't going to change his behavior as this article suggests.  Everyday is a bad day for a turkey.  He's always today's special on every predator's breakfast, lunch and dinner menu.

[Cutt]

[[/quote]Good stuff right there, but you'll never convince all these "pet" turkey hunters of it. To them, the pet turkeys they are killing are "stupid".
[/quote]

Who's hunting pet turkeys? I know all my hunting is done on Public Land, and still don't beileve the last statement of the article. Not saying they don't gobble less, just don't give them that much credit to reason?