I need a new slate call as I shattered mine. I want one that is just pure turkey. Plays easy but is a killer in the woods
What do y'all suggest for an absolute slate killer?
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Busters calls are very nice
Sooooo many choices.....
Cane creek reaper slate
Wynne persimmon if you can find one from around 2017-2018
Footballer persimmon slate
MAC Cherry slate
Dawkins slate in a plastic pot
Older Halloran slates
Jason Powell chestnut slate
Roger Parks gobbler slate
Paul Durham makes a nice one as well
Daddy Rat /Paul Hicks makes a good one too
Jimmy Schaffer/Oakridge calls
Blackstone walnut slate ......
Lots of very good slates out there other than these as well.
Clay Townsend I just picked up one up sounds really good
Buster Halford Persimmon pot, Red Slate
Cane Creek Walnut pot, Slate
Pat Strawser as well.
Lon Trice
Madhatter (Redbeard)
Sunrize, bill Lyman and Steve morgenstern make good ones to add to this list
No one can really tell you the best slate.. We can all make suggestions of who builds some nice pot calls... The decision of what's best is all up to you and what you want to hear in sounds / tones etc...
Everyone on here is right and Greg nailed it. There is just a sound that I am looking for and once I find it, it helps my confidence in running that call greatly. Not as prone to hold back on it at times when I need to get in it better. All of em are great call builders
All of the above. Any great call maker on here, throw in Cody, David Halloran, and others mentioned in these threads will all be players for you......good luck....
Chad Zutter, Brad and Caden Roberts
Primos Ol' Betsy
David Halloran Calls are a staple and so easy to get your hands on. No forum, facebook or instagram DM's, phone number searches, answering services etc; jump on the site, add it your cart and pay up. You'll have it in a few days. More callmakers should establish a website where a buyer can cart and purchase their basic call offerings. I understand the need for contact and correspondence to purchase custom and high end calls, but every callmaker has their basic most popular call that they make more of than any other.
For the price point give dead bird walking around
Moye Howard is a member here
Moyhow I believe is his username
Mac,Dustin Jones,Scooter Pegg, Stanley Wymbs these are just a few more to add to the list.
Several people say the get an older Halloran call but I have a newer one and can't imagine an older one sounding any better.
Chris
Quote from: hawkeye1958 on May 03, 2024, 08:05:49 AMSeveral people say the get an older Halloran call but I have a newer one and can't imagine an older one sounding any better.
Chris
I feel like most all cases of the whole "old vs new" call thing is the same as the "shoulda been here yesterday" fishing thing. I bet if David cranked out some new pots with his old burned rectangle stamp logo, nobody would be able to tell a difference lol.
I will say that ive encountered one glaring "older is better" in pot calls and that was the Primos Power Crystal. The strutting turkey logo power crystals vs the feather logo power crystals were significantly different. I have two of the strutting logos and have played countless feather logo's that aren't even close.
There are of course cases where old vs new does mean something; like when a company is bought out and manufacturing is relocated and done by others, etc. But I feel like callmakers who have been in the game for a long time like Halloran and Cody are making calls just as good today as they were 20 yrs ago.
I personally love my Nathan Taylor slates, but he makes calls that sound 'turkey' to me - I've listened to calls from very well regarded makers that have the wrong pitch for the turkeys I'm around, so soundfiles and surface (black/grey, red, green or purple slates) are important to get an ear for. For my 2 cents though, a cedar pot with a grey slate in it sounds like a turkey no matter who makes it.
Jimmy Schaffer slate over slate in a walnut pot would be my recommendation.
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I think slate is the one surface that most callmakers can make a fine one. A turkeys voice just seems to live in that rock. I had a piece of slate I picked up out of a creek in SC sitting on the porch outside this morning and just for chuckles me and the wife conditioned it and played it. Bet you could kill one with it. But with all that said, if I can only have one I'm going with my Buster Halford green slate in a persimmon pot. It's just flat full of feathers.
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Quote from: ColemantownHC on May 02, 2024, 02:50:55 PMDavid Halloran Calls are a staple and so easy to get your hands on. No forum, facebook or instagram DM's, phone number searches, answering services etc; jump on the site, add it your cart and pay up. You'll have it in a few days. More callmakers should establish a website where a buyer can cart and purchase their basic call offerings. I understand the need for contact and correspondence to purchase custom and high end calls, but every callmaker has their basic most popular call that they make more of than any other.
It's a production call. That's why it's always available. And that's not knocking it. He makes great calls. I've got a Metal Mouth that rarely leaves my vest. But no custom callmakers are producing anything at that rate. Best you can hope for would be something like SS making 15-20 short boxes and throwing them all up on the site at once, them selling out overnight.
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Quote from: ChesterCopperpot on May 04, 2024, 08:51:19 PMI think slate is the one surface that most callmakers can make a fine one. A turkeys voice just seems to live in that rock. I had a piece of slate I picked up out of a creek in SC sitting on the porch outside this morning and just for chuckles me and the wife conditioned it and played it. Bet you could kill one with it. But with all that said, if I can only have one I'm going with my Buster Halford green slate in a persimmon pot. It's just flat full of feathers.
Glad your back on Dave!
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I just purchased a Houndstooth slate call. It sounds pretty good to my ears. In the short time I have been able to try it out it seems pretty easy to run very similar to my Cody Woodsman and the price was quite reasonable. I ordered it on Monday and the mailman dropped it off yesterday. I had also ordered a Halloran Crystal Mistress on Monday which also arrived yesterday. I have left phone messages with a couple of custom call makers to try and purchase a call(s). Pardon my ignorance on this but is it best to try and communicate with them via facebook messages or keep trying the phone? I don't have a facebook account but I can create one if needed. Thanks and happy hunting all! Mike
Quote from: prkguy on May 05, 2024, 10:00:44 AMI just purchased a Houndstooth slate call. It sounds pretty good to my ears. In the short time I have been able to try it out it seems pretty easy to run very similar to my Cody Woodsman and the price was quite reasonable. I ordered it on Monday and the mailman dropped it off yesterday. I had also ordered a Halloran Crystal Mistress on Monday which also arrived yesterday. I have left phone messages with a couple of custom call makers to try and purchase a call(s). Pardon my ignorance on this but is it best to try and communicate with them via facebook messages or keep trying the phone? I don't have a facebook account but I can create one if needed. Thanks and happy hunting all! Mike
I think it's good either way but keep in mind that some of them still have a season open so it may take some time as most stop making calls while there season is still open.
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Or I could just plan on attending next years UNICOI. Is that conference held in Helen, Georgia every year?
I would look at john Sinclair custom calls, I really like the red slate he makes, my first was red slate over glass, he makes it over slate, copper, aluminum, also grey slate green slate, cal him and tell him what your looking for great guy to deal with.
Don't forget the Striker, in my opinion it's equally important as the pot, I had some pots that didn't sound good at all until a friend recommended a certain striker, it plays great on every pot call I have.
Lon Trice, John Sinclair, Wendall Rye and Mike Yingling are a few of my favorites
It amazes me that there was only one mention of Roger Parks gobbler slate call. It sounds so realistic and it's so versatile. You get 4 different strikers to handle all calling needs. So easy to run and sounds amazing. I personally went to Roger's house and I've never met a man that was so willing to show you how to call and has so much knowledge about gobblers and hunting and calling tactics. His trophy room is spectacular, I've never saw so many long beards in one place. I also have an old Cody world class signed by Bill that sounds really good also. Those are the only two slate calls that I own that talk Turkey, the sounds are so lifelike. Believe me I have a big tub of pot calls and those are the only two that make it into my vest.
Dawkins plastic
I will always go with my CODY Slate Call; my World Class has been retired to one of my Displays as I was gifted a SPEC 1 LEGEND!
*Someone here had some CODY calls posted recently, and I did notice a SPEC 1 in there.
MK M GOBL
Eddie Wynne persimmon slate
Sadler McGraw walnut slate
Partial to the consistency of the realistic sound coming from Gobbler Down Calls. I will also give a shout out to Bradley Humphrey who produced a Slate/Carbon Fiber call that is a killer.
I have several that are phenomenal.
Lonzo Bubinga Black Slate
Buster Persimmon Red Slate
Eddie Wynne Persimmon Slate
Paul Durham Osage Green Slate
All are absolutely full of turkey
Some will say Sneed, Halford, Dawkins, Lonzo, Cody and so on but I normally let the turkeys tell me what they like. There isn't a Holy Grail out there. As others have said, each of us has that hen in our heads that we are searching for in any pot. I'll tell you, I have killed more turkeys with and bought many more to end of the gun barrel with the Primos Ol Betsy slate in a plastic pot using a JLH Frogwood or other birch laminated striker. I would Love to get my hands on and play a Mike Battey slate, to see how they compare.
Battey you say,(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20250316/2d49eb40f355d70edc8d34bfeec6b766.jpg)
(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20250316/9fe79be618eadd42a32045ef8bb7ebbd.jpg)
Ricky Padgett has made some of the baddest slate calls in the country for a long time. Myself and I'm sure many Carolina boys have a persimmon slate over glass he made a batch of in 2016.... I'd call it criminal. I quit carrying it so much because it made other calls a waste if you wanted to get kills on them. There may not be one sound that always does it, but some calls simply have "it", that years of blood and feathers in many places can't deny
It will play too
Quote from: golfernash on March 16, 2025, 01:35:22 PMBattey you say,(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20250316/2d49eb40f355d70edc8d34bfeec6b766.jpg)
(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20250316/9fe79be618eadd42a32045ef8bb7ebbd.jpg)
Yep! I would love to play that just to see how it stacks up to the Betsy. I'm sure they are Very Similar
Quote from: bbcoach on March 16, 2025, 01:58:27 PMQuote from: golfernash on March 16, 2025, 01:35:22 PMBattey you say,(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20250316/2d49eb40f355d70edc8d34bfeec6b766.jpg)
(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20250316/9fe79be618eadd42a32045ef8bb7ebbd.jpg)
Yep! I would love to play that just to see how it stacks up to the Betsy. I'm sure they are Very Similar
Got my Battey prototype from the man himself hunting when I was a teenager...he was kind enough to gift it to me when he was working on his Primos/K&H pots. It's been used on more trickery than any other pot I have. (He also gave me an Alumislate a couple years later. Learned a lot from Mr. Battey)(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20250316/bc5a5a5c68f9454223c24a7bfc01cf5e.jpg)(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20250316/62abd88134e0e4547dcfd78f7a7156d3.jpg)
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Very cool
personally red slate ti my ear is just awesome....and buster makes a awesome red slate...but that's just me and the striker will play a huge role in that as well I like a good laminate like a frog wood or a canarywood personally and for me only JLH strikers....awesome guy but his strikers are even better