What did you learn this year ?

[JMalin]

Just more experience reading the bird's attitudes.  Knowing when to move on a bird and doing so quickly and stealthily versus knowing when to stay patient in your setup.  Knowing where they want to be is vastly more important than skill in actual calling.

[g8rvet]

I learned a real cold January, followed by a real warm February, followed by a real cold March plays heck on gobbling in my neck of the woods. 

I also learned that having and plan A,B, C and D does not always work if there are few birds there.  A and B have accounted for 90% of my birds in the last 10 years, both for me and others with me, and they were empty this year. 

I learned that going as a guest on a permit where you only hear one bird gobble sucks - not because that meant I was not gonna shoot, but because I did not feel right making the decisions on what to do and I believe it cost us a bird.  He was scared to get too close and did not believe me when I told him the bird was hung up.  By the time he did, the bird was walking away and we could not get in front of him.  Should have moved 30-45 minutes earlier.

I learned that if I keep hunting turkeys, I will always have more to learn.  I had not been blanked in many years, but I was this year.  Hello, my name is Humble Pie - take a big bite.  It tastes like doo doo, but I think it is good for ya.

[bonasa]

Pre-season and in-season scouting is paramount as are permissions on private land with no hunting pressure. Its a good feeling knowing that you will be setting up in a known strut-zone where you have been seeing birds doing the dance for days or weeks before. Even for out of state trips on public land, a few days of scouting goes a long way especially for a no quota Osceola.

[JonD.]

I learned to be extra thankful for my dad and uncles for taking me hunting when I was younger, and to try to store up extra patience when I take a new young hunter. I took my 16 yr. old cousin on his first turkey hunts this year. A bull moose could not have made more racket. I tried to explain how well turkeys can see and hear, but he constantly talked out loud, coughed, moved around, stuck his bare hands out of the blind, practiced aiming his shotgun, you name it. I gave him an unused mouth call and one of my pot calls for him to take home and practice with. Emphasis on take home. I thought surely he knew to wait until we were out of the woods but he decided to start practicing right then while we were hunting. When none of this was going on the whole time we hunted he was staring at his phone, texting. I guess I'm just old school, and must be only person in the world that doesn't own a cell phone. Anyway, we were extremely fortunate to finally get a bird to answer us and start coming in after 4 days of hunting. We were in a blind and I whispered for him to be ready and he lays his phone down, picks up his gun and sticks it out of the blind bare hands and all and shoulders it. Needless to say we saw nothing. I know its going to come up for me to take him again.... but me and him are going to have a long talk first.

[grayfox]

That I still don't know nearly enough about turkey hunting.

[TRG3]

It was reinforced to me that a turkey will do what a turkey wants to do. There is no obstruction too big for a turkey to work around if he wants to do so...or too small to keep him from coming forward to you. It was reinforced to me that turkeys will respond to my calling based on the experiences that they have had in the situation which I'm trying to present. If he is hesitant to come my way based on what he is hearing or seeing, try to change it to something more to his liking. He is in control of what I'm trying to present. To paraphrase the infamous Zig Ziglar, "You can get the gobbler you are after if you can convince him that you are helping him get what he wants".

[High plains drifter]

I learned that when you see them on top of a hill strutting, and there is timber between you and the bird, and they disappear, they are probably with a hen, and moving away.So you move fast up that cut, and hopefully they are still in range when you reach the top.He will not come down hill to your position, so move up hill, if you don't see him for 15 minutes.

[Turkeyhunter]

I learned to place the back of the decoys where you think the gobbler will come from. I had a gobbler come in and turn away from the decoys. He went out and strutted but the decoys were then facing him and would not follow him. I called, he gobbled for 20 minutes but I could just sense he was waiting from them to come to him. Then he walked away. Time from first contact to his walk away was one hour.

[Hook hanger]

Idiots are getting thicker and thicker every year.  I also learned it was absolutely hilarious to watch 3 different groups of hunters surround a public land field using full strut decoys and watch the gobblers leave out of the field unscathed. It was absolutely amazing the risk these hunter's were putting themselves in using these decoys on heavily hunted public ground.

[LaLongbeard]

Something I learned years ago. Most people are causal turkey hunters and don't care to put in the time or effort to be good at it. Its the reason so many jump on whichever new fad promises quick results and minimum or no effort. I didn't think it was possible for people to get more lazy but I was wrong. Had a guy drive by right past me on a closed FS road while I was walking to a gobbler, I guess he couldn't hear the gobbler from the car lol he drove past me I walked a few hundred yards called up and shot the gobbler an here he came back up the trail. I was looking for a limb to hang the gobbler to take pics and he stopped an stared with that mouth breathing dumb look I've come to expect in Louisiana.
No effort at all to learn the Turkeys language or to even become somewhat turkey sounding with there calls. I had several people calling to the gobblers I was working and most sounded like a buzzard being choked lol. I don't understand why someone would spend so much time and money on guns and scopes and TSS and decoys and do not even know what a hen yelp is suppose to sound like. I guess the thing I'm reminded every year is to be thankful for the mouthbreathers if they ever accidentally learn to hunt there won't be anymore gobblers left there's so many of them.

[Cottonmouth]

I learned that a 300 lb woman that hasn't worked a day in her life will walk 5 miles to pick mushrooms.  And scream every time she finds one. Turkeys don't like that. None.

[JonD.]

No effort at all to learn the Turkeys language or to even become somewhat turkey sounding with there calls. I had several people calling to the gobblers I was working and most sounded like a buzzard being choked lol. I don't understand why someone would spend so much time and money on guns and scopes and TSS and decoys and do not even know what a hen yelp is suppose to sound like.

Mostly because all they see are so called "experts" on TV "hunting shows"(the only real hunting going on is for wallets) that sound that bad too, so they think that's the way they're supposed to sound LOL.

[squidd]

I learned that buying fancy 20-ga. shells, two red dots, multiple choke tubes, multiple calls, new decoys and a few other odds and ends didn't help bag a turkey; didn't even point a gun at a turkey in 16 outings. 

But, I did find a few new spots to hunt next season.

[g8rvet]

No effort at all to learn the Turkeys language or to even become somewhat turkey sounding with there calls. I had several people calling to the gobblers I was working and most sounded like a buzzard being choked lol. I don't understand why someone would spend so much time and money on guns and scopes and TSS and decoys and do not even know what a hen yelp is suppose to sound like.

Mostly because all they see are so called "experts" on TV "hunting shows"(the only real hunting going on is for wallets) that sound that bad too, so they think that's the way they're supposed to sound LOL.

My future son in law took up turkey hunting this year. He told me he was watching some of those shows and some You Tube channels.  I told him they are fine for getting all excited, but don't think you are learning anything about turkey hunting or calling.  So we had a crash course this past offseason.  Step 1, get a load and pattern it.  Check.  Step 2, learn how to cluck, purr and soft yelp.  Told him that would kill 90% of the birds he encounters.  Check.  Told him to scout and find some birds. Check.  Told him to be still and wait for the bird that wanted to come to have time to come in on turkey time, not our time.  Check.  He killed a bird on his second solo hunt.  He was like a young un at Christmas when he called me to tell me about his bird and to tell me how it went down.  He was sitting exactly in the spot I told him where I would start listening at his property and he never had to move.  Just sat down and let the bird come.  Perfect. 

[srmturk]

I keep reading this thread.  One of the better ones.  Lots of wisdom and advice woven throughout.  Experience is most often the best teacher I've found.  Can pick up tips for sure...but there's nothing like getting out there...cold/sweaty...ticks and bugs...stone silence from the birds...getting your butt kicked by a bird over and over.....and learning from it.  Threads like this can help fill in some knowledge gaps however.