Turkey hunting can be better in the fall

Although the fall turkey season started Oct. 1 and will continue all month, most hunters think about an April morning and a gobbling tom wjhen they think about hunting turkeys.

Ther'es no question that spring is an exciting time to hunt turkeys in Missouri, but some of the most enjoyable sport for these big game birds is right now during the fall season.

Fall turkey hunting has some attractions that many hunters prefer to the spring hunt. Some of these attractions include the fact that the turkey population is at a peak while most spring-born flocks are intact and their numbers are a lot higher than they will be after the birds have endured the ravages of winter and the hunting season. Also, many of the birds are the young-of-the-year, making them easier to call. Both hens and toms are legal in the fall and the birds move in large flocks, thus leaving more sign and noise as they move through the woods.

As we move into the month, cooler weather makes it seem more like hunting weather, unlike the first week of the spring season. In the fall, hunters have the entire day to hunt, unlike spring when the hunting stops at noon.

There is enough challenge in the fall to make it appealing. You have to do more hunting in the fall instead of just calling or listening for a gobbler to sound off. A hunter can cover miles of ground searching for a flock that they can scatter before calling them back with clucks, yelps or kee-kees.

The month-long season gives hunters plenty of time to bag the main course for a Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner. To make the most of a hunter's time in the turkey woods this fall, here are a couple of tips that might help bag a fall turkey.

Carry several calls to lure in fall birds. A diaphragm, box, glass or slate call, all will work, but on any given day one may perform better than the other. The successful hunter carries two or three types and offers the birds a second or third choice if they don't respond to the first one.

Use binoculars to scan ahead and to check on objects far away that might be turkeys. Search for fresh sign such as droppings, loose feathers, dusting areas and scratching in the leaves. Also search for favorite fall turkey foods including wild grapes, acorns, persimmons, corn, clover, berries and insects such as grasshoppers.

When searching for turkeys, use your ears as well as your eyes. Turkeys purr, cluck or kee-kee as they feed through the woods. They also make a lot of racket as they walk through the woods. Many times you will hear the birds before you see them.

When you spot a flock of turkeys a quick desision is necessary. A trick that has worked for me many times in the fall is circling ahead of them in the direction they are heading and waiting for the birds to work in range and ambush them. If they do spot you the best tatic is to rush at the birds and try to flush them so they fly in different directions then set up and try to call them back.

You might walk 25 to 75 yards in the direction that most of the birds flew, then set up against a tree as thick as your body and wait. When the birds start calling try to imitate the call they are using, but don't overcall.

Don't get discouraged if you don't bag a bird the first time out. Fall turkey hunting is not that easy. There will be days when you might walk miles and not see a bird. In time, however, you'll find turkeys and when you rush into a flock of birds and send them flying and then succeed in calling one of them back and into gun range on a crisp October day with the smell of fresh fallen leaves in the air, you will have experienced one of hunting sweetest pleasures.