Ohio Valley Outdoors Magazine Fall 2001

Practice What You Preach

I was sitting on an oak ridge in central Mississippi. It was a beautiful April morning and some green was already starting to show in the cover and trees. It was warm; much like the weather in early May in the Ohio Valley. I was on a dream hunt with world champion turkey caller and owner of Pittman Game Calls, Preston Pittman.

For those of you who have read or seen any of the Preston videos, you know that one of the things that Preston professes more than any other world champion turkey caller is to not call too much. While other champion callers might say it, Preston is truly a man who practices what he preaches.

Preston and I had come out onto a small open ridge with a deep ravine below us that led up to a pine flat approximately 500 to 600 yards away. In addition to calling, Preston was, running a video camera to try to get some footage. On this beautiful morning we were setup with me down on a small flat that led to a sharp drop-off and Preston approximately 40 to 50 yards behind me. We were doing some blind calling when all of a sudden the thunder of a Mississippi tom answered from about 1000 yards away. As we both got into position, Preston to call and run the camera, me to possibly harvest a longbeard, the gobbler came strutting into the pine flat some 500 yards away.

From the beginning, unlike most turkey hunters I have hunted with, even our blind calling was a series of light to moderate yelps with quite a bit of time in between each call. The tom started his strutting ritual in the pine flat and we started our long wait. As I sat there, the thought that crossed my mind was, with this deep ravine and small stream down below us, there was no way that tom was coming up here.

The next hour and forty five minutes seemed like eternity. The tom had moved down to the next level of the flat, which put us in a position where I could see the bird, but Preston could not. Long periods of time passed and the gobbler strutted and gobbled with no answer from Preston. Then the tom would come out of strut and start to leave. And Preston, with an inborn sense and without being able to see what the gobbler was doing, would yelp, yelp, yelp behind me and that was it.

The gobbler would immediately go into full strut again and perform the same ritual for 15 to 20 minutes. This happened 4 or 5 times during that morning and talk about someone having a sixth sense. It was beyond me to understand how Preston could be unable see this bird and still call at exactly the right time to keep the bird interested. If anyone has ever heard Preston do some soft purrs and clucks they know that he puts a whine into his calls that almost makes you want to go over the hill and sit on his lap yourself, but I didn’t.

After an hour and forty five minutes, the tom had it and quite frankly so had my legs that were folded up around my chest to help hold my gun. The bird at this point started down the steeper ravine and across a wildlife trail, walking away from our position. Again, without Preston ever having the opportunity to see this bird, he let loose with some yelps and excited hen talk, followed by some longer yelps. If body language means anything, the body language exhibited by that gobbler told the whole story. He turned and gave up, knowing that he just had to come to the top of that hill and take a look.

The gobbler walked down the steep hill, jumped across the stream, and came up over a steeper part of the hill gobbling as he came. All of a sudden there he was some 25 yards from where I was sitting with my gun up and, actually to my surprise, right into the sight pattern of my gun. I squeezed the trigger on my Remington 11-87, and put the gobbler down for the count. All of this without any video footage because Preston was totally oblivious of all the action I had seen.

During that whole hour and forty five minutes, Preston Pittman had practiced what he preaches. He called just enough to keep the bird interested and did not over-call. Patience paid off that day and very light calls and natural sounds brought this 22 pound 10 inch beard gobbler into my sights.

Talking with Preston later I asked how he knew what the bird was doing. He told me that the bird let him know what he was doing by his gobbles and by his lack of gobbling, by the amount of time that occurred in between the gobbles, and also in the spitting and drumming that Preston could hear him doing.

It is possible to learn a lot about turkey calling from an expert turkey caller even without him calling. I learned a lot that day in Mississippi. Ever since I learned to use a diaphragm call, I have to admit one of my problems is in not keeping my mouth shut. The lesson I learned that day from Preston is to let the turkey dictate what he wants instead of trying to force him into doing something that he is not going to do naturally. Preston also says that, if you have the opportunity to spend time in the woods, listen to the hens and to what they are saying. If the hens are feeding for a long period of time before they make any clucks or yelps, then do the same thing. A gobbler knows what the hens are doing and what the hens' tendencies are in a particular woods at a particular time, and that’s what he is going to respond to.