Photo courtesy of Steve Sorensen Although the key to a late-season gobbler is still the hen, she may not be looking for love and he may not be as desperate as he was earlier in the season.

We’re halfway through the spring gobbler season and if you’ve been hunting the same place every day or two, maybe you’ve been teaching gobblers how to avoid you. What should you do to fill that tag? You could try hunting a new place. Or you could change the way you’re talking to gobblers.

How can we call differently late in the season when the breeding is winding down, and turkeys are back in survival mode? There’s the key word — survival. Hunters never forget that we’re trying to kill a turkey, but sometimes we forget that the turkey is trying not to get killed. Let’s remember that survival motivates turkeys every day of the year.

In the fall, hunters use the “kee-kee” call to mimic the sound of turkeys regathering into a family flock. Turkeys are very vulnerable when alone, especially young ones, so young turkeys are programmed to regroup because safety in numbers is the prey animal’s key to survival. Gobblers never totally abandon that desire to be with other turkeys.

Early spring is also about survival, but for a brief period individual survival has taken a back seat to the survival of the species. That’s what motivates hens and gobblers to get together, so we start the season by capitalizing on that urge.

In the ideal early spring scenario, a gobbler announces his presence from a roost tree, we get near the tree, and we send out the soft sound of a hen in her tree waking up. She says, “Good morning. All is well. I’ll be flying down shortly but I can’t see the ground yet, so I’ll take a few minutes to powder my beak.” Yes, that’s a rough translation, but it’ll do.

Most hunters have made this sleepy “tree call” that tells gobblers the girl of their dreams (today’s dream anyway) is nearby. Then, once the gobbler flies down, we turn the volume knob up and pour heart and soul into calling that gobbler. That’s what the turkey hunting textbook says to do, and we hope to tie a tag on his leg by 7 a.m.

That works early in the season when Cupid’s arrows target hens and gobblers. Mid-to-late morning can also raise a hot gobbler that still cares about mating as he wanders in search of a willing and responsive hen. But in the late season, an aggressive, volumy approach to calling can show our impatience and desperation more than it does our calling skill.

Once breeding has insured the survival of the species, the turkey’s interest flips back to self-survival. By now most gobblers have encountered danger sometime during the breeding season, if not from a hunter, then from a fox, a coyote, a bobcat, or an airborne predator. Having been spooked and panicked while answering a hen’s invitation, they’re on high alert about individual safety. By mid-season, it’s no wonder your aggressive calls don’t get a gobbler’s RSVP.

That’s why it’s time to turn off the seductive voice of a hen inviting a gobbler to help her perpetuate the species, and turn on the subdued voice of a hen minding her own business, acting like everything is A-OK in the hen world.

Turkeys are back to that desire to be with other turkeys, so your job is no longer to convince that gobbler that you’re a lovesick hen. Your job now is to calm that gobbler, to keep him from worrying about becoming a turkey dinner. It’s time for the hunter to sound like a hen chit-chatting with another hen a few feet away. Soft clucks and contented purrs are the casual whispers and quiet murmurs of “flock talk.”

Whatever sounds you’ve heard hens make while feeding, do that. The gobbler, in his mind’s eye, will picture two or three hens. He’s still interested in feminine charms, but he’ll feel safer if she’s just telling anyone who will listen, “No danger over here. I’m just minding my business, feeding and preening and relaxing.”

What the gobbler hears is this, “I have food here. I’m safe, and I have everything I need.” To him, that translates, “She’s what I need, so I’ll drop by. She’ll be interested once she sees me.” Maybe he’ll gobble once or twice — or not at all, not wanting to attract attention until he sees the hens. So, be ready to click the safety off.

Now that next season’s poults are assured and this year’s sexual urge is somewhat sated, survival of the species has shifted to survival of the self. Call accordingly.

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When “The Everyday Hunter” isn’t hunting, he’s thinking about hunting, talking about hunting, dreaming about hunting, writing about hunting, or wishing he were hunting. If you want to tell Steve exactly where your favorite hunting spot is, contact him through his website, www.EverydayHunter.com. He writes for top outdoor magazines, and won the 2015, 2018 and 2023 national “Pinnacle Award” for outdoor writing.