How are you doing turkey hunters? In your turkey hunting journey, I have presented a series of best turkey calls for beginners with the help of this article. Along with our best picks, this whole piece of information is also equipped by the hunter call of the wild beginner's guide. I can understand that it’s a bit difficult task to choose your first range of turkey calls as you have to consider many factors along with the money that your pocket allows. So, read through the whole content and find a way to choose one of the best turkey calls.
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Top 6 Best Turkey Calls For Beginners
Go through a list of mine best picked six best turkey calls that pass all results on ideal turkey call for a beginner.
1 - Woodhaven Scott Ellis Energy Signature Series Diaphragm Turkey Call
About The Product
At first, we are going to present an energetic diaphragm turkey call by Woodhaven Custom Calls. The call is specially made to exhibit energy in the form of calling of an old lady hen by producing some sharp yelps and cuts. You can make great calling sounds by creating cackles, clucking purrs, and cutting sounds. The model is named as 3.0 reed “V” or Vyper cut. Woodhaven Custom Calls have been a maker of differentiated sounding calls from years.
Why Buy This Product
The great thing about this mouth call is that even novice hunters can easily use these calls after some learning practice. You can modify according to high or low volume. The ‘V’ cut is made to make call raspier. Those who are serious about mouth calling can consider this buying as a best diaphragm turkey call. A hunter has explained his experience that he has been able to kill five gobblers in a day using this very mouth call. Even shy gobblers also get attracted to this hen call consisting of raspy yelps, cuts, and purrs.
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2 - Primos Hunting 272 Friction Call, Turkey, Starter Pack
It is kind of an excellent beginner turkey calls pack that consists of different kinds of calls. The package contains a mouth call with storage box, a double-sided box call, a slim striker with bat, a slate call and a mouth call conditioning kit. Even advanced hunters are also getting impressed with this high-quality performance turkey call kit. The weight of the package is almost nil to carry in long distances.
Why Buy This Product
If you are also one of the hunters who hook up twice or thrice when turkey season opens up, then this may be the perfect beginning for you. You will be able to produce realistic sounds like turkeys. With a decent practice, you will be able to produce sharp, raspy, and realistic sounds. Each one has its specific advantage to be used by a beginner. The budget-friendly price with a quality feature also appeals most of the buyers to consider this option.
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3 - Primos Hunting PS222 The Gobbler-Turkey Shaker
About The Product
Here Primos Hunting presents a loud shaker call in black color. The call is modifiable by one-handed or two-handed. An additional silencer cap on the bottom of call is situated to eliminate unnecessary sounds while moving in the woods. For a beginner, this shaker call is straightforward to use and loud. One handed operation of call is for Jake gobbling, and the two-handed process is for mature gobbling. Even with the cap and rubber, it is still easy to operate.
Why Buy This Product
Primos have built them specifically for challenging turkeys that are hard to call in. Hunters can grab the attention of turkey with the sounds produced by this call, which is the ultimate aim for investing in any call. Use your one hand for male or Jake gobbling and two hands shaking for adult gobbling sounds depending upon the situation of your hunt. The sounds are also realistic to be noticeable. For fun, you can use it as an adult toy. Lolz!
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4 - FOXPRO Osage Slate Hickory Osage Slate Pot Turkey Call with Hickory Striker
About The Product
FoxPro has presented a slate turkey call with a Diamondwood striker. An eye catchy laser etched design with sound ports are built on the back of a call. It is called as a burnt osage pot call. The striker can produce a variety of hen turkey sound variations. This call is explicitly made in the USA and made a great addition to serious turkey hunter’s calling gear list. The overall design is stunning with attractive woodwork.
Why Buy This Product
Do not go by the design of the striker. It is made to be easily used with the striker. It is expensive, but it offers worth quality with different sounds. You will be successfully able to produce sounds like soft purrs, putts, tree yelps, clucks as well as loud yelps to locate shock gobbling turkeys. The sound ports are made at the back of the call to increase volume and sound projection. However, the striker is better enough to use with slate, but hunters are even able to mix it different strikers for producing high-quality realistic sounds.
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5 - Lynch World Champion Turkey Box Call
About The Product
Lynch has launched this turkey box call for 75 years and is continuing to be the favorite call of most hunters. It is nicely structured with two-sided uses where you can utilize one side for producing hen sounds and another side for gobbler sounds. They have used mahogany and walnut straight-grain wood to reproduce realistic sharp sounds and is built specifically in the USA by turkey hunters themselves. Well, the chalk is not provided with it. You can buy one if you like to.
Why Buy This Product
The brand presence from a long time itself talks of the authenticity of calls they made. Not only for beginners but advanced hunters like this call significantly because of its real performance. It can produce various turkey sounds, including clucks and yelps very ideally in loud and clean pitches. After investing in chalk, it will be able to give a much precise performance. Thus, if you are either a serious turkey hunter or a novice who wants to know how to use a turkey box call, then this may prove to be the best option to start with.
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6 - Hunters Specialties H.S. Strut Hammerin Crow Turkey Locator Call
About The Product
H.S. Strut has built a turkey locator crow call that can reproduce various sounds of a crow such as gathering, distress cries, fighting as well as coming here calls. This weather-resistant call is made up of plastic material that is proven in the field. The type of sounds that it produces is raspy and reed. With some practice and customization on the style of calling, you can easily make real crow sounds.
Why Buy This Product
It is a fact that you will encounter some difficulties using it at initial circumstances. But after changing the style of calling, you will catch the way and good to go to produce realistic crow sounds that are appealing to turkeys. The amazing part is that you will have fun making voices with this crow locator call. At the same time, this small call can produce loud, raspy, and realistic sounds after you have learned how to use them.
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Look For The Following Before Buying Turkey Hunting Calls
As you already know that turkey hunting sport is almost as popular as whitetail hunting. So, there arises a strong need to develop your turkey hunting calls gear list besides other necessities. Because of that, you need to look for the following main points before buying a turkey call.
Sound
Learning and practicing calling is the key to success. It is a fact that different turkey calls of the same brand can produce varieties of tones in lower or higher pitches depending upon the style of your calling. A request is said to be better if it can provide most of the turkey voices with modifications of low and high pitches in a raspy and sharp manner.
Raspiness is a sort of vibration in calling turkeys that looks so realistic to the ears of gobblers. Overall, I must say that you should buy a call that reproduces realistic turkey sounds. You should also be able to mix the sounds like mixing cutts with yelps and then gobble etc.
Comfort Of Use
Beginners always look for calls that are easy to use. This is the reason they ignore diaphragm calls most of the time to avoid the practice. Even every type of call needs a prior practice session. The difference lies in the variety of calls where diaphragm needs a little bit more practice as compared to others. And, after practicing these calls, the results are much more effective. Thus, avoiding the practice is not a thing with any type of call, may it be a diaphragm call or a locator call. All you need is a good practice to get better results. Better results lead to comfort of using the calls.
However, you cannot rely on one type of call. Talk to local turkey hunters of different areas or listen carefully about the turkey voices, then you will be able to select the calls in a much better way than before. It also makes you confident about using different types of calls at one time with an ease of use. Well, for a beginning, you can choose one or two suitable calls.
Maintenance
Maintenance is necessary for everything, and so does the calls. But the ones that require instant maintenance are also annoying to the turkey hunters. As it takes a lot of time to maintain turkey calls, it is advised to choose those calls that require less frequent maintenance. I am referring here to those turkey calls that rank high in quality and material construction. You should also consider buying additional maintenance tools. They help keep your calls well maintained to sustain for a longer period.
Calling Style
I have mentioned below best turkey mouth call, locator calls, slate calls, box calls, and pot calls. They all have a different style of calling. As the name suggests, mouth calls are operated by mouth, box calls with the help of hands, pot calls with the help of strikers, etc. And, the different styles are designed for different purposes and for producing different pitches of sounds. For instance, box calls can make sounds louder as compared to locator calls. But locator calls are also better in producing sharp sounds.
So, we cannot say that a particular type of call is better than others. Each of them has its advantages over the other. My advice is either to look for a package of different calls so that you could be able to get a variety in one package or to individually go for different suitable calls according to your budget, preference and comparative ease of use.
Movement
Along with various styles, turkey calls also require different movements. Beginners go for those calls that require fewer movements while moving in the woods. Here mouth calls come to the advantage as they avoid using hands and you can easily use guns. Turkeys are smart, and once they sensed danger, you are going to miss that hunt. On the other hand, box calls are easy to master and require fewer hand movements.
So, you should consider buying those calls that will create less disturbance in your other turkey hunting activities.This factor is especially kept in mind while selecting the best turkey calls with regards to the beginner's point of view.
Guide to use turkey calls in a more effective manner
Given below are some ideas on using diaphragm turkey calls and box turkey calls in a better way to get desired results. To have a long life of box calls, chalks are highly recommended to use. This information is also provided and will prove to be very helpful.
Using A Diaphragm/Mouth Turkey Call?
Here I have listed some tips to use mouth calls efficiently. Give them a read to have an idea and avoid misleading conclusions about diaphragm turkey calls.
How To Use A Box Turkey Call In A Better Way?
Box calls are made up of premium quality wood depending upon the brand you buy. The sound is produced by scraping the paddle bottom against the side panel’s lip and the hollow chamber in a narrow place.
Yelp
To make this sound with a box call, apply slight pressure on the paddle or lip while sliding across the lip of box’s side panel. Hold the box in your left hand with your thumb pressed on the base of the paddle and right hand should be used to slide the paddle back and forth. Vary the friction to produce various sounds of yelping.
Purr
This is a soft, slight and scratchy sound which can be made by the sliding panel against the lip of the box call. The process is the same as yelp, but the sound is slightly light. Also, follow the purr after a cluck.
Cluck
The cluck is a type of single sound. The procedure of holding the box is identical as I mentioned above. Just use your left hand to slightly, hit against the paddle’s other end and slide it back over the box.
Cutt
Cutting sound reveals the exciting mood of a turkey. So, use the box call to make cutt sound to excite the gobbler. Hit the paddle with the box and make swinging movements. Holding the paddle tightly is not ideal here.
Gobble and Cackle
To make turkey’s cackle, hold the device vertically, and shake it with speed. After shaking, it will produce a clattering sound. Whereas, stirring it with a light hand and slowly, the resulting sound will be turkey’s gobble.
As you read through my list of best calls, you will encounter that I have mentioned using the chalk. Here is the reason why to use it.
Maintenance Tips For Turkey Calls
It is very essential to maintain turkey calls. This enhances the lifespan of a call along with giving best results. There are many methods which should not be adopted to maintain a call. The methods may further worsen the response and will lead you in no way. So, here are some maintenance tips for different types of calls to take a look at.
Using Chalk On The Box Call
First of all, do not think of oil-based options to fine-tune your box call. It is much better to tune it with chalk where carpenter’s chalk does a great job. The chalk is used when you notice that the call is sounding somewhat off-key. It provides the friction that the call usually should have. The important thing is to keep them dry in your vest as well.
As you are aware that turkey pot calls are made up of glass, slate, crystal, or aluminum. Specifically for crystal or glass pot call, solely use coarse grit sandpaper like of 60-grit. And, for aluminum or slate pot call, the sand grit paper is 220 grit coarse.
⮚ Crisscross sanding is preferred while sanding hard surfaces such as crystal or glass.
⮚ Sand with grain only in case you are sanding soft surfaces. On aluminum or slate, you can use fine sandpaper or a scuff pad.
⮚ Hold the pot call kindly by the rim only. It also ensures maintaining the maximum volume of the call.
⮚ Maintain greater tilt with the peg. It will help to ensure the coarser sound.
⮚ Hold the pot call close to the edge to have a higher pitch.
Helpful Maintenance Tips For Turkey Pot Calls
I have managed to gather some useful tips on how to use pot calls and how to maintain their efficiency level for a long time. You can use pot calls to produce different sounds ranging from yelping, cutting to cackling, etc.
- To make yelps, make circles measuring ½” to 1” upon the surface. You can make a ‘J’ shape also, as advised by most of the hunters.
- The purring sound can be created by pulling the peg towards you along with making a half circle in light pressure.
- lucking sound is almost similar to purring. You have to remove the peg about 1/8” to 1” towards you in a light pressure.
- The next is cutting or crackling sound. Simply pull the peg towards you by ¼” to 3/8”.
- The key is to apply accurate and more pressure on the peg.
So, this is how to use a slate turkey call. Pot calls are also known as slate turkey calls and comprise of striking surface, with an attached hollow pot. The holes are also made underneath the sounding surface to create sound resonance with the inner chamber.
Maintenance Of Turkey Mouth Calls
+ Keep turkey mouth call away from direct sunlight or heat.
+ Serious turkey hunters suggest putting these mouth calls in the refrigerator when not in use. Or, place them in a box or bag while you are using.
+ Let the different reeds stick together to produce different sounds. In this way, all multi-reed calls can be tuned.
Common Turkey Locator Calls Used By Every Turkey Hunter
As the name itself signifies, locator calls are used to determine the location of turkeys. Hunters keep a lot of turkey locator calls in their vests with each having their significance. Given below are different types of turkey locator calls that are commonly used by turkey hunters.
Owl
Owl locator call is the most popular call used by hunters. Hunters choose a specific time for calling with owl locator calls. For instance, they call it in the early morning when the birds are on the roost, which allows the hunters to slip into position before their fly down time. The best owl call for turkey hunting sounds like “Who-cooks-for-you, who-cooks-for-you-all.”
Crow
It is the best alternative for owl locator calls. Generally, these calls are used at dawn and dusk to get the birds to gobble. You can also use them on different day timings to hear shock gobbling toms.
Duck
Although it is not a frequently used call by hunters, a loud duck call can do a great job on any given day. Goose tubes, coyote howlers and truck doors are also standard calls among these duck calls.
Conclusion
Hopefully, the informative on the six best turkey calls for beginners hit the mind of beginners and clears out all their confusion with regards to using them and making a rational decision before buying these calls. All calls require an initial practice so you cannot ignore that fact wholly. The thing is to make an investment in quality product and practice consistent learning of producing sounds from that particular call.