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"I'll vote for a pattern that hits the Bird from top to bottom. Vitals, broken wings and legs. A jelly head is not any more impressive or dead."

Anybody that would say anything that stupid about turkey hunting should post less and read more.

Tell me why…. If it works when they are flying. And had it do the same when they were walking.
I must be lucky. 😂

Did you ever kill a Turkey that didn’t have it’s feet on the ground?

And I’m sure it was an inadvertent omission that you left the first part of the quote out…..the real close qualifier. You wouldn’t have done that on purpose would you?I think you did. 🤣 Or perhaps you never got one in close???? You ever see what a center punch shotgun hit does to a Turkey at around 20 yards?

Yea, I’ll take stupid and consider the source.

I read this thread with interest. A couple thoughts…I’ve shot many thousands of ducks, geese, cranes, doves and quail in the last 50 plus years. I’ve also shot about 40 turkeys in the last 15 years that I started hunting them. One thing I’ve learned is that even though the tool you use is very similar for wing shooting and turkey shooting. The way you use them is very different. Anyone who asks “How could you possibly miss something the size of a turkey?” Probably hasn’t hunted turkeys. That 5 inch circle that represent his head, is a small target at 30 yards and beyond. The tighter the pattern the better! But don’t miss! I learned early that you point a shotgun and aim a rifle. With a turkey gun, you are aiming. I can appreciate anything that will help improve that aim.

Turkey hunters across the nation are in awe of your prowess. You really should write a book and make some videos so that your techniques can be shared with the rest of us amateurs (which I am definitely one of).

You are the only guy I've ever heard of that touts a full choke and #6 shot for doves and IC or Mod with 7.5s or 8s for turkeys, which I'm sure you will rationalize for us shortly. I guess you just "know better."

"Center punch shotgun hit a turkey at 20 yards..."

Please, stop.

Yes, center right under the neck. Feathers will be floating down around the body. If you ever get close to one you should try.

Anyway, you post a lot on shotguns, it shouldn’t be a surprise. Then again maybe not.

Addition: If you decide to quote, it would be appreciated if you don’t cherry pick. 🤣

Thinking on it, shot one close center back as she was running away. Same result. 8’s and she flopped a bit, but gave up.

Reason being, I shoot most of them in the fall, while hunting Grouse. So they are targets of chance. If I was going out specifically for Turkeys, then it would most likybe 5 or 6’s. Using 8’s or 7.5’s is why I don’t shoot unless they are close. And really, I’m no great Turkey hunter, but have found if I decide to hunt them specifically, then it mostly becomes an issue if spending enough time looking. And come evening they most often give away where you should look the next day. Or a woods walk will most often show were they are hanging around.

Around here they are not that hard to find. Although their numbers for some reason have taken a hit.

She! That explains a lot! Another thing I learned a long time ago was that when you shoot the hens, they stop laying eggs. We all have our opinions!

Im my neck of the woods, fall turkeys and spring gobblers are two different propositions altogether. It's hard not to notice. I've killed more birds in the fall, many while hunting something else, than I have in the spring while specifically hunting gobblers.

In the fall, the birds are flocked up and I've had them foraging right up to my deer stand while I'm wearing blaze orange. I've shuffled my feet to see what would happen and watched them (a little less than hastily) wander off, only to come right back a half hour later to the same spot. Completely indifferent to the fact that there was a hunter in blaze orange right among them. My first bird of the 2022-2023 season I took with buckshot and it was close enough that the buckshot entered and exited as a single hole. No shot spread at all. That's how close they will get. I don't know why that is except maybe they just don't associate the fall with being as dangerous when they are all flocked up. I dunno.

Spring birds aren't like that at all, at least that I've seen. By the time the season here in eastern Virginia starts, the hens have been mated and are off on their own. The toms are alone and tired of fighting. I spent this spring season trying to get a tom to come into my call and they just weren't keen on it. It took me to the third-to-last day of the season to get a two year old bird to come in to see what was making sounds, and even he got no closer than about 30-35 yards or so and then started to wander off before I shot him.

There's a reason people shoot birds at 40 yards. Because getting a tom to come that close in the spring is hard. It's not as hard in the fall. They are completely two different types of hunting.

That was a big part of my point above! Well stated!

Not to mention hens are quite a bit smaller and easier to kill than a big gobbler. I wouldn't want to body shoot one with 7.5 or 8 shot at close range regardless. I don't want my meat saturated with shot.

There are no absolutes. Two years ago a Bud and I worked the same spring Bird from opposite ends of a field. He killed it inside 30 yards.

I had a Coyote come in.

Here a lot of hunters go out and practice calling Birds before the season comes in . They wise up more than a few Birds.

I’m not shooting at 40. Even with the new TSS shot.
Little fun in it.

Well, thanks for the clarification about it being Fall hunting, and sometimes hens. I wonder if those two things have anything to do with their numbers taking a hit?

Don’t think so. We had a piece of ground that only a few of us hunted. There were at least 3 huge flocks..30 minimum.

If 10 Birds were killed there it was about the max.
It’s now down to small flocks of 10-15 Birds.

Battue, I don't think you are stupid. I think you are saying some stupid things. Probably based on inexperience in the turkey hunting world and your insistence that you know more than everyone else in this forum. I can tell you know about clays games and some about wingshooting. But you are not a turkey hunter. Occasionally a turkey killer, but that is a different thing entirely. If you're a turkey hunter you enjoy the hunt. You enjoy scouting, locating, calling and using woodsmanship to bring a bird close enough that you center the head and neck for clean quick kills. After that comes enjoying your harvest on the table. What you're talking about is akin to ground sluicing a covey of quail as a target of opportunity and then blowing the hell out of the meat. What's the point of that?

And btw, yes I have killed a few turkeys flying. When I was young and dumb a few times. Once when I wounded a gobbler. And I always took a hard target focus on their head and lead them so as to place my shot charge on the head and neck. Not the breast and body of the bird. I wanted to kill them instantly so I could recover the bird and not see it glide out of sight where it would hide in the thickest brush around. Also cracking a tooth on a piece of tungsten is to be avoided at all cost.

I I’m not a dedicated Turkey hunter. However, most of my Birds have been killed quickly or instantly. I can only think of one Bird that got away.

As far as the eating???? None have been destroyed to the point of throwing a breast away and have to crack a tooth.

Nor am I about to start aiming for heads, when I have a whole body of vitals to hit. I have a bigger target up close with a standing Deer and a scope. I don’t shoot heads there either.

Addition: And the Jelly Head phenomenon and LR killing of Turkeys is around a decade or little more recent way it’s done. That wasn’t always the case.

I can’t prove it, but when you start shooting Turkeys at 40 yards plus with a shotgun, my bet is there are as many crippled gobblers taken out of the flock as there are by us who shoot hens. Maybe that is why the numbers are down.
How many took an outlander pellet in the guts and walked away as a supposed miss. To die later. If you don’t think it happens, then you haven’t given your 40 yard patterns a critical look.

And there are more than a few who can’t see a Turkeys head at 40 yards vs aiming at it with a shotgun. Many couldn’t hit it consistently with a scoped rifle.

Forgive the typos, texting while bouncing along in a car.

I've been shooting turkeys in the head for over 40 years. Just killed a big gobbler two weeks ago. All pellets in the head and neck, not a single one in the meat. Just the way I like it.

At 40?

More like 25 this time but I've killed a pile of them at 40 and farther in the past. Me thinks you need to study some 40 and even 50 yard patterns with modern chokes and turkey loads if you think 40 isn't certain death with a well directed charge.

where i hunt turkeys they don't sit tight like a pheasant. So I'm still struggling to imagine jump shooting turkeys. Maybe there are places that the cover is just that thick that they'll hold tight? Where I hunt they like to run rather than hide and hold.