Editor’s Note: Calvin Perryman from Troy, Alabama, has hunted many hardwood bottoms and upland pine stands for 25 years for gobblers, primarily on family lands in the Black Belt in Wilcox, Dallas and Butler counties in south Alabama. Much of south Alabama never has had a closed season for turkey hunting. Even during the Great Depression of the 1930s, turkeys were revered there. Many large landowners protected their turkey flocks, so that they could hunt them in the spring and the fall. Also, that section of the U.S. had quality habitat for turkeys. Today many of the landowners around where Perryman lives and hunts do intensive predator control, which positively impacts turkeys, their eggs and their poults. That’s why hunters around this place are so effective in taking turkeys.

“In 2017, I decided to try a new gun, a Franchi Affinity 20 gauge 3 inch Magnum shotgun and shoot hand-loaded TSS – Tungsten Super Shot shotgun shells with #9 shot,” Calvin Perryman reports. “TSS is a composite of tungsten and another alloy that makes the shot heavier than lead. It’s 30-percent heavier than Hevi-Shot. This shot allows you to shoot a smaller-size shot and still deliver the punch that you get from a large-size shot.”

“The first turkey I took with this gun was a pine plantation turkey. When the gobbler was at 30 yards, I squeezed the trigger, and he went down just as quickly as if I had shot him with a 3-1/2 inch Magnum.” 

“I use an Indian Creek choke in my barrel. This 20 gauge is a much-lighter gun to carry, and it’s easy to handle in the woods. Using the shells that I do, I can take turkeys at the same range I was taking birds with my 12 gauge 3-1/2 inch magnum. I use Hodgdon powder, and I’m loading with 1-5/8 ounces of #9 shot. When I pattern my gun at 40 yards, I’ll put 315 pellets in a 10-inch circle. You don’t have to use a big shot to kill a turkey, especially if you have a dense pattern.”

One morning a tom gobbled early to an owl and then didn’t say another word. But Perryman reports, “I could hear him drumming. I make my own diaphragm calls, and I had put a ghost cut in one of the diaphragms.”

The turkey walked through a bottom to Perryman’s left. Perryman slid around the tree trunk to get in position to take the shot. He could hear the turkey drumming in the leaves, although he couldn’t see him, and then the tom drummed behind a big tree right in front of Perryman.

“When the bird came over the little rise, I aimed my 20 gauge at his head, and the gobbler went down,” Perryman recalls. “Taking that second turkey with my 20 gauge helped me build my confidence and gave me a lot of satisfaction in the gun and the shells I was shooting. I know that hand-loading a shotgun shell takes quite a bit of time. However, I gained a lot of confidence in the shells I’d hand-loaded, the power of the 20 gauge and the knock-down power of those #9 TSS shots.” 

Tomorrow: Locate Turkeys Without Scouting

Expert Guidebooks on Turkey Hunting: Best Sellers

Turkey Hunting Tactics
This turkey hunting audiobook has entertaining chapters like: “How to Miss a Turkey”, “Hunting with a Guide”, and “The Turkey and the New York Lady”.

You’ll learn about all the subspecies of turkey across North America, how to use a turkey call, how to scout before turkey season, how to find a turkey to hunt, and what hunting gear you’ll need to put the odds in your favor to take a wily gobbler.

VERSIONS: AUDIBLE, KINDLE & PRINT

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How to Hunt Turkeys with World Champion Preston Pittman
You easily can take a turkey if you don’t make any mistakes, but you have to know what the deadly sins of turkey hunting are to keep you from making those mistakes. If you understand how to hunt a turkey, you’re far more likely to take a gobbler than if you just know how to call a turkey.

Of course, calling is important, and if you want to learn to call a turkey, Preston Pittman will teach you how to call turkeys with box calls, friction calls, diaphragm calls, and other turkey sounds.

You’ll also learn why Preston Pittman once put turkey manure all over his body to kill a tough tom.

When you have turkeys that strut and drum in the middle of a field, when you know there’s no way to get close enough to get a shot, Pittman will show you some weird tactics that have worked for him to help you hunt tough ole toms.

But the main thing you’ll learn in this book is how to become the turkey.

Using what he’s learned while hunting wild turkeys, he’s also become a master woodsman who can take most game, regardless of where he hunts. To learn more secrets about how to be a turkey hunter from one of the world champions of the sport, this turkey-hunting book with Preston Pittman is a must.

VERSIONS: AUDIBLE, KINDLE & PRINT

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The Turkey Hunting Guides’ Bible
The quickest way to learn how to turkey hunt successfully is to either hunt with a turkey hunter with years of experience or a turkey-hunting guide. These two types of turkey hunters have solved most of the problems turkey hunters ever will face. 

Just as one size of shoes won’t fit every person, one style of turkey hunting doesn’t fit each hunter.  Each turkey-hunting guide interviewed for this book has his own style of calling, hunting, and outsmarting turkeys.  

While listening to this book, make a list of the new information you’ve learned, take that list with you during turkey season, and try some of the new tactics. Then you’ll become a more versatile turkey hunter and prove the wisdom from The Turkey Hunting Guides’ Bible.   

VERSIONS: AUDIBLE, KINDLE & PRINT

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Outdoor Life’s Complete Turkey Hunting (2nd Edition)
This Audible book will help you learn how to call turkeys with two of the nation’s best, longtime and well-known turkey callers, Rob Keck, formerly with the National Wild Turkey Federation, and Lovett Williams, a wildlife biologist who recorded wild turkeys giving the calls that you’ll learn how to make on various types of turkey callers.

VERSIONS: AUDIBLE & KINDLE