Editor’s Note: I first interviewed Matt Morrett of Pennsylvania when he won the World Turkey Calling Championship at the age of 16. He also won the Junior and Senior Grand National Turkey Calling contests and the World Friction Turkey Calling Championships five times. Today Morrett, who started hunting turkeys with his dad in 1976 at the age of 6, is the director of marketing for the Pennsylvania Game Commission. Here are some of Matt’s recollections on what turkeys can teach us.
In seminars, at shows, and whenever I meet the public, I’m often asked, “Matt, why do you take other calls when you hunt turkeys? You’ve won the World Turkey Calling Contest five times with a friction call.” Well, I don’t care how well a person calls. Each turkey call makes a somewhat different sound. On any morning, a gobbler may only gobble one type of turkey call. Just like you won’t go bass fishing with only one bass lure in your tackle box because you never know on what day the bass will prefer one lure, the same is true when you’re calling turkeys. I take slate calls, glass calls, aluminum friction calls, box calls, push button box calls, usually a paddle-style box call, and a wide variety of diaphragm calls with me when I’m hunting turkeys.
For instance, a glass friction call can be heard much farther away than a diaphragm call or a box call can. The glass call also has a different sound from a slate, a box, or a diaphragm call. When the leaves are on the trees, the glass call has the ability to pierce that foliage and tickle a turkey’s ear, often better than any other call. I use various calls to sound like several turkey hens. Just like people sound different when talking, turkey hens sound different too. Therefore, the more types of turkey calls you have, the better your chances are to sound like a hen that the ole gobbler wants to talk to or a flock of hens instead of just one hen.
One of the biggest mistakes that most turkey hunters make is to believe that the only call that will call a turkey is a mouth diaphragm call. If the truth were known, I believe more turkeys would be taken home to dinner by hunters who use box or push-button calls than any other calls made. Because of our new technology, call manufacturers can put the sound of a real live turkey in a box call, a push-button call, a slate call, a glass call, or some other type of new friction call that the turkey call manufacturer designs. With a diaphragm mouth call, you may have to spend years practicing to sound like a wild turkey with one. A hunter should use any call that will make a turkey gobble. So, if you’re going turkey hunting this spring, you can blow those mouthcalls all you want to, and don’t get me wrong. I also blow a mouth call, but don’t go into the woods without a vest full of friction calls.
Looking for more content? Check out our YouTube channel and watch “Why Hire a Teaching Guide” by John E. Phillips.
Check out John E. Phillips’ 12th book: “Turkeys: Today’s Tactics for Longbeards Tomorrow“
- hunting strategies with pros Will Primos, David Hale, Eddie Salter, Preston Pittman, Allen Jenkins, Terry Rohm, Paul Butski, Larry Norton and others.
- information about taking turkeys with .410 shotguns.
- box-call techniques.
- strategies for moving on turkeys.
- ways to hunt public-land gobblers.
- the differences in calling and hunting Eastern, Osceola and Western turkeys.
- the latest research on turkeys; and other information.
Click here to check out John’s 12th turkey book.
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
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
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
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
Tomorrow: Turkeys That Understand Hunters
You may also enjoy:
“Learning from Turkeys with Matt Morrett” Day 5: One of Matt Morrett’s Toughest Turkeys
“Learning from Turkeys with Matt Morrett” Day 1: Public Land’s High Pressured Turkeys
“Learning from Turkeys with Matt Morrett” Day 4: Turkeys That Understand Hunters
“Learning from Turkeys with Matt Morrett” Day 2: Late Season Public Land Turkeys
Turkey Tales from J. Wayne Fears Day 4: Getting the Texas Captain Cook Tom
Successfully Turkey Hunting Public Lands Day 1: Why Hunt Public Lands for Turkeys
