I call myself a Run And Gun turkey hunter, but if you’ve read a couple of my blogs about hunting turkey then you know I’m more of a Stop, Look, and Listen (SLL, for short) turkey hunter. An SLL turkey hunter is mobile, but not really moving fast. An SLL turkey hunter walks to areas that are known to hold turkeys, and he listens and he looks for turkeys. He looks and listens way more than he calls. When he is in woods that hold turkeys, he walks slowly, and he walks quietly. The whole time he is in turkey woods he is using his eyes and ears for hunting turkey.
A great tool for any turkey hunter to kill more turkey, whether his is a runner and gunner or an SLL’er, is a pair of binoculars. I know what you are thinking. “Binoculars for hunting turkey? Why do I need binoculars to hunt an animal that I am only going to take a shot at from 50 yards?” Well, there are more reasons to carry a pair of binoculars with you when you hunt turkey than there are reasons not to carry binoculars. Here are a few of them.
When hunting turkey, binoculars will allow you to see through thick brush much better than you ever can see with your naked eyes. I use binoculars to look through brush in a curve in the road to see if there are turkeys ahead before I round that curve walking down the middle of the road and spook them. Binoculars allow you to check field edges for gobblers who are loafing in the shade before you actually walk, or crawl to the edge of that field. Those shade loafers are turkeys that most of us never know are there because we don’t, or can’t, look 5 or 10 yards beyond a field edge into the woods. While we are on the subject of field hunting, binoculars allow you to distinguish if those birds you see in the field 400 yards away are buzzards, hen turkeys, gobblers, or just jakes. Binoculars allow us to sometimes see what that hung up turkey is doing when he is stuck at 80 yards and won’t come closer and they can allow you to see what has that turkey hung up. Binoculars also allow you to better see roosted turkeys in low light conditions so that you don’t bust up the whole flock of birds and ruin your hunt for the day after you bump a bird from the roost.
Most hunters do not carry binoculars when they are hunting turkey because of the extra pound of weight or because they think they’ll tear up their $1,000 deer or elk hunting binoculars. Those are valid concerns, but they are not well thought out. First of all, you don’t have to take your big, expensive pair of Swarovski binoculars with you when you are hunting turkey. A small pair of good binoculars can cost you a hundred or so dollars, and if you break or lose them, then so what? You are spending $40 – $60 for a box of 10 high dollar turkey shells that you likely won’t have at the end of the season, so why wouldn’t you spend a little money on a pair of binoculars that you can keep for several years or much longer. Secondly, that smaller pair of binoculars can fit snugly and securely in a pocket of your vest or very comfortably against your chest with a good bino strap.
So, if you want to kill more turkeys this spring, consider investing in a small pair of good binoculars. If having excellent eye sight is good enough for a turkey to beat you down in the turkey woods, then logic should tell you that a pair of binoculars will help to level the playing field when you are hunting turkey.