When you spend enough time in turkey camps, you learn that the best part isn’t always the hunting — it’s the people you meet along the way. Every now and then, you run across someone who's hungry to learn, and it reminds you why we love this sport so much.
On a recent trip, I had the chance to cross paths with a young hunter named Logan. What happened next turned into one of those moments that makes building and running turkey calls feel like a whole lot more than just business.
Story Time...
I went on a little adventure and ended up in a turkey camp with a few new people - one being this young man, Logan.
He had pulled his calls out and we were talking calls, and I noticed his friction call was an older plastic body call, and he was running it, and the sound was pretty rough.
But the one thing going for him is he had the mechanics down for running it as I watched his hands. I told the young man to "hold on one sec" and went to my truck.
Now if you know me, my truck is a walking turkey call shop with all the calls tucked away that I have stolen from my own shop!🦃I looked in that little pocket behind the driver's seat and there was a 1.75 Crystal and striker. I grabbed it and went back inside...
I handed it to Logan and said "run this and then run your plastic call"... He instantly could see the difference. I told him to take the call and use it so he would have something he could work with.
The next morning, we all met after the hunt and when he rolled up, he was quick to let me know he had killed his personal best turkey.
I walked over and look at that turkey's feet and there was a fine set of 1 1/2 spurs. I told him "It doesn't get much better than that!"
He told me he was calling to a turkey and all of a sudden, a turkey that had not gobbled slipped in strutting to him and it happened to be this old turkey with the knives on his legs.
It doesn't get much better than that in the turkey woods and the call-building world.
Glad I met this young fella by chance. Never know... He may have never yelped that old turkey up! Just glad I was there to live in the moment of it.
When we got ready to leave for home, he tried to give it back to me and it was one of my personal calls... I simply told him "I think that call was supposed to stay with him." 😉🦃
Stories like this are exactly why we hand-build every call here at Houndstooth Game Calls. There’s nothing better than knowing a call you built helped someone bring home a longbeard they’ll remember for the rest of their life.
If you’re just getting started—or you’ve been at it a while and want to fine-tune your calling—don’t underestimate the difference a good call can make. Sometimes, it’s the one little thing that turns the whole hunt around.
👉 Browse our full lineup of Friction Calls right here »
👉 Learn more about our Award Winning 1.75 Crystal Call »
👉 Read More Turkey Hunting Stories »
See y’all in the woods,
~ Lyle