Author and son, Harrison, with gobblers taken along fresh fire breaks near an oak hammock. (Photo by Ian Nance)
March 26, 2025
By Ian Nance
The first couple hours of the morning hunt are seemingly the most critical. Yes, we love the classic scenario: locating a gobbler on the roost, a few well-timed yelps, and the bird strutting in full splendor into your set-up within two hours, but I lack the word count here to comprehensively explain what all can go wrong, especially with lock-jawed, swamp-dwelling Osceola gobblers.
Whatever the reasons for frustration, once the fog burns off, the winds increase, and the gobbling activity slacks, it’s up to the hunter to switch tactics, as gobblers will still be very killable as the day wears on, just a bit harder to locate as they wander away from the roost.
So, here are four tips for hunting late-morning gobblers.
1. Mentally Prepare To paraphrase the great Yogi Berra, turkey hunting is 90 percent mental; the other half is physical. Simply, you must want it. And, yes, once the birds have stopped gobbling, the day starts feeling like slog. So, mentally invest in and prepare for a full morning of hunting. Bring a comfortable seat. Pack snacks and drinks and fully charge the smartphone. Doing so will eliminate excuses to call it quits early. I like to play a little game of “Thirty More Minutes” until I can reach at least noon.
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2. Switch to a Louder Box Call As the morning progresses, the spring breezes typically increase, which will limit the range of most turkey calls. Couple this with birds often retreating into thicker pine stands and swamps, and the acoustic baffling effect of the trees further diminishes the effectiveness of mouth and slate calls. The high pitch sound of the trusty box call is about as close to a Gobble-on-Command device that anyone has dreamed up, and its ability to ratchet up the noise is what makes these a winner in the late-morning Florida woods.
3. Hunt Well-Traveled Paths and Clearings Scouting helps significantly here, and if you’ve found a fire break, logging road, or other dusty path with fresh tracks and strut marks, it’s a wise bet to camp on these trails. As the morning wears along and hens leave to nest, gobblers will reliably walk these searching for females, so long as hunting pressure hasn’t interfered with their habits. Likewise, timber clear-cuts and drying depression marshes pull birds throughout the day as they provide good feeding opportunities as their thoughts waver between love and food.
Related Strut marks and tracks provide clues on where to set up on late morning hunts. (Photo by Ian Nance) 4. Modified Running-N-Gunning Staying mobile does have its benefits, especially if the weather is windy or you’re hunting thicker areas where calls are limited. I’m not a fan of charging through the woods while hammering away on the box call, but try to tactically select probable areas like listed above, working one for 30 minutes to an hour, and then moving along. A map and a plan of attack helps when slipping quietly from one location to another.
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Courtesy of Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. Late morning turkey hunting has its own sets of challenges, but many veteran turkey hunters will tell you, this is one of the best times to kill a gobbler. Rely on scouting, be patient, and allow a longbeard to wander into your set-up after they’re less controlled by the whims of hens and the sunrise excitement of the early morning has passed.
