# Turkey decoys - are the cheap ones any good at all?



## Jeresss (Oct 16, 2019)

Hi.

I've only been turkey hunting once, so forgive what may be a stupid question. Turkey decoys seem to run the gamut from cheap to ohmygod expensive. I'm curious if the cheap ones are effective, or should I just save up for the pricier ones? I found good review url for this topic. By the way, the turkeys present at the lease are Rios, not Easterns.

Thanks


----------



## Lone_Hunter (Oct 25, 2017)

Define cheap? I've one hen by Primo's i've been carting around with mixed results. I have had another hen come in and feed around my decoy. I've also had a tom hang up on the limb instead of flying down. He could see the decoy, and hear me calling, and was waiting for the hen to come to him. He eventually lost interest and flew down opposite of where i, and my decoy was. I don't think decoy's are the end all, be all, and you probably shouldn't rely on them. I think there is a time to use a decoy, and a time not to.


----------



## taxidermist (Sep 11, 2007)

Lone Hunter has a great point! When the Toms are strutting and gobbling, they are calling the Hens to them. I believe decoys are great if used at the proper time. They can pull a lone Tom in if he's cruising around looking for hens after having been run out of the flock. Most the time that in the late morning/afternoon.


My best luck has been knowing where they roost and sit in the path they are coming back to roost on and ambush them. I'll usually place one hen decoy out, and keep quiet. I wont call at all, if I do, it's a soft purr/putt a couple times every 30 minutes. Just to let them know something is in the area. 


I have a couple "stuffers" I made and they work great. Nothing like the real thing.


----------



## Gilmoregirl (May 9, 2017)

When I first started out I had no idea what I was doing. Bought a cheap primos and another foam one.. the primos was okay but didnt hold its shape. Foam was garbage. Right there was about 50. If I were you I'd just fork out the extra and get you avian x. They blow up fast and pack down fairly well. I have spent a decent amount on decoys. (Avian x full strutter, half jake, 2 hens.) but more often than not I feel its better to have none. Or least get you a single hen. Very situational again and depends on so many factors. I think the odds stack in your favor with less out there. spent a few seasons empty handed because I was more worried about decoys and my setup. From my experience tom ain't coming to you from where you first heard him and he is expecting you to come to him.


----------



## High_Country (Apr 29, 2019)

I purchased some RedHead collapsible decoys for the spring hunt this year. I don't recall the exact price, somewhere around 30 or 40 I think. Speaking to Lone_Hunters point, I never used them nor did I need to. There were Turks all over the place. It was just a matter of finding a nice big juicy tom.


----------



## Jedidiah (Oct 10, 2014)

There's almost no Easterns in Utah, or none at all. In the early spring calling toms into decoys is usually about pissing them off, so setting up a jake and hen and then gobbling and purring is a good strategy. Switch to just a hen or a couple hens later in the general season. In the fall you find a landowner who wants turkeys killed, find the roosting sites nearest to their fields and set up in cover at the edge of the field. I've seen the tom and his entourage get huffy with a jake decoy in the fall (and seen birds in the fall with dangling spurs) but I think it's more about being in their flight lane and maybe putting out some hens to make it look like there is good feed there. A lot of guys complain about the fall hunt being on private land but I've sat at the edge of a field down from a draw full of tall trees and had the morning just come alive with dozens of birds flapping down to come eat the alfalfa.

+1 on the Avian X, those are the ones I have too.


----------



## tshuman01 (Jun 23, 2018)

I have a primos Jake & Hen as well as a hen avian x. Avian X is by far better quality, but I hear that the Dave Smith ones are the real deal. I have to stuff a kids football in sideways on the Jake for it to hold its shape in the field.

In the spring I called a tom into my decoys and it started going at it with the primos Jake then headed down to the avian x hen before. If you go primos buy some spray paint and do some personal mods... the colors are not right for Utah birds.


----------



## Jedidiah (Oct 10, 2014)

Easterns are a really common decoy because so much turkey hunting outside Utah is Eastern hunting. We had this pretty fast population growth in turkey here in the last 10 years or so, arguably in the last 20 but they're almost all Merriams and Rios. Rios tend to be down south and Merriams in the north but that isn't really strictly always the case.

Anyway the thing is those Eastern decoys are not going to work well for Rios or Merriams because they lack the inner lighter ring of feathers on the fan that both Merriams and Rios have, and other general coloration differences. I use Rio decoys in the south but I feel like I could get away with using them for Merriams too, haven't really tried it though.


----------

