If I had a dime for every time someone asked me the best time to hunt turkeys during a season, I’d have a bucket full of dimes. Think about it for a minute, what are the factors that turkey hunters should be considering to best utilize their time when chasing the “Big Bird?”

Whether you and I’ve hunted wild turkeys for years or are planning your first turkey hunt ever, that’s an important question. Identifying the best times and places to hunt will only help you, as opening day of the 2024 wild turkey hunting season arrives on April 29, one-half hour before sunrise! And if you’re anything like me then that’s all you’ve been thinking about since the middle of February.

Few things in the hunting world are more exciting than a big gobbler coming to a call, and while it’s been said that turkey hunting has become a borderline obsession of mine, the answer to the question of when the best time to hunt turkeys perplexes me as much as it does anyone else. So, let’s dive into some of the factors we need to consider when coming up with an answer to this puzzle of a question.

If you’ve chased turkeys long enough, you’ve probably experience about every condition known to man in the springtime turkey woods. I can personally attest to this, as I begin my 45th year of hunting wild turkeys in more than 20 states around this great country of ours. I’ve turkey hunted in snow so heavy that I could barely see a decoy just 25 yards in front of me. I’ve also hunted on days that were so excessively warm that I was stripping down as I walked while wading through thick vegetation that limited my vision almost as much as the snow. So in my opinion, there’s no doubt that wild turkeys can be successfully called in and hunted in a myriad of conditions. But we need to go a little deeper than just that.

Due to their population explosion in just about every state, wild turkeys are now one of the most hunted species in North America. This statistic also means there are more hunters entering the turkey woods every year. I think we can all agree that the spring season is the best time to hunt wild turkeys. Fall is also great, but springtime can be magical. Whether you’re hunting close to home, or in some far-away place, spring turkey hunting is as exciting as it gets, especially when you have a long-bearded gobbler answering every call you make while closing the gap and HUNTING YOU! That’s an adrenaline rush better than anything money can buy, but we still want to narrow it down a little more. Like, what’s the best time during any given day, or what’s the best period during a season for having the best opportunity for success? All very tough questions with still no definitive answers.

Obviously, wild turkeys roost in trees at night, or on the ground in wooded areas if a hen is on a nest. Gobblers are active in the mornings while making their presence known, as the breeding season is driving them now, continuing right through the end of May. So hunting in those early morning hours is really the time that most hunters view as “the magic hour,” when they want to be in the woods as often as possible. A few things to remember about this, or any turkey hunting scenario, is to try and check the weather and plan accordingly. Turkeys are always more active on calm, clear days especially in the mornings. Bad weather, including wind and rain, will generally decrease activity, and strong winds will really diminish a hunter’s ability to hear wild turkeys even if they’re close. Watch the weather closely, but don’t let it stop you from getting after them, as plenty of gobblers are still on the lookout for hens, even on bad weather days.

Finally, if I could only pick a three-to-four day period to hunt in Western Mass., it would be the last four days of the second week of the season, while hunting during the mid-morning hours of every single day. Over the years, most of the successful turkey hunts I’ve been involved in have happened after 8:30 a.m. in the morning. My advice to anyone asking would be, pay more attention to the mid-morning hours, stay patient, and stay in the woods for as long as you can. Mid-morning hunts can be just as productive as those early morning hours, and the woods have usually emptied out by then, which means you’re hunting with little or no pressure from other hunters, and that’s never a bad thing!

Joe Judd is a lifelong hunter and sportsman. He is an outdoor writer, seminar speaker, member of the New England Outdoor Writers Association, and a 2019 inductee into the N.E. Turkey Hunting Hall of Fame. Joe is also on the Quaker Boy Game Calls and Bass Pro Shops/Cabela’s Pro-Staff. He can be reached at jjontheridge@comcast.net