Welcome!
My general suggestions.
Use a 3" gun with a good extra full choke, Winchester Supreme #5' s or 6' s. If you get decoys Feather Flex seems to be the most popular. My Carry Lite' s are very realistic but not as portable as the FF' s.
Try a box call for beginning. Maybe a Lynch Foolproof. If possible, buy a slate type call like a K&H Old Yeller and learn it too. It pays to have more than one sound. If you want to try mouth calls, buy a double reed of some type and start trying.
Use full camo, the turkey' s have sharp eyesight. Buy the tape " So You Want To Be A Turkey Hunter" and watch it several times before next spring. Visit here often and just add turkeys!
P.S. A good fanny pack or turkey vest makes the hunt much more pleasant. The cushions and pockets on the turkey vests make them real handy.
Have an interest
Anyway let me just cover a couple of important points I believe will help in your beginning stages of turkey hunting.California as you well know has a lot of birds but the major portion of our overall population inhabit private lands.To this end its up to you to secure a starting place to have a real legit spot to hunt turks in.Having never hunted gobblers before tells me it would be a good idea to try and set-up a hunt with one of your buddies first who has, or try booking a guide service to get a grip on how its done.Videos are nice but can give you a fasle sense of reality on how easy it looks on tape.Getting back to my first point to much emphasis is put on equipment nowadays and not enough on your preseason work such as locating huntable populations of birds and learning the overall terrain you intend to hunt.Obviously good camo,calls,and all this other stuff are necessary but being able to sit still especially when the birds are close is more important.Remember this,you can be the most well equipped hunter in the woods but it wont do you a lick of good if the birds aren' t there.Do your preseason work now and not wait till spring season gets here as so many do.Find the birds,periodically check on there movements,try and locate there roost,and as our terrain starts to turn green again with the coming of spring everything will fall into place.Good luck and stay here with us at bbs because there are alot of helpful folk here who enjoy huntin turks!!
