I live and hunt in Southwestern Wisconsin, which is pretty much the turkey mecca, it is where they were first reintroduced in the late 70's and is where they have made their home since then and are extremely abundant. I hunted second period, 3rd period and Last Saturday and Sunday. Second period was a total bust, not a single gobble heard after flydown time and I put in a good 30 hours in 3 days. Several spots private and public, I never had even an incling of an opportunity. Period three was my brothers season. Had birds right off the roost within 50 yards, never saw them and they gobbled to us for a good 2 hours and slowly made their way away from us. Came back later in the morning and made it within a hundred yards and still nothing. Saturday evening of period three we had a tom come in at 5 pm. He was at 60 yards and walk by, stood behind some brush, walked back the way he came. I yelped, he strutted, did the wing flip thing and walked right back into the woods. Then proceeded to gobble five or six times at us when I called. We were sitting in a blind at this point in time so there is no way he saw us, I had one hen decoy out.
Finally this past weekend, I hunted the same spot as I did with my brother, with him we sat in the draw and this weekend I sat above the draw just out of the woods. I set up, sat in my lounger and wasn't sitting more than 30 seconds and a tom fired off no more than 50 yards into the wood. I heard hens, I heard him, he responded to my slate and mouth call. I heard him fly down, he continued to gobble. I didn't like my position so I moved a little, he was still gobbling. I still didn't like my position so I moved one more time. After this move, he quit gobbling back at me but I could here him spitting and drumming in the woods that is how close he was, I could not get him to come out. It seemed like this all season long that I could not get these birds to come out of the woods toward me. I am chalking it up to not finding the bird in the right mood (or very wary only going with the hens that come to him). I felt like a failure, wondering what am I doing wrong. I would prefer to just chalk it up to bad luck. Anybody have any thoughts on what maybe would change the outcome in these situations?