tealboy

Ive never hunted with a gobbler decoy but last yr i noticed my inability to get a large osceola to pay any attention to my calling or hen, jake decoys. This was frustrating and went on for an hour. Eventually, another gobbler showed up close to my decoys and the monster gobbler came running straight toward us in pursuit of the gobbler that showed up.

Anyway, my lesson from this was, gobbler decoys can be extremely useful so i bought a primos mobile b. My question is, a lease member says i should trim the beard to 6 or 7 inches to avoid the decoy being too threatening and scaring off good gobblers. Do u agree? The fake beard is appx 9 inches out of the box.

buckman11

yes i agree. 7 inches

Topgun 3006

***Yep, I'd trim it down to around 6" if you're looking to get a big longbeard to come in because they're going to think they can whip his butt easier than a big mature one.

JW

Look at your beard. You can pull it back to that length and tape in place.

JW

xOEDragonx

Definitely yes, I use a b-mobile my self and I've shortened the beard to about 6", I always put a roughed up or jake tail on it, and I repainted the head for a slightly better realism effect, but that last one was mostly for my own sake. That thing needed touching up.

And yes, I've had luck with setting b-mobile out knowing there was a henned up tom in the area. When the hens and jake wouldn't pull him towards me, b-mobile definitely did. I personally haven't had an experience yet where a bird seemed intimidated by b-mobile, I've even had a pair of jakes come in and start acting like they wanted to size him up. So I for one am a believer that they have their uses, just like every other tool in the turkey hunting arsenal.

On a separate note, if for whatever reason you don't actually want to trim b-mobile's beard, there's only a small patch of glue holding it in. Break the glue, pull the beard in and just use a piece of duct tape on the inside of the shell to hold it where you want it. That's what I did, and it gives you the option to make it longer or shorter at will.

JW

You need to look at why that Tom hung up on your decoys. It certainly wasn't your calling.
To me it is simple - REMOVE the JAKE decoy!
If you had removed the Jake decoy you would have seen a difference. And Strutting Tom Decoy could in fact do the same thing.
That bird as big as it was - is sub dominant. I have had more toms come short due to a Jake decoy being in the wrong place at the wrong time. When I had the chance I just removed the Jake decoy and witnessed a big difference.
And using decoys are not a given. Decoys can help and tdecoys can hinder.

JW

Teebugg

X2. Decoys are not a given. And ive also seen big toms shy away from a jake decoy. Heck my jake decoy had a 4" beard and that 11" bearded big tom did not want anything to do with the decoy. He went off and i grabbed the jake and hid it. 20 mins later i called that same bird into a hen decoy. He hesitated at first and im sure he was looking for the jake. Nonetheless he ended up strolling right into range.

Was it that i took the decoy down? Or did he finally muster up enough courage to come in? No clue,but my money is on the jake making him shy away.

sabraham

I too have a B-mobile and i removed the fake beard and put a heavy 10 inch beard from a gobbler in its place. I personally dont think beard length has any bearing on dominance. I say that because i have not had any problems with any birds shying from my decoy and when multiple birds come in i try to pay attention to the pecking order and the largest bearded bird was not always the dominant bird. My observations is the head color has more influence

bald9eagle

Something the Primos boys discovered when first using B-Mobile was that toms preferred to come in to the back of the strutting decoy. They always set their strutting decoys up facing them and away from the gobbling bird.

Myself I am not a big decoy man even though I own a Avian hen. I am even considering getting another one. They have their place to give the tom more confidence. I hunt a few places where the woods are wide open due to prescribed burns.

sabraham

Facing the strutter toward me is something i do. They dont seem to mind attacking the rear. Also i put the decoys about 12 yds from me so if the gobbler does check up 10-20 yds short he is still in easy range