Game calls

[Kathy Marshall]

I've been wanting to try turning some game calls for awhile now. My BIL and one of my nephews are both avid hunters (rifle and archery) and I'm thinking they'd make nice Christmas gifts for them.
Elk is their favorite and my nephew is a lucky son of a gun and gets drawn almost every year (not easy to do in AZ), his dad is not so lucky . They also hunt white tail, mule deer, javalina and turkey.

Is there much difference in the kits from one supplier to the next? Do the kits come with decent instructions and do you have any tips to make things go easier?

Thanks!

[Curt Fuller]

Kathy, I used to turn a lot of duck calls. I turned a few goose calls too but they never sounded quite right. I used the Hut metal reeds http://www.hutproducts.com/departments.asp?dept=105for my duck calls and they worked pretty good. They're pretty easy to turn using either a pen mandrel or by making some cone centers. I've never had much experience with any other calls but I noticed on the HUT site they have a bigger variety than when I was turning them. There are limitless woods, acrylics, and laminates for turning them and the starter kit had easy instructions. Once you turned one you will figure out ways to do it better though. The REAL call makers make their own reeds though.

[Marvin Hasenak]

Unless you want to make your own reeds, this would be the list I would suggest you start with. Not really callmaking with this list more of woodturning and then assemble the call. But you will learn a lot about sounds and how hunters use them.

Duck and goose calls, go to Echo Duck calls and buy their ready made inserts.

Deer grunts and elk call reeds I would use HUT Products, they use an industry standard molded toneboard and ready cut reeds.

Predator and javelina calls, the closed reed calls use JC Products reeds, you can buy direct, but you have to buy 250 reeds and sleeves, and you would need about 5 different reeds so buy from All Predator Calls, allpredatorcalls.com or the HUT Products individual reeds.

Turkey calls, pot calls and strikers are the woodturners best bet, you will find instructions on Custom Calls Online. A good supplier is Stumpy the Glassman, you will find him on Custom Calls Online, another supplier is Brookside Turkey Calls, he has a website and has kits. Probably the best way to get started is to buy a kit, it gives the basic dimensions of the pot calls.

The HUT kit comes with instructions, not much to the instructions when, more of an assembly method, all you have to do is turn the blanks to shape and assemble. To start buy at least one kit, after you have put together a kit, then you can buy just the reed assemblies and use your own wood, acrylic or whatever to make the calls like you want. There is a callmaking forum, Custom Calls Online that you can get additional information. You might want to start by reading some of the info on CCO before jumping overboard.

If you really want to get into callmaking, plan on spending months and years figuring out how to make your own toneboards and spending a small fortune on toneboard jigs and other gadgets, My jigs, mandrels, and the other things cost more than my lathe did. A custom jig will set you back about $300 for duck calls, a goose jig will add another $300, predator call jigs, you need 3, add in another $1000. These custom jigs are designed by the callmakers, you have to do that on our own.