Video Clip: Under Eye's expert guidance, writer Bill Heavey calls in four jakes.

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We're set up in a blind at the head of a brushy ditch leading up to a cornfield. This is prime turkey country, near the town of Kirksville in northern Missouri. Ray Eye is not exactly irritated, but we both know there would probably be a bird on the ground by now if we were doing things his way. The standard deal is that he summons the gobbler and the dumbass outdoor writer pulls the trigger. Then the writer poses for a hero picture and lies about the hunt. I had to go screw up a good system, trying to learn something by doing the turkey calling myself and having Ray critique. That was bad enough, and it didn't get any better when he heard me call. "My God," he'd said with a wince last night in the motel. "Look, I can put you onto turkeys. But I can't make 'em commit suicide."

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Calling Tip: Don't call scared.
"Turkeys aren't smart enough to ask, hey, you think that's a real turkey or a guy blowing a mouth call?" says Ray. "That's giving them too much credit. They think turkey sounds are made by turkeys. And real hens don't call as if they're afraid of getting a response. They call soft sometimes, sure. I've heard hens call and not get a response plenty of times. But turkeys call for a reason, and that's to communicate." That's why Ray's personal bias is toward aggressive calling. There are a lot of hens out there, so he figures he needs to sound hotter than the real ones to get a gobbler to come his way.