Grand-Slam Turkey Hunting Secrets – a quick chat with Wild Turkey Grand-Slam Record Holder Jeff Budz

Budz has shot more than 500 wild turkeys and completed more than 120 grand slams of all four subspecies (Eastern, Merriam’s, Rio Grande, and Osceola)

  • Budz has shot more than 500 wild turkeys and completed more than 120 grand slams of all four subspecies (Eastern, Merriam’s, Rio Grande, and Osceola).
  • Budz travels light because he covers a lot of ground. He always has two mouth calls in his mouth,
  • When Budz needs to reach out a long distance, on a windy day, on a ridge, or in a deep swamp like where he lives in Florida, he relies on a Rafter Box Call from 4-Play. See details in the story. 
Jeff Budz with one of the more than 500 wild turkeys he has taken in his 35-year hunting career. Photo courtesy of Jeff Budz

By Dan Small

To call Jeff Budz a turkey-hunting fanatic is a serious understatement. He has more than 35 years of hunting, guiding, writing, and filming hunts all over the world. To Budz, who lives in Okeechobee, Florida, hunting isn’t just a hobby or––in the case of guiding––a paycheck; it’s a way of life. 

Budz has shot more than 500 wild turkeys, completed more than 120 grand slams of all four wild turkey subspecies (Eastern, Merriam’s, Rio Grande, and Osceola), and recorded a self-guided super slam of longbeards (one in each of the 49 states with wild turkeys.

We caught up with Budz as he was preparing to launch into another spring turkey season.

Q: When did you start turkey hunting, and how did it become such an obsession?

Budz: I shot my first turkey in 1989 during my junior year at Southern Illinois University. My friend Jim Lynch took me out. Two jakes shock-gobbled to his calling and came running in. We each shot one, and I was hooked right there. What I love most is the interaction between the hunter and the gobbler. It’s like a chess match. Turkey hunting changes through the season, and you have to stay one step ahead to connect with a bird.

Q: For many turkey hunters, a grand slam is the Holy Grail, something they hope to accomplish once in their lifetime, yet you have done it more than 100 times. What drives you, and how were you able to record that many?

Budz: I shot my first grand slam in 1994, and then in ’95, I got two because you can legally take two Osceolas each spring. Osceolas are the bottleneck since they’re found only here in southern Florida. Not many people had done it back then, and I was curious to see who had taken the most grand slams. So I checked the (NWTF) record book and learned it was Dick Kirby, founder of Quaker Boy Game Calls. I thought he hung the moon, but he was ahead of me, and that just drove me nuts because the view from second place never changes.

Click on THIS LINK to visit 4-Play

We each got two grand slams in ’95, ’96, ’97, and ’98. Then, somebody told me you could shoot two Osceolas in the fall, too, so in 1999, I shot two in the spring and two in the fall. Along with other birds I had shot, I had four grand slams that year. When the records came out in June, I learned that Dick had also figured it out and had taken four grand slams that year. I got mine on November 29th and 30th, and he got his on December 30th and 31st, so at least I had beaten him to the punch!

I didn’t know how many slams I was behind Dick at the time, but I wanted to catch up with him. Then, a Seminole tribal member told me about a place on the reservation where non-tribal members could buy permits, so I bought one. That year, I shot five grand slams. Then, I learned you could buy as many tags as you want. The following year, I went back there and here came five Osceola gobblers all in a line. I fired one shot, and four of them dropped stone-cold dead.

I was actually aiming for five, but I was beside myself because with all the other birds I had shot over the years and not yet recorded, I had just picked up four more grand slams. That deal isn’t available anymore. Many states are cutting permit numbers, so the opportunity to do what I did is slipping away.

Q: So, your record may stand, then?

Budz: I don’t know. My son is 5 1/2 now. He hasn’t shot a turkey yet, but if anyone’s gonna break it, I hope it’s him. I’ll do everything I can to help him as long as he wants to.

Q: What advice do you have for beginning turkey hunters?

Budz:

  1. Spend as much time in the woods as you can.
  2. Scout areas you plan to hunt before the season opens.
  3. Talk to mail carriers, UPS drivers, school bus drivers, and anyone who drives around in areas where you want to hunt.
  4. Knock on doors.
  5. Don’t be bashful.
  6. Get as much intel as you can. If I see a tom strutting in the same place two days in a row, I can usually get him.

Q: How important is calling, and what calls do you carry?

With the 4-Play box call, a hunter can sound like a flock of turkeys, which can fool even a mature old gobbler. Photo by Dan Small

Budz: I would never win a calling competition, but some competition callers can’t kill a bird because they are not good woodsmen. I travel light because I cover a lot of ground. I always have two mouth calls in my mouth, but when I need to reach out a long distance, on a windy day, on a ridge, or in a deep swamp like here in Florida, I rely on a Rafter box call by 4-Play. The rails are made of four different kinds of wood: walnut, poplar, sassafras, and cedar. Each makes a distinct sound, so you essentially have four calls in one. “Rafter” is another word for a flock or group of turkeys. It’s the perfect name for a call that sounds like a whole lot of hens.

When I’m calling, I try to sound like a flock of turkeys, like a party. I want to get inside that tom’s head and make him come check us out. It says a lot when the Rafter is the only box call I’ll carry. When I call, I’ll add to the variety of sounds by turning my body left or right. I might step behind a tree or go over a little lip. Even older gobblers who have heard it all can’t resist that difference in pitch, tone, and movement.

Q: You completed the super slam in 2014, and you also took a grand slam of bearded hens with a bow. What challenge is left for Jeff Budz?

Budz: I want to get a slam with every legal hunting tool. So far, I’ve done it with .410, 28-, 20-, 16-, 12-, and 10-gauge shotguns, a rifle, a crossbow, and a muzzleloader.

I just got a recurve, and I’m practicing with it. I also want to go real old-fashioned with a musket–maybe put some nails in there or whatever they used back in the day. I’ve got a couple of other ideas I can’t talk about right now, but you’ll hear about them eventually.

For more on Jeff Budz, visit his website: www.tagitworldwide.com. To order a Rafter box call, visit https://4playturkeycall.com/partner/13/

c. 2024 by Dan Small Outdoors, LLC; https://www.facebook.com/dansmalloutdoors/ 

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4-PLAY for Christmas! …A Love Story

  • Woodsy turkey call sounds combine screech and scratch controls
  • Henry C. Gibson and Eric Steinmetz each provided sound innovations about 120 years apart
  • Tone and tune change in one box that allows clucking, purring, yelping and cackling is about pure genius 

By Larry Whiteley

Now some of you probably read that headline, and your mind drifted off to another kind of foreplay. However, this is not that kind of foreplay. This 4-Play is something that can get a turkey gobbler all excited to come looking for love.

Let me begin with how this kind of 4-Play started. You see, the first box-style turkey call was patented in 1897 by an Arkansas farmer and fence supply manager, Henry C. Gibson, of Dardanelle. Though there may have been box calls before his patent, Gibson sparked a new industry with many imitators creating box-type turkey calls.

For over 120 years, the turkey box call has never really changed much from the original wooden box and paddle design. Then along came avid turkey hunter Eric Steinmetz. Eric built his box calls for years and had terrific success with them. He even sold a few to local hunters. Eric couldn’t get the thought out of his mind about coming up with a call that was more versatile and more effective than the standard box call design. He would think about it as he drove down the road with his traveling sales job. When he was home and wasn’t turkey hunting, he was in his shop tinkering with different designs and wood types.

He finally came up with the idea of building one with a forward-mounted wheel that would allow the paddle to be moved to both sides of the box. That way, it could be used on any of four sound rails, each made with different wood types to have four different tones. Thus came the name for his call, the 4-Play. He also found that since the wheel allowed the lid to be moved forward and backward, he could strike the sound rails in multiple locations, adding to his box call versatility. The 4-Play is a turkey box call like no other you have ever seen or used.  

The U.S. Patent Office agreed that Eric’s box call was so innovative they awarded him a Utility Patent. 4-Play turkey calls are available with Cherry, Walnut, or mahogany bodies, and all have sound rails made of walnut, eastern red cedar, sassafras, and poplar. If you’re a turkey hunter, you have to have one of these. For more information, watch videos, read reviews, and order, visit https://4playturkeycall.com/shop. Or, give them a call at 610-984-4099. They would love to visit with you.

“It is a versatile call,” says Eric. “With a little practice, you can make an almost unlimited number of tones and pitches. I just want hunters to use it and then hopefully send us pictures of them and their Gobbler. That’s what would make me feel successful.”

Eric has since sold the 4-Play patent to Brian Benolken, but he is still involved with the business, working shows, building calls, and of course, turkey hunting. He’s even won several calling competitions with his 4-Play. Brian is busy growing the business under the name of Cutting Edge Game Calls, and his goal for the company is to offer you products for making you a better and more successful turkey hunter. Brian and Eric both are continuously thinking of new innovative ideas.

This old turkey hunter has never seen anything like it in all my years of turkey hunting, so I just had to have a 4-Play. I love it! I can’t believe all the sounds I can make with it. I’m clucking, purring, yelping, and even fly down cackling with it. I can’t wait until spring turkey season. My wife can’t either! Can you believe she banned me from the house and makes me take my 4-Play and practice out in the barn?

If you are a turkey hunter, you might try hinting to your wife or girlfriend that you would surely like to have 4-Play under the tree for Christmas. If they look at you like you’re weird or something, you might have to just order online or call Cutting Edge Game Calls to order one for yourself. But if they smile, this could be a very Merry Christmas in more ways than one.