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What amazed me was the one jake did all the attacking and he mostly used his wing to hit the decoy. Almost like he was punching it. It was so loud it almost sounded like a gun going off when he hit. The other two birds doing all the purring seemed to be routing him on! Another thing that amazed me was we had a full length beard taped to the decoy to make him look like a tom but the jakes still attacked it. Does anybody have any insight as to why a subordinate bird would attack a full grown tom?
Kevin:
IMO, I don’t think the loud noise of the decoys scared the toms away, I think it was the aggressive purring and fighting of the terrible trio. A turkey fight is a TON of noise. That loud single pop from the wing hitting the deke was loud, but when they bump chests and continually beat wings I think it’s probably more noise overall. Those toms in that area live with those aggressive jakes day-in, day-out. They might’ve even gotten their butts kicked a few times.
I usually see it with a bigger group of jakes, but there’s plenty of times when aggressive jakes will outfight the toms. Esp. if there was a bad hatch or two in a row, and you’ve got mostly older toms and jakes with few 2-3 year olds.
Two years ago, we had a pair of superjakes (brother’s father-in-law killed one and it was 20 1/2lbs with a 6″ beard) that strutted with the hens and made the toms sulk off in the corner of the pasture. When one started strutting, the jakes stopped what they were doing and chased him out of the pasture. Like I said though, I usually see it with a large group of jakes and one or two toms. They’re outnumbered and the jakes become the main attraction.
With turkeys it’s half guesswork anyway, but it’s a theory that I’ve seen play out several times before.
Either way, GREAT footage. You know when you see that turkey shuffle sidestep that you’re in for some great decoy thumpin’!
Joel
)and yes great footage. 
