The wing bone turkey call has always been one of my favorite calls. This call besides natural voice and the cherry leaf was one of the first turkey calls dating as far back as the 16th century. American Indians made bone yelpers from the bones taken from the wings of turkey. In 1940 an archaeologist dug up a wing bone call near Kentucky Lake. These bones are now on display at the University of Tennessee's McClung Museum.

Learning to use this call can be tricky. Forcefully pulling or sucking air through the hollowed out bones operates the wing bone. Once mastered the caller can make soft to loud yelp, cuts, kee kees and gobbles. The wing bone call is probably reasonable for the death of more turkeys than any other call that I know of.

The bones commonly use to make the call are the radius, ulna and humerus from the wings of the wild turkey, using the radius as a mouthpiece, the ulna in the middle and humerus at the end. All three bones are found in the wing. It is said that the bone from domestic turkey are to thin. I would say it has something to do with age, the older the bird the stronger the bone.

The traditional wing bone yelper is made from a wild hen's wing. Wild toms have large bones that have deeper tones that imitate gobblers. A wing bone call made from gobbler bone would be a great call to use in the fall when gobblers are in their batcher groups. It is also said that bones taken from a young hen will sound like a young hen.

To make a wing bone call
1. Disjoint wings from turkey and remove all feathers, meat that can be done using a small sharp knife.

2. Cut the ends off the three bones using a fine toothed saw

3. Remove the marrow from the radius and ulna bones using a pipe cleaner or an air hose to blow it out.

4. Place bones in boiling water, to which you've added a small amount of dish detergent and bleach. Boil until you can remove the meat and sinew and then boil them again to get the grease out of the bones.

5. Set bones aside on paper towel to dry.

6. After the bones are dry, the humerus bone has a considerable amount of
webbing inside, so be sure to get this out with a knife, file, drill or some other mechanical means or just leave it.

7. Bones should dry to an even white color. If not, be sure to remove all traces of marrow and reboil for about an hour adding a small amount of detergent and bleach to the water. Another way to get the bones an even white color is to immerse them in hydrogen peroxide after boiling them. Rinse thoroughly with water and let dry.

8. Glue the bones together using epoxy.

9. Glue the large end of the Radius bone into the small end of the Ulna bone and the large end of the Ulna bone into the small end of the humerus bone. You can use masking tape to temporarily hold the wing bones together while you tune them for the tone that you want. Different length bones will give you different tones. You might have to cut some of the end of the bone off to get them to fit.

Over the years there has been many variations of the call. Some call makers have modified the barrels by using cow horns; shot gun shells, and even bones from other birds such as geese.

Primos Hunting Calls have came out with a wing bone call this year. The Wing Bone Yelper Turkey Call Model 348 .
This call reproduces soft to loud, unique yelps and clucks. It also comes with a kisser button which helps with proper mouth placement every time. Folks this is a great call and sounds great once mastered.

Get back in history and try one of these calls. Once you have mastered this call the pure satisfaction of using the call that you made to call in a big gobbler is a feeling that cant be described.
Above all, know your target and hunt safe.

© Copyright 2002 Donald Parker