Short Reed Goose Calling Basics
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Helping You Get the Most From Your Hunting Dogs


Short Reed Goose Calling Basics





By Matt Wettish



[Introduction]

0:18 I tell you what, when we clear this brush out between the pond and the field, it's going to be nuts next year when it comes for goose season. How you doing? Welcome to Gundogs Online and my name's Matt Wettish.  I'm here to talk to you today about short reed calls and answer a few of the simple questions, basic questions that most people have about them.

0:38 One of the questions I get most often about short reed calls is how easy they are to blow and how easy are they in comparison to a flute call? Very simple. They're not anywhere near a flute call, but they're extremely easy to blow. One of the misconceptions people have, first and foremost, is your hand movement. Flute calls, the old different types of calls, people think that you have to move your hands all around like a magician to make the sounds. You don't. Keep things simple. First and foremost, keep it simple. I'll show you some basic hand movements, some basic positioning that should get you to use just about any type of short reed on the market.

1:23 First off what I want to talk to you about is your hand position of your on hand. The on hand is what we're going to consider the hand that holds the call. The off hand is going to be your chamber hand or the hand that makes the sounds. Okay? 

First off, take your short reed call and you wrap your hand around the end with your forefinger, your index finger, wrapping the edge of the call. Now, this is going to play the same for 90% of the calls out there. Wrap it around. Keep your other fingers straight up. Close them. Now, don't make a fist. Leave a chamber on the inside of your hand.

Now, rule of thumb, now this is for 90% of the calls: take your finger from your other hand and put it underneath your middle finger. If you give that space of your middle finger, that should probably do it as far as the back pressure is concerned on the call. Okay? So you want to maintain that, basically that ergonomic when it comes to utilizing the call.

2:34 Now, once you have the position set, you can make that, make sure that chamber's there. Now it's your off hand. Your off hand, this is the hand that makes the goose sounds, the individual goose sounds, okay?  From this hand not moving [goose calling], okay? That's one goose.

Take this hand, now you're going to fire that hole into the palm of your hand. You want it right here. Not into here, not up here but right into the palm of your hand.  Once you place that around, okay, you have a chamber, that makes one goose. [goose calling]  

3:23 Now, if you can do that, you've got one, two, three, four, five geese at your disposal.  Listen to this.

3:32-3:40 [goose calling]

3:42 Five geese, one sound. [goose calling] This hand does not move. This hand controls the tonal qualities.

3:58 Now, keep in mind when it comes to short reeds, it doesn’t matter if it's a Tim Grounds Super Mag, a Sean Mann Shorty, or a Jeff Foiles Strait Meat. They all basically run the same. Now, keeping it simple is the key. When I said get your on hand on, your off hand for the chamber. Each sound is individual. I'm not moving during the sound. I'm moving in between each sound. So it's.......

4:33-4:44 [goose calling] 

4:45 Don't move in between. Keep the sounds separate. Slower is not necessarily worse. You don't have to be a speed demon. Keep the sounds clear and concise and you're going to end up being more successful in the field.

5:04 Here at Gundogs Online we've got all different types of short reed calls for you to choose from. So click on them; check them out. There's going to be some support videos, some audio, all sorts of stuff for you here as far as answering all the questions you need answered. So check them out. Good luck next time you're in the field.

[Closing]   

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