REIDSVILLE, N.C. – Dylan Bearden and Kimmy Hanks are slowly but surely making Reidsville North Carolina’s capital for turkey-calling.
Turkey-calling is an outdoor sport that involves imitating sounds that turkeys make either through devices or one’s own voice to attract them for hunting.
Bearden has been calling since he was 5 years old, and he’s 26 years old today.
“My first time turkey hunting was probably when I was four,” Bearden said in an interview.
The father of two took home 4th place, or 3rd runner-up, at the Grand National Turkey Calling Championships in the Friction Division last week in Nashville, Tenn.
“Us callers look at it as the Super Bowl of turkey-calling contests,” Bearden said. “Everybody competes to be at that contest.”
For the past two years, Bearden has focused his calling on friction techniques.
He jokes that after a certain age, reaching the high-pitched sounds turkey make didn’t come as easy.
“I did a lot of mouth-calling as a kid, natural voice calling, and just recently got into friction calling in the last two years,” the pro said.
Bearden has been sponsored by Hanks Game Calls, a game call-making company also based out of Reidsville owned by Hanks.
Hanks won the D.D. Adams Award back-to-back in 2017 and 2016, the highest award in the call maker industry.
Hanks’ ‘marbled Paduk’ was designed and crafted by Kimmy Hanks and his son Anthony and helped Bearden clinch his runner-up spot in the Friction finals.
The only two other North Carolinians to place in any of the 9 other categories were Mitchell Johnson of Purlear in the Team Challenge and Jonathon Miller of Morganton in the Gobbling Championship.
Bearden is passing his skills to his eldest, Charli, age 5, who will compete in the Youth category at the 5th Annual Dennis Campbell Classic in Fisherville, Va. Over the weekend.
You can find the Reidsville turkey-calling dream team at the Dixie Deer Classic in Raleigh from March 2-4.
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