Frequently Asked Questions

Yes, you will just need to make sure to ship your calls to us by the February 2, 2027 deadline.

Please have your calls to us by the deadline above and ship to either of the following addresses:

National Wild Turkey Federation
Callmaking Competition
535 Gary Rd.
Edgefield, SC 29824

OR you can ship to the address below to be safer. All calls come back to this location to be checked in anyway and Briana Alley is the pre-contest coordinator. It also does away with any issues of the calls getting misplaced at the warehouse shown above. 

Briana Alley
Callmaking Contest
5050 Autumn Trail
Grovetown, GA 30813

You can checkin your calls in the Gaylord Opryland Events Center  February 9th, 2027 2-6 p.m. CST

We request that all calls have photos submitted. However, we do take photos of calls that are missing photos throughout the convention week. If you have photos you can upload them and choose not to show them until the week of convention from the account area. 

If you would still rather wait until the week of convention to upload your photos, please make sure you do so by Wednesday the week of convention so we do not upload our own photos of your calls. Your pictures will be much better than ours will be.

Anyone who uploads photos for their call will receive a special thank you gift for doing so. 

Registrations open December 01, 2026 9:00 am and close automatically on Feb 08, 2027 11:59 pm.

The system will try to automatically break any ties using the weights for each criteria in categories that use criteria for judging (Divisions 3 & 4 - Decorative Waterfowl and Hunting Waterfowl)). There are rare circumstances where the tie cannot be broken by the system and the judges have to rejudge those 2 calls to determine who wins. Below is a diagram to show how the system breaks ties using the weights. 

Judging in Divisions 1, 2, and possibly 5 will be judged with a flat score from 1-100. Judges cannot leave a whole number and instead will need to leave scores like 85.56, 95.93, or 75.79. The low and high score will still be dropped from the scores a entry receives. 

Yes, in divisions 1 & 2, the judges names will be displayed and the score they gave you will be shown. This is a test this year to see how it goes. Please be sure to read the rules for each division for more information and warnings about how contestants are expected to behave when it comes to disagreements with judges scores. It is important information.

Yes, We hope to have the judges available on Thursday morning from 8-9am to answer questions about scores and help callmakers understand the scores they received. We cannot dictate a judges time though and many have other obligations, but we are asking them to be present if possible. 

Yes, the judges have the ability to leave comments on the calls they judge. However, time is very limited with so many entries to judge. So comments are completely optional

Divisions 1, 2, and 5 close February 20th and Divisions 3 & 4 close on February 21st. Please check the listings for specific times. This year the entries have their own close times and will not close the entire category at one time. We still have time extensions for bids received in the final 2 minutes to give everyone a chance to bid but because the categories do not close all at once, you should be able to see which calls are being extended and which ones are not. 

You will first need an account with us. Creating an account is easy from the login area. Once you have an account, you will need to obtain a free bid number using a major credit card to secure any bids you place. After you have been given a bid number, you should be all set to start baidding online. 

Please note that a free online bid number will NOT allow you to bid in our live auctions in person. In order to bid in our live auctions you will need to be present at convention or have someone who is physically there to place bids for you. Please read below for more information on our live auctions.

In order to bid in the live auction you MUST have a live auction bid number & paddle. You must also be present to participate. If you cannot be present but would like something in the live auction, you can have a friend or family member who is at convention bid on the call for you. If you do not know anyone who is going to be at convention you can as a last resort reach out to Briana Alley the contest coordinator at (706) 814-8185 to bid on your behalf. PLEASE make sure you give us plenty of time before making that request. Live auction day is VERY busy for us and return phone calls could be slow. 

• Online Bidding works a lot like eBay bidding in the sense that you can bid the most you are willing to pay and the current bid will be as low as the current bid. For example if you see a call you really want that is currently priced at $100 and you bid $500 for the call, the new bid will be $110 until the next bidder bids $120. You will still be the highest bidder but now you will be responsible for $130 (The amount required to outbid the new bidder). 
• Keep in mind though that bidding in the last few seconds of the auction will only extend the auctions end time to allow the other bidder a chance to bid again. 

We understand that eBay has a system that allows bidders to "snipe" and bid in the last few seconds to win an item from another bidder. However, many of our members who want turkey calls do not have a fast internet connection and would like a chance to bid. Allowing sniping in an auction would make it an unfair advantage to the bidder with the faster internet connection. 

Also keep in mind that this competition has the purpose of raising money for the wild turkey. The time extensions give other people a chance to bid when they are willing to pay more for an item. This results in more money for the competition and more money for the Wild Turkey. 

The best way to overcome the stress of the time extensions is to place a bid for the most you are willing to pay for the call and let it go if the piece exceeds that max amount. If your high bid is more than the other guys max he or she is willing to pay, then you will win the call. 

You will be notified after the auction ends and we have verified that there were no problems with the bids. This notification will come by text message so you may want to make sure your phone number is up to date in your account. 

Bid paddles are used for live auctions and can also be used to bid with online. They cost $10 a piece and you are allowed to take them home with you each year. If you are unable to attend the convention and pick the bid paddle up we will mail the bid paddle to you after convention and online auctions are over. 

Online bid numbers are for bidding online and are free. They do not come with any physical token to hold as a keepsake. 

First you will want to make sure the call is not selected to go to the live auction. You can do this from your account area under the edit my entry option. You will then need to wait until bidding has been turned on. Once bidding has been turned on, do a search for your calls, click the little heart under your call to save it to your favorites. From there you can bid on your own calls all in one place or just watch it to see how much it sells for.

Auctions will open on Thursday morning the week of convention. Feb 11, 2027 12:30 pm

No. Online auctions are way more efficient. We understand that some are inconvenienced by this decision and we apologize for that inconvenience. However, it has become too difficult to proceed with the bid sheets. Online bidding opens up the bidding to wider range of people, is prone to less human error, is faster, and has a lot less stress to deal with from everyone involved.

Live auction items must be picked up after the live auction has completed. Online auction items will be packed up on Saturday afternoon, shipped back to the NWTF headquarters, and picked up by the company who does the shipping for us. You should expect delivery in 1-3 weeks after the auctions end. As always, if you need your calls sooner please give us a call and we can try to get your calls out sooner. There will be an additional charge charged to the buyer for shipping once your items are shipped. Insurance will be added on each package for the final value of all calls that are shipped. The second charge for shipping is separate from the cost of the calls purchased and is calculated at the time the items are shipped. Local pickup is not possible as the NWTF contracts the shipping out to a third party.

Sandy Brady will be shipping any trophies that have not been picked up at convention out 2-4 weeks after the convention is over. Medallions will be at the convention and are packed up into envelopes on Thursday the week of convention. They should be ready to be picked up by Friday morning. If you need them sooner please let us know and we can make an exception. 

The cost to buy these medallions has gotten very expensive over the years. We have found that many of the buyers of the calls do not really care as much about the medal as they do the call itself. The buyer has the ability to purchase the medallion if they wish, but it is not required. However, PLEASE NOTE that this year the buyer will be automatically charged for any medallions if he or she has not paid for their order by the time it ships. We have for the past few years tried to reach out to find out if a buyer wants the medallions before charging their saved card. This is time consuming and holds up everyone elses shipping. Our goal is to get everything shipped in one week after the auctions close. So moving forward we will charge the cost of the medallions (if there are any available for the call) when we charge the the order and shipping to the buyers card.

Hopefully we will have the medallions in time for the convention so we can hand them out to callmakers who attend. If you are not attending the convention, we will ship them out 1-3 weeks after convention. Medallions are still awarded to call makers without any cost to them.

That depends on whether or not we have already placed our order for medallions with the supplier. If it is after the order has been fulfilled we cannot complete the order. Still contact us though as we may have extra's available for sale

We are a conservation organization as well as a turkey organization. The NWTF efforts to preserve the habitat benefit all wildlife and not just the turkey. We also have deer calls, owl calls, squirrel calls, and just about anything else you can imagine. Mark Warmath organizes and runs our Duck call divisions of this contest and is pretty big in the Turkey world too. His efforts to make this an open contest have been substantial and often go without the acknowledgment they deserve.

• Entries in Division 1 and division 2 will now receive a flat score from 1-100 instead of a score for each criteria. This is an overall score based on the judges opinion of the call. 
• We have implemented challenge categories in each division of the competition (Except wildlife art) where we challenge people to enter in those categories for a chance to win $500 in cash. You do not have to place in the category to have a chance to win, you just need to have entered. 
• We have also added a $1000 drawing for both the turkey side of the competition and the waterfowl competition. A random contestant will be drawn from each side to win a $1000 prize. This is based off from the calls entered so the more calls you enter, the more chance to win you get. 
• Kids workshops have been expanded with the success those workshops saw last year. We were able to secure a promise from one of our very own judges who wishes to remain anonymous to support the growth of this program as well as a signed sponsor to support this program.  
• Free call giveaways will continue this year with a drawing every hour to one lucky person. We thank eash and every callmaker who donates to this program every year.
• Callmakers can now pay deduct their 50% or 70% from the checkout when its a 50% or 30% donation for the call when completing checkout on a call they are buying back. They will not receive a check after the convention for the sale of the call. They will still receive a check in the mail for any prize money. 
• Callmakers will now have the ability to fill out an online form to have their prize money and their portion of the call sale deposited directly into their bank account through an ACH deposit. 
• We have added a new feedback section to our website where callmakers can request changes. Access to this will be granted after the competition has completed and will be by invitation to only the callmakers who competed this year. 
• We opened up the youth registrations and made them free for any youth entering our competition in the youth only categories. 
• Callmnakers can now request that a call does not go to the live auction. This will help the callmakers who want the call back but cannot be at convention to bid on the item in the live auction.