You can just about toss everything you've ever learned about traditional turkey hunting into the round file when it comes to hunting this big bird during fall. After all, toms will no longer respond to the call of a love-starved hen -- at least not as they would during spring.

And that cleverly concealed spot you've chosen, where you blend in like an ink spot on a blue suit, can also be somewhat disregarded since once you locate a cluster of turkeys, you'll need to run after them like a herd of bulls chasing people in the narrow streets of Pamplona in Spain.

Nevertheless, you get the idea. You're going to "bust-up" that flock in the hopes of calling them back to the area where you'll be waiting -- unlike the spring season when a turkey gunner enters the woods and remains as silent and still as a statue.

Indeed, fall turkey hunting is a bit different than what we've been taught in order to succeed during the standard spring season. And it's a bit tougher -- or at least it is for guys and gals who have yet to try bagging a bird when the leaves are falling and that early-morning chill doesn't necessarily translate into warmer temperatures by midday.

But why scatter a flock of wild birds, only to call them in again?

When speaking with Larry Herrighty, chief of New Jersey's Division of Fish and Wildlife's Bureau of Wildlife Management, I asked that very question.

"You know those signs on Jeeps, placed high on the windshields that say, 'You wouldn't understand, it's a Jeep thing?' Well, that's a lot like fall turkey hunters. You wouldn't understand unless you're a turkey hunter. The reason fall turkey hunters scatter a flock of wild birds is the 'calling tradition' of turkey hunting. It's what makes the sport so satisfying to most of us.

"Certainly there's no law that says a turkey gunner cannot take a bird after locating a flock -- if you can get close enough to take a safe, sure shot. But turkey hunters would rather scatter the flock and then call, and call, and call, just for the satisfaction and challenge of calling in a nice big bird," Herrighty said.

Despite a rather drastic departure from typical spring hunting, the fact that New Jersey and Maryland even have a fall season is a tribute to all those conservationists (read: hunters) who helped in some way to bring turkeys back from the brink of (geographical) extinction, to the extent that today, these birds' numbers are higher then they've ever been.

Presently, Maryland offers fall turkey gunning in only three of the state's 23 counties: Allegany, Garrett and Washington. These three are the state's westernmost counties. Nonetheless, the Old Line State's fall season may be one of the nation's oldest annual fall turkey seasons, dating back to "before we even kept records," according to Bob Long, the state's upland bird biologist who places the start of the state's all season date somewhere in the mid- to late 1940s. New Jersey's dates back only to 1997, when the Garden State instituted its first fall season.

What was the genesis for these fall turkey seasons? According to Herrighty, the Garden State implemented its fall season at the request of turkey hunters. But those hunters were adamant about having certain fall-season restrictions in place, such as a reduction in the regions where turkeys could be hunted, as well as a strict one-bird limit.