Mark "La Cross" Hoke Interview

©Kenny Gray

Mark Hoke is a very accomplished turkey and waterfowl hunter from Laurel, Maryland. To his credit, he has designed several turkey calls and now works with the Zink Calls Company on the designs and testing of their diaphragm and pot style calls. He has been featured in hunts on the Zink 24-7 waterfowl video series, as well as had appearances in other waterfowl videos and outdoor television programs. Mark is a husband and father of two, a member of Zink Calls’ elite Z-Unit and also a member of the Avery® Pro-Staff.

Who gets the credit for getting you into hunting?

Mark: That would have to be my father, who started me out at the age of seven, scouting with him and my younger brother, I didn’t really hunt until the age of eleven, that’s when I got my first single shot shotgun and I got into squirrel hunting. From the age of seven to eleven, I went basically every Saturday during the hunting season with my father and my brother, so I’d have to say my father surely gets the credit.

Do you remember your first hunt? Tell me about your first hunt?

Mark: Yeah, at the age of eleven I went out squirrel hunting with my dad and my brother. Up until this time as I said we always hunted together and I would sit right next to him at the same tree. This time out, I basically sat by myself, I think the tree was a Beech nut, while my brother and dad went to other locations. I remember sitting there all morning with a gun in my hand, feeling pretty darn cold hunting squirrels by myself. The limit then was six and I think I ended up getting four, all grey squirrels. We mostly have grey squirrels here in Maryland some fox squirrels, but you don’t see many of those, they are mostly on the Eastern Shore.

So how did you get the nickname, “La Cross”?

Mark: Well it’s basically a name that was given to me by a good friend of mine, Fred Zink. He gave me that name because of something that happened years ago, during my senior year of high school. There is a story behind it, but I don’t tell many people that story, so you’ll just have to go with the fact that La Cross is my given nickname. A lot of people ask me this, but the story is reserved for just a hand full of my close friends. Sorry, I wish I could say more.

What about hunting waterfowl and turkeys has made pursuing them such a big part of your life?

Mark: I’ve hunted a lot of game in my time and I’ve had the opportunity to go from state to state and meet a lot of people, but the thing about waterfowl hunting and turkey hunting is the fact that I get to interact with the game itself. Being able to call game makes it that much more exciting to me, so just the communication and vocalization that I’m able to do with game in the field is actually the high point of the hunting experience. I love that interaction when you are talking to a spring gobbler or a flock of geese migrating south. There is nothing wrong with deer hunting or squirrel hunting, but I love when you are calling to these animals and you get a response from them. I always say that we don’t call them in every time to’ kill’em,’ but I do call them in every time to ‘trick‘em.’ That’s what I love about it, the interaction, the vocalization, and the fact that you can trick something of nature to come into your spread.

It’s my understanding that you formally worked as a waterfowl and turkey guide, but now volunteer your services for disabled veterans. How did you get involved with taking disabled vets hunting?

Mark: For years I guided in my home state of Maryland, for turkey as well as, waterfowl. Growing up in Maryland, you are exposed to waterfowl hunting at an early age and it almost comes second nature to you, but something I took for granted was that I had a father willing to teach me and hand down what he learned as a small boy hunting. Something he did to help provide and feed his family; was a sport to me. Hunting was a way of life for him and a way of survival for him and his family. He taught me something, which I didn’t understand then. I thought everybody knew how to duck hunt and turkey hunt. It wasn’t until I got older when I realized the values he taught me would carry me through life. At the age of 25, I started to help out teaching hunter safety courses in my area. That’s when I met young hunters eager to go hunting and people in wheelchairs looking to get back into the sport. Most of the hunt’s back then where very limited and mostly deer hunts over time we have grown to several hunts a year and have found way’s to expand to goose hunts, turkey hunts, we even have a annual hunt every year called the Zink Calls Handicapable Dove Shoot. The friends that I have made over the years Bob Tharpe, Paul Mc Dowel have touched my life in so many ways that I couldn’t put a price on it, if I was still guiding. The Handicapable hunts started to get notice by the local media. Angus Philips a sport’s writer from the Washington Post did a story of the Zink Calls Handicapable Dove Shoot. That’s when the PVA got in contact with me.

It wasn’t until the PVA (Paralyzed Veterans of America) contacted me to ask if I would be interested in taking some of the guys coming back from Iraq, who were injured and would be staying and getting treatment at Walter Reed Hospital out hunting. I told them I would be honored. The fulfillment that I get out of getting to know these guys, hearing what they went though, learning from their experiences and the feeling of giving back to what they have done for me is far more than any financial benefit I got from guiding. This is such a small thing compared to what they given us, as far as freedoms that I have because of what they have been doing over in Iraq. I’m just happy they picked me to take them out. I mean it’s unbelievable what these guys can do, given their situations. I don’t even call them handicapped; I like to call them ‘handicappable.’ I’m really just grateful that they are giving me the opportunity to take them out.

Mark Hoke on a "Handicappable" Hunt in Georgia

©Kenny Gray

I know you are both an accomplished waterfowl and turkey hunter, but which of the two is your favorite to hunt?

Mark: Well that is a very good and interesting question. I guess, if you broke it up and said that duck hunting is one, goose hunting is one and turkey hunting is one, then I’m going to pick turkey hunting every time. I enjoy turkey hunting, but if you combine hunting ducks and geese into one, as waterfowl, I’d have to say waterfowl. I truly enjoy turkey hunting, but I love the combination of hunting ducks and geese over water or over a field. If they were all broken out separately though, turkey hunting hands down.

Let’s focus on just turkeys now, seeing the season just wrapped up. Of the four different species of turkeys found in the United States, which species have you been successful in harvesting? Which of them four is your favorite?

Mark: I’m happy to say that I’ve harvested all of the species of turkeys found in the United States. I’ve also shot the ‘Grand Slam’ twice.

My favorite is the Eastern. There is something about that bird that I still don’t understand. It’s not that he’s smarter or wiser than his cousins the Osceola, the Merriam’s, or the Rio it’s just that the environment that he’s in can make him unpredictable at times. For the most part you can’t predict what he’ll do during his daily routine if he is undisturbed. If I hunt Merriam’s, I can determine where they go and where they’ll be at; If I hunt Rios, I know that I can call them from long distances and get them to come; If I hunt Osceola’s, I know if I go to certain areas, I can capitalize on those birds. With the Eastern, his daily routine can change with the slightest change in weather or a slight change in predator pressure, human’s being one of them, so I’m going to say that the Eastern is the most challenging and the one I enjoy to hunt the most.

Do you hunt turkeys the spring season, fall season or both? Which do you think is the easiest season to hunt them in?

Mark: I enjoy hunting them in the spring the most, but fall has it’s challenges. Sometimes in the fall, I just call them in and don’t harvest them. At that time of year (fall), the long beards are in bachelor groups and it makes it a little more difficult to find and hunt them. During the spring time a gobbler’s vocalization is probably 90% gobbling and that is what everyone enjoys so much about hunting them in the spring, the birds are just so vocal. In the fall it’s a different type of hunting, in the fall they are surviving, they aren’t worried about breeding, so it makes it more of a challenge, which makes me love to get out there and hunt the fall too. If you just want to go out and kill a turkey in the fall by breaking up a family group (jennys, jakes, hens) that’s pretty easy, but if you target a bachelor group and try to get a long beard get ready for some schooling from those timber barons, it’s very challenging.

How many states and countries have you hunted turkeys in? What is your favorite state/country to hunt?

Mark: What people don’t realize is that the wild turkey, the American Turkey is a native bird to this country, there are turkeys in other countries, but for the most part the U.S. and Mexico is where you’ll find the wild turkey. I have hunted many states. I’ve hunted all of the states on the East Coast, except for Rhode Island. I’ve hunted out west, in Texas, Oklahoma, Wyoming, North Dakota, and South Dakota. I try each year to go to a different state to try something different. Avery® has helped out with a lot of this through the pro-staffers that I’ve met and then who have opened up their house to me and allowed me to stay with them while I am hunting their state.

My favorite state has to be South Carolina. In South Carolina there is a five bird limit and the fact that you can shoot two birds in the same day in some counties. It’s more than that though, the friendships I’ve acquired with some of the locals in the areas is what keeps me going back. The Collins family specifically; I really enjoy going there for a week and spending time with them. They are down to earth people that make me feel like family and treat any of my friends I bring the same way. New York’s Southern Tier is a close second, there are a lot of turkeys in New York and my wife’s family is from there.

Can you provide a tip for the readers? What is the best way to determine the age of a turkey you’ve harvested?

Mark: To determine the age of a turkey, the best way is to look at his spur length. Beard length can change from year to year. Beard length varies due to mites, weather – it can freeze and break off, the length of his legs – a tall turkey usually has a longer beard. So to determine age, it’s best done by spur length. A first year bird will pretty much just have little nubs for spurs. I like to say that he’ll have the size of a chocolate chip and no larger than a candy corn. A year to two year old bird is going to have roughly ¾ inch spurs. Older birds will have 1 inch or 1 ¼ inch spurs. A 1 ½ inch spur length is a very old bird, probably three to four years old.

So then what is an old turkey?

Mark: Most turkeys don’t make it to an old age. I’m not saying that they all don’t, as people have documented ten and twelve year old birds, but you have to remember that since he’s been knee high to a grass hopper some things been trying to get him, a hawk, a coyote, or a fox. A turkey is one of the best food sources in the wild, I mean everybody loves turkey. So he’s constantly being chased. A lot of them don’t make it when they are first born; a hen will have a clutch of anywhere from ten to twelve eggs, but come winter time, she may be down to three or four offspring. Some are even lost to owls on the roost and then there are hunters. Normally they don’t make it more than four or five years. So the average big tom you are chasing is probably between three and four years old, maybe five, but typically most birds are two years old that are harvested.

How did you get into making turkey calls? Have you ever competed in calling competitions?

Mark: That is a really good question, it wasn’t really a situation where I wanted to make a better turkey call, it was more towards I wanted to make something I built myself that I could go out and harvest a turkey with. In the process of doing this, I found out that different types of materials made different sounds. Weather; humidity levels, rain, and wind affect the sound of certain materials, so I began to produce calls for different situations. For windy days, I designed a glass call that would cut through the wind and get the sound out there. I made a slate call for calm days that was very realistic sounding, but softer. So again it wasn’t really to build a better call, just a call of my own to harvest a turkey with.

When I was eighteen or nineteen years old some of the people from the NWTF pushed me into calling turkeys and I did very well, I was very successful here in Maryland. I was Southern States Champion and Eastern Shore Champion a few years. I always placed in the top 3 or 4 in the state championships in turkey calling and owl hooting. I did a lot of owl hooting with my natural voice, so I always got into those state competitions. As I got older and had more responsibilities and family, I kind of backed out of it and my free time was mostly spent in the woods.

If you had to pick just one type of call to hunt with, which would you pick? Why?

Mark: It most definitely would be a tube call. With a tube call, I can get a lot of volume out of it, on those windy day’s by adjusting the reed or latex and just as quickly as I change it to get volume, I can change it back to get the low end or soft sounds on calm weather. I feel you can make all the sounds of the turkey vocabulary even gobble with a tube call. A totally different sound in the woods, great in high pressure areas. My go to call.

How and when did you become involved with Zink Calls®? What is your role with the company today?

Mark: I’ll tell you how I started out. I did a lot of seminars at Bass Pro and I would do seminars on turkey hunting, as well as, waterfowl hunting while working for Avery Outdoors® Pro-Staff. This is what got me to meet Freddie and Freddie asked me to come on to his pro-staff. What people don’t realize is that the Z-Unit is not so much the best of the best; it’s more of a leadership program. The Z-Unit is made up of guys that Freddie feels are good leaders in their area and guys who can Talk the Talk and still show respect to the industry, it’s not about us, but what we believe in. For example: If you are dealt a tough situation, its how would you deal with that situation and over come it. So it’s not such much as being a great hunter, but a person that is able to be responsible, ethical and understands that is more to it than pulling the trigger when you’re hunting.

Once I was chosen to be on the Z-Unit, my love for turkey hunting seemed to roll into working in the turkey call industry for Freddie. Freddie is very open to everyone’s opinion. We just take the products that we are designing, we all take them out and use them and we give our feedback on them. It’s a group effort, not just one person making the decisions type of situation. All of our opinions come together, which I think give us one of the best products on the market.

What duties do you have with Avery® as a member of their Pro-Staff?

Mark: What has happened with my Avery® status is that when it (pro-staff) first started out, we had regional pro-staffers that was someone in the area that was fairly well known and that could help out at stores, such as Bass Pro, Cabelas, and Sportsman’s Warehouse. They brought me on because I was already doing seminars at Bass Pro and they asked Bass Pro who would be a good person for my area. That is basically how I joined up with Avery®. Once I was with Avery® and our pro-staff became more organized under Rob Jepson, we wanted everyone to be on the same level, which I think is the way to do it. All the pro-staffers are on the same playing field. Our duties are spread out amongst us in each state, so in my state alone, we have several Avery Pro-Staffers®. We have a lot of events here and this allows us to take turns, so we don’t get burned out on it.

How has being affiliated with Zink Calls® and Avery Outdoors® impacted your outdoor career?

Mark: You know, I’ve been on a lot of pro-staff teams throughout my years and I’m forty four years old now. I’ve been on a ton of them, from Nikon to local pro-staffs. What I found out with Avery® was that the guys that I was working shows and whom I was hunting with were just like me. It was the first time, being on a pro-staff team that I didn’t feel like I was the only working the show, I felt like we are all on the same playing field. The friendships that I have acquired over the years from being on the Avery Pro-Staff®, like with David Rearick, Mike Bard, Curt Wilson, and Alex Langbell out weighs what I have received financially for my services from Avery®. The people that I meet and the people that I am able to call friends now and that I hunt with has changed my life totally and as far as how I look at the industry. Before I looked at it all as work and time I was away from family, which it all still is, but now with the friendships I’ve acquired, it makes it all worth it. That is something you just can’t put a price on.

When you aren’t hunting or performing your duties for Zink® and Avery®, what do you do?

Mark: Well believe it or not and what a lot of people don’t understand is that I have a job. I’ve got a financial obligation to my family. So when I’m not out there hunting or promoting for Avery® or Zink® I’m actually working and spending time with my family. In the summer time, I try to spend some extra time with my family camping and as you know there are always things going on at home. So when I’m not hunting, building turkey calls or other industry duties and working, I’m devoting a lot of my time to my family.

What do you feel is your biggest accomplishment in the hunting industry? What are you most proud of?

Mark: I’m going to have to say, hands down, the progress we had with taking the PVA veterans out and some of the events that we’ve established; for example the Zink’s Handicappable Dove Hunt, which is now a big yearly event that we are doing. So what we’re a doing for the handicapped hunters is my biggest accomplishment.

What words of wisdom do you have for the young hunters out there?

Mark: Do well in school. Serve God and country. Well youth hunts are an important part of my life, as I try to take as many kids out to get them introduced to turkey hunting or waterfowl hunting. I truly believe that the seed we plant today in that young hunters mind is going to help them out later in life. Just respect for the land, to understand how to be an ethical hunter, it’s the things we show them now, that later in life they can take with them and show someone else. I think it’s our obligation as a hunter to hand down a tradition that was once handed to us.

For more information about Mark Hoke, check out his biographies on the Zink website: www.zinkcalls.com or Avery Outdoor’s website www.averyoutdoors.com. You can also see Mark in the Zink Calls 24-7 Video Series.

For Some Spring Turkey Hunting Tips from Mark, check out our GHHC Fowl Article:
Tips For Hunting Spring Tukeys

Mark Hoke and Jimmy Wren Filming in Mark's Favorite State, South Carolina...

©Kenny Gray