Turkeys struggling?

[FLATHEAD]

The pines have always been there and limt was fine for years...its something else. I do think lack of trapping has something to do with it...from the time that egg hits the ground something is after it.

The #'s of pine acreage has been increasing and maybe the limits have finally taken their toll.
I really dont think it's just one thing that has caused it. Those I mentioned may not be the root cause,
but they sure dont help.
The pine monoculture may as well be habitat destruction IMO. Back in the day, South Bama used to
produce some absolutely giant whitetail. But turning our row crops into rows of pines have put a
serious damper on that.
I'm looking at buying some land and it's hard to find any that isn't one big pine plantation, or was
a pine plantation but has been logged and re planted in pines. Not exactly diverse habitat, which
is what Turkey and Deer need.

 

[dtrkyman]

Death by a thousand cuts is the turkey's issue. Habitat at the top of the list, predators, lack of trapping predators now, Avian predators a large issue. Hunting them too early in the breeding season seems to be an issue according to some biologists.

https://www.realtree.com/turkey-hunting/articles/are-turkey-seasons-opening-too-soon

 

[FLATHEAD]

Hope they dont go the way of the Bobwhite.
I dont guess anybody ever figured what happened there.

 

[MJB]

Doing good where I'm at no drought for the last few years and lots of tall grass and acorns everywhere.

Don't forget birds of prey take many birds, I've seen it first hand.

Good thing they have more than one hatching. We have tripled our numbers in two years before then 3 years of nothing.

 

[Southern Heritage]

I definitely see our numbers lower but noticed it does this in cycles.
habitat is very important
predator control is very important
we had a 5 bird limit and I just don’t see it as a issues. Out of 50 or so turkey hunters I know 47 kill one or maybe two birds a year.
as for where to hunt I can’t help you. i thought about trying out west this year just to change it up.

 

[OMB]

Death by a thousand cuts is the turkey's issue. Habitat at the top of the list, predators, lack of trapping predators now, Avian predators a large issue. Hunting them too early in the breeding season seems to be an issue according to some biologists.

https://www.realtree.com/turkey-hunting/articles/are-turkey-seasons-opening-too-soon

Definitely all of those things, plus I think in a lot of upper midwest states they had sort of an ecological explosion as most states didn't started aggressively re-introducing them until the late 1970's/early 1980's. Wisconsin traded Missouri for grouse in the 70's, turkeys were re-introduced and now I believe they're in every county of the state (while the opposite has turned out for the grouse I might add.) Having land in two states, it definitely feels like 1998-2008 was peak turkey population in our areas, which also coincidentally aligns with our highest deer harvest numbers. Loss of excellent habitat (less logging and every farmer slash and burning every last piece of cover to get one more row of corn in ) and less predators probably play the biggest part in this part of the world.

I think just like everything else, we've become so much more effective at killing birds than we were 10 or 20 years ago. There was a thread posted recently about TSS loads to take birds at 70+ yards plus and when I grew up turkey hunting, shooting past 40 just wasn't a thing. Nobody was really fanning toms, we didn't use red dot sights, and we didn't have great pop up ground blinds and life like decoys available to the masses. Probably going to be another case where we're either going to have to cut back on technology or cut back on opportunity.

 

[huntineveryday]

The number of turkeys in southwest Nabraska are down compared to what they were from like 2008-2012, but they are still way better than they were prior to 2005ish. When I was a kid the dry creekbottom along my grandparents would maybe get a jake or two that would wander through in mid-May, but that was about it. It was that way up through the early 2000's. By the time I graduated from college in 2010 there were about 100 that wintered there, with flocks spread about every mile along that creekbottom in the spring. It was like that all over that part of the state. Now the numbers have dropped back down and there are probably around 45-55 turkeys that winter there. Within a couple years of turkeys showing up, so did bobcats. I'm sure that foxes, coyotes, avian predators, and nest destroying animals all increased in numbers, then they did well, which knocked turkeys back a bit. So yeah, the numbers are down, but it's hard to say how much they are really decreasing there and how much they are just starting to find thier normal balance on that landscape.

I will say this, the turkeys that I like to hunt there, and here in South central Nebraska, and up in the sandhills...they are all in smaller isolated flocks that you could have a really negative impact on if you aren't paying attention. You could potentially shoot all of the older, breeding toms out of a flock and leave the hens with only jakes that can't reproduce yet. You do that on 2 of the 3 flocks on the 2 miles of creeckbottom you're hunting and it's going to have an impact on those next few years. Being able to get three tags and hunt while the birds are still breeding sets you up for that potential problem. Scouting to know how many mature toms are in an area and being aware of the breeding activities of turkeys is important if you are limited to smaller properties or single areas to hunt.

 

[Zappaman]

Huntingeveryday has an excellent point here: when they were introduced (also here in Kansas) they exploded for about 10-15 years with optimal condition a less preditors... but this might just be an "adjustment" period where we are getting to sustainable levels.

Still, I am ALL FOR more predator control BY HUNTERS AND TRAPPERS. That said, I'd think an incentive to those hunters (small state sponsored fee paid per skull) would be a great program to revisit... it sure helped keep coyotes down in eastern NM where we raised about 6000 sheep (and about the same in goats) back in the 70-80s. State trappers were also VERY good at their job then, and when they got let go in about 1990- lamb crops went from 95% to 70% in a few short years (when we got out of ranching).

 

[Jimss]

Hopefully with turkey numbers dropping, the predator numbers will also follow suit? If not, turkeys may be in big trouble! Boy, I've been pretty spooked especially in Nebraska where quotas remain the same. It's pretty sad to have 3 tom limits in the spring when turkey numbers are so low? Also having either sex turkey tags in the fall? Hopefully the game and fish wakes up and at least eliminates hen tags in the fall.

 

[deerhunt1988]

Hopefully with turkey numbers dropping, the predator numbers will also follow suit? If not, turkeys may be in big trouble! Boy, I've been pretty spooked especially in Nebraska where quotas remain the same. It's pretty sad to have 3 tom limits in the spring when turkey numbers are so low? Also having either sex turkey tags in the fall? Hopefully the game and fish wakes up and at least eliminates hen tags in the fall.

Hopefully Nebraska hasn't gotten too greedy with the license revenue non-residents bring into the state...They were REALLY pushing their 3-bird limit and public land opportunities through advertising in the mid 2010s. Pretty much the only state game and fish agency you'd see advertising turkey hunting, particularly to non-residents, at the time. I remember seeing full page ads in hunting magazines and elsewhere. I first hunted public land in Nebraska in 2012, and I can tell ya, the hunting pressure on public land (mostly non-residents) is over twice what is was a decade ago! Their advertising seems to have worked.....

 

[doc holiday13]

knocking down predator population is key to increasing turkey population. Its said that racoon population is at an all time time high

 

[Jimss]

1988, I agree about nonres hunting pressure! A buddy of mine just started his own outfitting business in Nebraska. He said his phone was loaded last year with nonres needing a place to hunt. Many of them had been hunting private land with 0 luck from so much hunting pressure. Unfortunately the same thing is likely true in all states with public land and OTC tags. Unfortunately the turkeys are the ones that take it literally on the head! Here in Colo I climb cliffs in the dark and hike around 4 miles in to get away from OTC turkey hunters. I never saw another sole until the last couple years.

 

[dtrkyman]

I was fortunate enough to hunt Nebraska in it's prime, you literally had to be hidden and ready to shoot if you made a turkey call, there were that many eager and stupid birds!

Several years of increased pressure and harvest and that came to a halt! Even where bid numbers were still really good hunting was tough, highly educated birds. I actually enjoy hunting "tough" birds, but when you have limited time and travel hundreds of miles it makes it tough to commit to an area.

Good thing is everyone is currently talking about the issue and many are trying to do something about it!

With the crazy amount of coons maybe they are in for a disease issue that would wipe em out for a while again?

 

[Biggie]

They're down everywhere I hunt. In KS a handful of flocks have remained stable but most are down 75% or more in the past 5 years. Moving all but two units to one birds put a lot of pressure on the public birds in those units that still allow two. Within two weeks of shotgun opening I witnessed several flocks where the jakes ran the show because all of the toms were shot. The outfitters who are now in the one bird units started moving their operations NW and leasing up previously accessible ground. Often times there would be 4+ people hunting a single gobbler on land you'd maybe see one or two hunters on all season.

Still some strong winter flocks in NE but many have all but disappeared in the last 5 years. We still have success but it comes from several years of hunting the same area and knowing how those birds travel the properties throughout the day. Going in blind now would be rough. It used to be that you could go up in May and shoot a couple birds in a weekend with little effort. This year pressure was high all season and by May the public areas were void of turkeys. Every year the pressure has crept up thanks to all of the advertising by the state and idiots telling the world where they hunt on the internet.

SD really depends on the area of the state but since they actually limit tag numbers and adjust them yearly hunting remains fair if you can get a tag. I can't personally speak for the black hills but those I know that hunt the area say pressure keeps going up.

I love to travel for turkeys but it's time to get rid of all of these OTC NR tags. Too many big swings in hunting pressure caused by people with GoPros strapped to their heads.

 

[Laramie]

Of course they're are a lot of factors but I call bs on environmental. Turkey populations have crashed basically everywhere and we all know the weather varies drastically from region to region. The only constant is the drastic drop in fur prices meaning drastically fewer people out trapping. Raccoons and opossums are the worst nest robbers. Need a bad case of distemper to run through because trappers aren't going to be enough anytime soon. The Russia Ukraine war is likely to set the for industry back 5+years. No economy in Russia = no for trade.

 

[roosiebull]

Huntingeveryday has an excellent point here: when they were introduced (also here in Kansas) they exploded for about 10-15 years with optimal condition a less preditors... but this might just be an "adjustment" period where we are getting to sustainable levels.

i think the term i have heard for this phenomena is "eruptive dynamic" where a series of non natural things all line up perfect for a species, they boom, then things adjust back to natural levels, and that perfect storm that happened will likely never happen again.... around here, some of the old timers are pretty doom and gloom about blacktail numbers, because they were able to be around for the logging boom, and explosion in blacktail numbers.... they want to manage for the "eruptive dynamic" numbers even though it's impossible to get there.... pre logging boom, there were hardly any blacktail around at all..... what do we manage for? don't want to sell ourselves short and manage for pre logging boom numbers, but also don't want to manage based on the unnatural explosion in numbers with the logging boom..... where do we set the bar?

same kind of thing, and i assume you are right.... now for you in Kansas, what is a realistic healthy turkey population look like? sounds like maybe current populations are a realistic baseline?