True Rios - How deep in the heartland?

[Northerner]

I am heading up to Northwest Nebraska for merriams in the spring and was wondering if the possibility of chasing true Rio's birds was feasible.  I am guessing the closest would have to be Kansas and was wondering how deep would I have to go to get into non hybrid birds.

Any suggestions on where to go for walk in areas that might hold them?

[mudhen]

North Central Kansas has some really nice Rios these days. 

Nothing we shoot in North Central Nebraska looks much like a Rio, they are either buff Merriam's, or some pretty funky colored hybrids.

This Kansas bird was shot 15 miles south of the NE border in 2011, #25.75 lbs, decent beard:



I've shot pretty pure looking Rio's in Kansas as far east & south as Pittsburg, and they just get more Rio looking as you go west...

mudhen 

[Spring Creek Calls]

This Rio is from KS, shot this spring. The buff feathers are nearly identical to the Black Hills Merriam cape I have in my basement.

[jblackburn]

I have hunted around Smith Center, KS for the last several years, I used to think they were pure Rios, but since I have lived in Oklahoma I am not so sure.  There are variations in color, but the biggest difference is the sound/intensity of the gobbles.  The Rios I hunt in OK have a deeper, booming gobbler (but not as deep or booming as the easterns I grew up chasing in MO), while the KS birds have a higher pitched, almost domestic turkey sounding gobble.

Here is this year's Kansas gobbler



This year's OK gobbler




A little off topic, but this bird was taken in south east OK and is supposed to be and Eastern, but look at the almost white secondary tail feathers.   This bird's running buddy had copper secondary feathers just like the birds in MO.



Long story short, I reallly dont have a good answer!

[busta biggun]

Southern Nebraska has Rios. We saw hundreds of them along the Platte river as we drove across I-80.

[Hooksfan]

Southern Nebraska has Rios. We saw hundreds of them along the Platte river as we drove across I-80.

Saw the same thing.  Hardest thing I ever had to do was drive past all those birds to get to the Pine Ridge to hunt.

Mudhen,
I have also shot Rio/Eastern hybrid colored birds in the Pittsburg area.

[stinkpickle]

North central Kansas definitely has them.  I've hunted along the highway 81 area around Belleville and Concordia and 99% of the birds looked (and sounded) like Rios.  I've seen one or two that might be considered hybrids, but I'm not sure what a bird needs to be considered a "pure" Rio, anyway.

[Wingbone]

I'm beginning to think that somewhere down the evolutionary line, a stray Eastern met up with a stray Merriam somewhere in Oklahoma and spawned the Rio. Reason being I've killed Rios that looked like Merriams, and Rios that look like Easterns and none of them were anywhere near the imaginary boundaries separating the subspecies from each other. My first ones in Kansas seemed too white to be Rios then I found some in Texas to be even lighter. My biggest Rio to date looks like it has Blaze Orange tips on long and short tail feathers and he was hundreds of miles from any Eastern territory. There just seems to be one distinctive characteristic to me of a Rio, they all sound like domestic birds to me, no matter what state I hunt them. It all boils down to this, if the NWTF says you're in Rio country, then you're in Rio country.

[TRKYHTR]

Even "True Rios" are going to have some variations in color phase. If they live like a Rio, Act like a Rio and sound like a Rio, then it must be a Rio. Good luck on your hunt.

TRKYHTR