Air turkey?

[Colt45]

I'll be going to southern Florida in a month and a half for an Osceola and, was wondering how I can get the bird home if I fly down? Will the airline allow me to bring a frozen bird back with me? Should I just ship it? Any advice would be appreciated!

[guesswho]

Not sure.  But I like your confidence.

[Matt.Wilson]

Southwest will.  No dry ice, and the ice (regular) has to be in bags that won't leak.  Get the double zipper bags

[Kevin6Q]

I've never shipped a bird but did move a lot of soil samples from ag projects. Fed-Ex will allow dry ice and if you freeze the bird on dry ice it will be COLD and some more DI in the packaging will help. Pop it into a throw away styro beer cooler packed with DI and put that into a cardboard box. This should get you 48-72 hours. The downside is the cost. It will be about $100 which might also be what the airline charges for additional packages. The upside is dry ice is dry so no leaks and it is also really cold (-109F) so should last a lot longer then if you have water ice and delays. DI can be dificult to find but most ice suppliers carry it or know where to find the stuff.

Best of luck on the hunt.

[Colt45]

Thanks for the input! You've given me a few options now all I have to do is connect in one!

[shaman]

If you mean to taxi the bird, give it to a taxidermist down there and be done with it.

If you mean to eat it, I'd eat it down there, and be done with it. That way it needs no regurgifration, no dry ice, and you can carry it straight through without hassle from the airline.

Cheap, simple, no muss no fuss, and no trying to explain to the TSA agent that your  wild turkey on a leash is a service animal.  It doesn't work. Don't ask me how I know.

[g8rvet]

We bring back a cooler full of ducks every year from Canada.  Easy peasy.  Just freeze the meat first and pack it in a cooler.  Counts as one of your checked bags. Only problem is with your gun case and bag,that makes 3 checked and that gets expensive. If there are 2 of you going, two guns to the gun case and one can check it and one can check the cooler and put both birds in the cooler.  I have also carried my own limit in a carry on bag.  Freeze it first and it will be cold when you get home. When traveling alone once, I used a small soft sided cooler. Would easily fit a turkey, maybe 2!  Just make sure you have no other carry on.  I used my blind bag to carry the stuff I wanted on the flight, put the soft sided cooler in the bin overhead and put the bag at my feet. If women get to not count a purse, we should too!    You can also curbside check the soft sided cooler and not have to worry until your destination. It is colder under there anyways.

If for Taxidermy, then I agree, ship it done. 

[GobbleNut]

 The simplest thing to do is to learn how to cape your birds,...which is really easy to do,...and then you can put the cape in your regular checked baggage or even a carry-on.  That way you don't have to make any special arrangements for shipping, and you have no added costs whatsoever. 

The fear of messing up the cape by trying to skin the bird yourself is way overblown.  Anyone can learn to do the basic caping process for a mount.  Even if you make some small errors in the process, a good taxidermist will have no problem fixing them.  If you are not confident you can do this, just take some of the birds you kill that you are not planning on mounting and cape them out until you get the hang of it. 

If you kill a bird early in a hunt and it will be a few days before you fly back home, just cape the bird, put it in a plastic garbage bad, and either freeze the cape or keep it on ice until you are ready to fly.  Then just put in in your luggage and you're done.  Once you are back home, you can throw the cape in the freezer until you get it to your taxidermist.