I have pasted a post from my blog below, I thought it might be a reminder of why we love this sport, even amidst our differences
It's coming, Spring activities and TURKEY SEASON, YES!
Posted on April 16, 2020 by antioch46
April is always a highlight month for me. So many good things happening and to do. Fishing is picking up, birds are singing and nesting, morel mushrooms come up, planting garden, flowers blooming and of course Turkey Season!
Turkey hunting is one of my two most favored outdoor activities, along with fishing. These are two big ingredients in who I am as a person. After my faith and family they are pretty high on my list of what gets the bulk of my attention. Being in the woods, on the water and along the streams just make me feel complete and close to God.
Hunting was always a heritage in our family and I grew up squirrel and rabbit hunting on the family farms with my dad. As I became a teenager I was intrigued with bird hunting and soon took up the challenge of hunting Ruffed Grouse. They were considered a tough bird to accurately shoot and I loved the challenge. There were plenty of them around our farm and community. I became better than average at bagging them and they got most of my hunting time. Early in the 1970s we began to see a new bird in our woods, Wild Turkeys, and they intrigued me. I was amazed at the first one I ever saw on my cousin's farm. It was like seeing a dinosaur, because they had disappeared many years before my time. where did this huge bird come from. I soon learned that the Ohio Division of wildlife was reintroducing them and trying to establish a viable population.
If you want to read a detailed account of the turkey's success story you can do it here (it's an older paper, but relevant)
http://ohionwtf.org/assets/Uploads/TurkeyPubs/The%20Wild%20Turkey%20Past%20Present%20and%20Future%20in%20Ohio.pdfIn the late 60s they had successfully established enough turkeys to allow very limited hunting. BY 1971 I was ready to try it. I was absolutely addicted as soon as I tried it. What other animal had I ever hunted that I could communicate with and the sound of that thundering gobble echoing through the hills was electric. Besides that I found out they were delicious to eat. It wasn't just bagging a turkey gobbler that made this so thrilling it was everything you encountered while doing so. No other game is hunted in the spring when all of nature is coming to life.We hunt turkeys in the spring because of the opportunity to interact with the gobblers. Only males are legal and the season doesn't start until most of the hens are sitting on nest. The gobbler is then expendable in the population. There is science behind hunting.
While turkey hunting I have seen and done so many things that are not a part of bagging a Gobbler, and that is what makes it so great. Among these is finding morel mushrooms. The most delicious plant God ever created. I have seen many rare birds, young of many species, so many beautiful wild flowers and the blooms of the dogwoods and redbud trees are spectacular. So much is happening in the spring woods, that if your bored your just not paying attention. It's not just bagging a turkey!
I have devoted much of my life to being a Stewart of the land. I have always loved everything outdoors and been drawn to it from birth. I could always be found doing something outdoorsy. My grandfather had been involved with forestry as a fire warden, my dad farmed and developed seed corn varieties and cousins had a large tree farm we worked on with them. I never wanted to do anything but work in the outdoors. So I studied Parks and Wildlife Management in College and started work with Ohio Division of Forestry the day after I graduated High School. My career took me through three years with forestry (two at a state forest and one at a state Nursery), then 5 years with a private nursery and sporting goods company and finally I settled in at a State Fish Hatchery in 1979. I spent the next 28 years there, becoming Superintendent in 1985 and retiring from that position in 2006. It was a dream career and I got to do so much for all the resources I loved. From stocking game fish to propagating and reintroducing endangered species and working with all kinds of Wildlife projects it was an honor to serve the people and sportsmen of Ohio. It fulfilled what God had put in my heart as a youth.
Most of what I have talked about above is funded by Hunters and fisher-people through license fees and excise tax on outdoor gear (through the Pitman-Robertson and Dingle Johnson Acts of congress)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pittman%E2%80%93Robertson_Federal_Aid_in_Wildlife_Restoration_Acthttps://www.fws.gov/wsfrprograms/Subpages/GrantPrograms/SFR/SFR_Act.htmNo general tax dollars are spent on Division of Wildlife funding. If you are not a hunter or angler you can still support wildlife through doantions on your state tax or through Ohio DNR
http://wildlife.ohiodnr.gov/about-contacts/support-ohios-wildlife
