What’s happening to our precious Turkey’s

[Tom007]

I was recently listening to a podcast. There was a gentlemen on there that said they put cameras on 228 ground nests in an area. This included grouse,Qual and turkey. The number of nests that survived from 228 was "0". Most where eaten by nest predators,skunk,possum and racoon. A few where taken by coyotes and a few of the hens also where taken by coyotes.

If this does not sound like a problem then nothing will.
Be interesting to see how many trapping licenses sell in your state compared to 20yrs ago when turkeys where booming.

Wow, this is scary....

[mountainhunter1]

I live in North Georgia. Have been hunting turkeys for well over thirty years and still have a lot to learn. That said, smart or not, it is clear in our state it is four major things that have hurt our turkey hunting.

Predators - Man - Chicken litter on pastures - and fourth and last "TIMING" of controlled burns.

I am not so worried about predators killing too many adult turkeys, but man the evidence of them destroying nests is very abundant. I am finding the most evidence ever of that in recent years.

Man is a problem - as we are ever taking more habitat just to have a place work and to sleep, but things like TSS have changed the landscape in huge ways. I hear almost weekly during the season about guys killing birds at 60-80 yards (which is crazy anyway). Used to be that just was not happening with the old Winchester XX or Federal Premium, etc. that you just hoped would kill a bird at 40 yards. I remember those days. I know, I know, the choke industry has changed and now even the XX loads will reach out further. But Chester is right, man is a big factor.

No doubt the chicken litter on pastures is killing turkeys. They are supposedly gathering evidence to say just how big of a factor that is.

Controlled burns are very beneficial, but the TIMING of them can be very detrimental. Burning during the heart of the nesting season is not a good idea in my estimation any way you figure it. Why not start in late December and wrap it up by late February instead of burning when the majority of nesting is occurring?

[BDeal]

We are seeing more coyotes than ever. On one of my last hunts of the year I had a coyote charge a decoy. Unfortunately he veered off at the last second and by the time I got the gun up he was 60 yards away and on the run.

[mountainhunter1]

Wildlife is behind the eight ball because of a lack of leadership in today's America. Just this week, our President stated that a 9mm is a high powered caliber. My point, we have too many folks in leadership making decisions about things they know little to nothing about. So don't expect them to make a lot of changes to really help the turkeys out. Guys like MC are good guys, but I wonder if there are enough of those type guys left to move the needle as you are hoping to see.

I also remember the days when if you saw a game warden, he was dirty and sweating. They used to only use the truck to get to a spot to bust their butt to do some work to improve the forest. I realize that there are still some good ones out there, so please don't take offense, and I also realize that they are often understaffed these days due to the lack of leadership I mentioned above - but that said today most game wardens work from their quad cab truck and the most used tool they have is a stainless steel cup to hold their coffee. To be fair to those guys, they are likely just taking marching orders from the lack of leadership guys who are above their head who desire to see little done to help the wildlife and especially to make sure the hunter is not helped in anyway. Trust me, it is a small percentage of our government (state level/or national level) who desires to help the hunter in anyway. So don't expect them to do many great things to help the turkey or those hunting them.

[Paulmyr]

From what I understand the reason they burn during the growing season is that's when it has the most impact to the woody invasives that are not conducive to good nesting and brood rearing habitat. Burning during the dormant season does little control these invasives. Studies have shown on lands with burning schedules by the time it's ready to burn the hens aren't using the habitat because it's not very good. There maybe some short term detrimental effect but the long term effects far out way it.

[Paulmyr]

Studies have have also shown the  size of the burn is more relevant. After a burn get over a certain acreage, don't remember the exact number but it's in the thousands, it will start to have an impact. So I think it's not timing we should be concerned with but the actual size of the burn. My guess is because what  habitat that's good for brood rearing and nesting gets incapsulated in these larger burns.

[Sixes]

A  lot of good theories and I agree with a lot of them.

But, what I saw happen on a 10K acre quail plantation was in no way a gradual thing. It happened from one season to the next, huge population down, I would guess 85-90%, and the following year, we left our hunt a few days early because we found 0 sign of any type of turkey.

This plantation is managed for quail. It is burned yearly in sections before the nesting season, predator control is top notch, plenty of everything a bird needs and wild quail are thriving.

Something happened to the hens and without hens, there are no gobblers being born.

It is not just that plantation, we used to see flocks of turkeys anytime we would ride the surrounding areas, almost every big AG field,creek bottom and hardwood areas had birds everywhere. Then, they disappeared from all of these areas almost overnight.

I hunted there this year and the population is SLOWLY coming back, but the hens are still not back in the big flocks.

The rest of the areas of GA that I hunt have only seen a slight decrease in birds, my primary hunting club still has a decent flock and another area that I hunt has a stable flock. But, as far the area in middle GA where the big plantation is located,  something killed the hens and the only difference that I saw was when the heavy use of manure came back into the scene.

[Dtrkyman]

There is some science behind the timing of controlled burns, burning earlier or later does no promote growth of plants beneficial to turkeys.  Burning at the time of nesting does promote growth of the important plants beneficial to the birds.

I do not know all of the details but I have read that the few nests destroyed by fire are worth the sacrifice for the overall habitat.  Chamberlain discusses this very topic, I do not know the correct answer but I would think he has the studies to back it up.

It is becoming evident that the nest predators is one of the major factors currently.  I do not recall the numbers but DU or Delta did a study on duck nests in the same region, one area was heavily trapped and one was not at all, the nest success was drastically better on the trapped marsh, one of those common sense things but hard data is good to have!

Years ago in central IL. coons got distemper and were wiped out, the turkey hunting over the following 10 or so years was incredible!

[redleg06]

It is becoming evident that the nest predators is one of the major factors currently.  I do not recall the numbers but DU or Delta did a study on duck nests in the same region, one area was heavily trapped and one was not at all, the nest success was drastically better on the trapped marsh, one of those common sense things but hard data is good to have!

Years ago in central IL. coons got distemper and were wiped out, the turkey hunting over the following 10 or so years was incredible!

This is a quote from Sam Zeveloff- A zoologist.  Important to note he's not saying the raccoon population has grown by 15-20%, he's saying it's increased 15-20 fold (which has continued to increase since the 1980's) :

"Zeveloff says the North American raccoon population is estimated to have swelled 15 to 20 times between the 1930s and 1980s. Since then, it has continued to grow as more raccoons colonize not only cities and suburbs but deserts and mountainous areas, where they were once rare."

It's just common sense that the higher the density of predators (nest predators in this case), the lower the chances of survival are on prey.

For example -  If you have an easter egg hunt in a 1 acre field, hide 10 eggs, and send a kid out to find those eggs, they might come back with 50-60% of them (depending how well you hid them and how good the kid is at looking). If you hide the same 10 eggs in the same field and send 10 kids out to find them, what are the chances many eggs don't get picked up?  Point being,  we're seeing more predators out hunting the eggs, per acre/square mile etc, and less eggs hidden in the field to find but, on this egg hunt, we can't go place more eggs in the field to go around but we can sure do our parts to reduce the participants in the egg hunt...

You will hear biologist hint at predator control, and even some of the bigger hunting public figures/corporations etc. but in this climate with PETA lunatics around every corner, a society that largely doesn't like or understand hunting and trapping, you aren't going to hear many people just come out and say that we need to take out predators. They'll say we need to reduce bag limits on hunters (we're predators also) because that's more palatable to the general public, and improve habitat (again, more palatable) but you won't hear much on the trapping from a lot of these people because they can't afford to take that stand. Habitat and hunting definitely contribute to population but 70-80+ % of all turkey are being killed in the egg by nest predators (that's one of the few areas of turkey biology that is pretty well agreed on by everyone). Of the eggs that hatch, only 33% of those poults survive to become juveniles. 

The reality is that if we as turkey hunters (along with quail, and waterfowl hunters) decided to start trapping and making it a priority to reduce the predator population - specifically in the months leading up to nesting season, we'd see higher nest and poult survival, which is the bottleneck behind population decline. Hell, if half of the guys that are willing to go to the woods to go shoot turkey would also decide to pick up a trap before the season, it would put a dent in the population but most won't - they'll type about it on a forum or post about it on a facebook group. I hope that's a personal challenge to a lot of the people reading this to get up and do your part.

[Paulmyr]

It is becoming evident that the nest predators is one of the major factors currently.  I do not recall the numbers but DU or Delta did a study on duck nests in the same region, one area was heavily trapped and one was not at all, the nest success was drastically better on the trapped marsh, one of those common sense things but hard data is good to have!

Years ago in central IL. coons got distemper and were wiped out, the turkey hunting over the following 10 or so years was incredible!

This is a quote from Sam Zeveloff- A zoologist.  Important to note he's not saying the raccoon population has grown by 15-20%, he's saying it's increased 15-20 fold (which has continued to increase since the 1980's) :

"Zeveloff says the North American raccoon population is estimated to have swelled 15 to 20 times between the 1930s and 1980s. Since then, it has continued to grow as more raccoons colonize not only cities and suburbs but deserts and mountainous areas, where they were once rare."

It's just common sense that the higher the density of predators (nest predators in this case), the lower the chances of survival are on prey.

For example -  If you have an easter egg hunt in a 1 acre field, hide 10 eggs, and send a kid out to find those eggs, they might come back with 50-60% of them (depending how well you hid them and how good the kid is at looking). If you hide the same 10 eggs in the same field and send 10 kids out to find them, what are the chances many eggs don't get picked up?  Point being,  we're seeing more predators out hunting the eggs, per acre/square mile etc, and less eggs hidden in the field to find but, on this egg hunt, we can't go place more eggs in the field to go around but we can sure do our parts to reduce the participants in the egg hunt...

You will hear biologist hint at predator control, and even some of the bigger hunting public figures/corporations etc. but in this climate with PETA lunatics around every corner, a society that largely doesn't like or understand hunting and trapping, you aren't going to hear many people just come out and say that we need to take out predators. They'll say we need to reduce bag limits on hunters (we're predators also) because that's more palatable to the general public, and improve habitat (again, more palatable) but you won't hear much on the trapping from a lot of these people because they can't afford to take that stand. Habitat and hunting definitely contribute to population but 70-80+ % of all turkey are being killed in the egg by nest predators (that's one of the few areas of turkey biology that is pretty well agreed on by everyone). Of the eggs that hatch, only 33% of those poults survive to become juveniles. 

The reality is that if we as turkey hunters (along with quail, and waterfowl hunters) decided to start trapping and making it a priority to reduce the predator population - specifically in the months leading up to nesting season, we'd see higher nest and poult survival, which is the bottleneck behind population decline. Hell, if half of the guys that are willing to go to the woods to go shoot turkey would also decide to pick up a trap before the season, it would put a dent in the population but most won't - they'll type about it on a forum or post about it on a facebook group. I hope that's a personal challenge to a lot of the people reading this to get up and do your part.

That's a pretty good analogy and I would tend to agree with it. The question I have is why aren't we seeing turkey numbers drop across the board? Why does it only affect certain areas of the country and not others?

[eggshell]

I agree, raccoons are public enemy number 1 in the woods and fields. I am guilty as all heck. Back in the 70s, 80s and early 90s I ran a trap line and I was once a professional grader/partner in a fur auction company. Then the market went bust and we disbanded the company and I hung up my traps. I would work hard to catch 50 raccoons in several miles of trapline a year. Now I can catch 15 to 20 around my garden and barn. On the farm if a raccoon got into the chickens he'd kill several chicken and destroy all the eggs over a couple nights before you caught him. Just think what is happening with the density we have now.

[redleg06]

It is becoming evident that the nest predators is one of the major factors currently.  I do not recall the numbers but DU or Delta did a study on duck nests in the same region, one area was heavily trapped and one was not at all, the nest success was drastically better on the trapped marsh, one of those common sense things but hard data is good to have!

Years ago in central IL. coons got distemper and were wiped out, the turkey hunting over the following 10 or so years was incredible!

This is a quote from Sam Zeveloff- A zoologist.  Important to note he's not saying the raccoon population has grown by 15-20%, he's saying it's increased 15-20 fold (which has continued to increase since the 1980's) :

"Zeveloff says the North American raccoon population is estimated to have swelled 15 to 20 times between the 1930s and 1980s. Since then, it has continued to grow as more raccoons colonize not only cities and suburbs but deserts and mountainous areas, where they were once rare."

It's just common sense that the higher the density of predators (nest predators in this case), the lower the chances of survival are on prey.

For example -  If you have an easter egg hunt in a 1 acre field, hide 10 eggs, and send a kid out to find those eggs, they might come back with 50-60% of them (depending how well you hid them and how good the kid is at looking). If you hide the same 10 eggs in the same field and send 10 kids out to find them, what are the chances many eggs don't get picked up?  Point being,  we're seeing more predators out hunting the eggs, per acre/square mile etc, and less eggs hidden in the field to find but, on this egg hunt, we can't go place more eggs in the field to go around but we can sure do our parts to reduce the participants in the egg hunt...

You will hear biologist hint at predator control, and even some of the bigger hunting public figures/corporations etc. but in this climate with PETA lunatics around every corner, a society that largely doesn't like or understand hunting and trapping, you aren't going to hear many people just come out and say that we need to take out predators. They'll say we need to reduce bag limits on hunters (we're predators also) because that's more palatable to the general public, and improve habitat (again, more palatable) but you won't hear much on the trapping from a lot of these people because they can't afford to take that stand. Habitat and hunting definitely contribute to population but 70-80+ % of all turkey are being killed in the egg by nest predators (that's one of the few areas of turkey biology that is pretty well agreed on by everyone). Of the eggs that hatch, only 33% of those poults survive to become juveniles. 

The reality is that if we as turkey hunters (along with quail, and waterfowl hunters) decided to start trapping and making it a priority to reduce the predator population - specifically in the months leading up to nesting season, we'd see higher nest and poult survival, which is the bottleneck behind population decline. Hell, if half of the guys that are willing to go to the woods to go shoot turkey would also decide to pick up a trap before the season, it would put a dent in the population but most won't - they'll type about it on a forum or post about it on a facebook group. I hope that's a personal challenge to a lot of the people reading this to get up and do your part.

That's a pretty good analogy and I would tend to agree with it. The question I have is why aren't we seeing turkey numbers drop across the board? Why does it only affect certain areas of the country and not others?

I don't know that there are many places around the country that are seeing expanding populations. Definitely some that are more stable than others but I think most areas have seen numbers going the wrong direction.

This is purely theory but it makes sense to me- Like the analogy I gave with the easter egg hunt-  If you have 10 eggs and 10 predators, and they get 80% of the eggs then you have 2 eggs leftover to carry the population going in to next year...and that's a razor this margin for error when you account for hunter pressure, natural mortality, weather, burning, farming practices, other predators, etc. on top of everything else.  But, if you have 100 eggs and the 10 predators still got 80% of them, then you have 20 eggs leftover going in to next year.  Meaning, when you have a bigger number to start with, since the survivors breed and multiply, the felt impact isn't as large when an equal percentage is taken out of the population on a given year (it is when you have multiple years of bad production and high mortality like Oklahoma and parts of Kansas, due to extensive drought and hunting). I believe it's why you've seen the wildlife agencies go to the "super stocking" method for introducing/re-establishing turkey in an area -  Basically they now transplant about 100 turkey into a large tract together vs the old methods of doing 12-15 scattered more sporadically.   

[redleg06]

I agree, raccoons are public enemy number 1 in the woods and fields. I am guilty as all heck. Back in the 70s, 80s and early 90s I ran a trap line and I was once a professional grader/partner in a fur auction company. Then the market went bust and we disbanded the company and I hung up my traps. I would work hard to catch 50 raccoons in several miles of trapline a year. Now I can catch 15 to 20 around my garden and barn. On the farm if a raccoon got into the chickens he'd kill several chicken and destroy all the eggs over a couple nights before you caught him. Just think what is happening with the density we have now.

Yep-  I was tent camping/hunting in the midwest this year and was absolutely surrounded by them every night I was there. You absolutely couldn't leave food open, in or out of the tent, or they would 100% find it.  I just remember thinking, if there was a turkey nest out there in the woods, no chance it made it. There were just too many of them bouncing around searching. 

I used to be really into waterfowl hunting/dog training and had a good lab. I used to be amazed how he could get within 30-50 yds of a specific duck we had shot and swim or run right to it once he smelled it...keep in mind, these weren't ones he had seen, or out in the open field of view, and there may have been 100's of other ducks (all putting out scent) walking or swimming that same ground minutes or hours earlier, but somehow he could smell his way right to that duck. Anyone that's ever worked bird dogs, deer tracking dogs, etc. should have an idea how effective these animals/predators are at finding prey...well, turkey smell and I'm sure concentrated areas like nest smell that much more. Once nest predators have keyed in on a particular type of prey, they become very efficient at seeking them out.  It's hard enough for prey to hide from a few predators but nearly impossible when the predator population density explodes.

[arkrem870]

Nest predation is the elephant in the room. It's also the hardest to control. That's why it's all but ignored by most states dnr and the experts.  The drop in nest success correlates directly with falling fur prices.

[Paulmyr]

Nest predation is the elephant in the room. It's also the hardest to control. That's why it's all but ignored by most states dnr and the experts.  The drop in nest success correlates directly with falling fur prices.

It also correlates in the rise in turkey hunter numbers and the addition of new techniques/ equipment used to harvest them. Pick your poison.