Bird Patterns are changing......

[mac43rn]

I have 3 areas around my house, but one trailcam has been capturing the same birds literally every single day for the last 8 weeks.  I have the plotwatcher Pro.  Birds come off the roost at 6:20 strut around and then work their way across the corn field where I plan to setup.  Seems so easy right? 

The last two days my camera did not capture a single photo of a turkey in that field.  Their roost tree used to be filled with 30-40 birds, now there are only 3-4 birds. 

On April 8th (Tuesday) we had 5 strutters in the fields.  They were out there in the fields all day long.  The last two days.....nothing.  Not one bird on camera.  We do not start until a week from Saturday. 

I guess my question is.....what the hell is going on?  I really thought this year was going to be so simple.  Do Turkey typically find a new roosting tree? 

Any help would be greatly appreciated.  If I get a Tom great, but my first objective is to get my children to put a bird down.  Anything after that is gravy. 

Thanks again. 

[Skeeterbait]

Sounds to me like your seeing the typical change from winter habits to spring breeding habits.  In the winter it is typical to see them flocked up in large groups.  As spring breeding time nears the groups break up and dominate toms stake out areas with preferred strutt zones.  Lesser toms either remain near a dominate tom if they dont challenge him or wander around.  This is why deer hunters often think they can tell you exactly where you should hunt because they saw tons of turkeys all winter, but they arent in the same place come spring.  They will spread out and some may move several miles from where they were all winter.

[cphill]

Skeeterbait hit the nail on the head . Farmers will do the same tell u yea they been in this field every morning problem is that was all winter not spring

Sent from my C771 using Tapatalk 2

[jakesdad]

Same thing happens here every year too.Good thing is if your lucky enough to have a decent sized enough piece of property to hunt on around the area you've been seeing them,chances are they didnt go real far.The birds we see and get on camera all winter in our fields but seem to disappear in the spring are usually within a 1/4 to 1/2 mile radius of our fields on the adjoining neighbors.Not sure how it is in your area but thats how it seems to pan out around here.Im in NE Missouri in a mix of crop and timber.

[Green Trumpeter]

Agreed, sounds to me like they are dispersing and settling into their spring habitats.  Even during the spring in my area the birds tend to change their habits fairly often.  If I find birds are repeating the same routine two days in a row, I try and get on them quick because within the week their pattern will likely have changed.