Aging Osceola

[ManfromGreenSwamp]

Fell free to chime in...
After many years in wildlife biology in Florida and handling hundreds, upon hundreds of Osceola gobblers in the feild, I'm no better than the next guy at aging turkeys.

Here in Florida we can have super spurs. A "heavy" bird will be 20-22 pounds. A "good" beard, anything over say 10, but definitely in the 11"+ range are the lowest percent of birds checked.
When it comes to spurs, "great" hooks will be anything over 1.25" and sharp.

My question is, while I know they break and wear and all birds are different, especially the environment, or ecosystem...
What do you guys think the age of a bird is with say 1.5"? What about a 1.875? 2.0"??
Is there really a difference at this point, or do we're continue to claim all birds with 1.25" spurs are 4+ years old?

Photo for discussion.

I'm of the mindset the oldest, "best" birds have first sized heads. That's what sticks out to me the most.



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[Southernson13]

While most biologists agree there is no direct correlation between length and age I think it's sort of like deer teeth. Identifying that 3 year old is easy. Past 3 years old your odds of properly identifying age is a guessing game. Same with turkeys. Anything over 1 inch is a mature bird. Other than that it's just a crap shoot

[camotoe]

I wonder if u had the foot splayed out would there be a size difference pertaining to spur size ?


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[camotoe]

Big foot big ??


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[ManfromGreenSwamp]

Big foot big ??


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I've measured toes...they seem to be very similar in length, leg length has some variation but could be genetic?


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[GobbleNut]

I am certainly no expert on Osceola's having only hunted them four times over the years.  As far as spurs go, they are in a class by themselves overall.  However, if I was to speculate, I think you have them lined up, left to right, in the order of their age,...the left bird being a two-year-old and the others being 3+. 

My only real reason in participating in this discussion is to give some insights into how those spurs would compare to the Merriam's in the country I hunt.  In this country, the left bird would be a minimum of four years old, IMO.  The others,...no telling,...but definitely much, much older.  In fact, in my 55 years of Merriam's hunting here,...and looking over probably five hundred or more Merriam's gobblers, I have only seen three birds with spurs anywhere close to the three on the right,...and with all three being similar to the cut-off leg 2nd from the right.  Never seen one with spurs like the far right and would be skeptical about whether they even exist here. 

...Just an observation for what it is worth....

[silvestris]

I never worry about age among adult turkeys anymore.  He is a good one or a really good one.  I thought more about age when I had the opportunity to hunt the same private ground and knew the individual turkeys.  Aging them and identifying them by their gobble is good enough for me.  I go for the high, shrill gobble over the garbled ones.

[HartClemson99]

20+ years ago when I was a wildlife biology student, some of the only documented information on spur length in relation to age was done by Lovett Williams down in South Florida.  More research is coming out and spur length may be more of a factor of genetics than age from 2 years on as previously thought.  The gents in this video are two of the best wild turkey biology minds out there today.  Listen to what Michael from UGA has to say concerning the subject at about 7:30 in this facebook post they did last week:

https://www.facebook.com/LSUAgCenter/videos/1252917584912840/

[ManfromGreenSwamp]

20+ years ago when I was a wildlife biology student, some of the only documented information on spur length in relation to age was done by Lovett Williams down in South Florida.  More research is coming out and spur length may be more of a factor of genetics than age from 2 years on as previously thought.  The gents in this video are two of the best wild turkey biology minds out there today.  Listen to what Michael from UGA has to say concerning the subject at about 7:30 in this facebook post they did last week:

https://www.facebook.com/LSUAgCenter/videos/1252917584912840/

Thank you for posting!


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[Old Gobbler]

Being from florida I've seen hundreds of specimens in the last 35 years from me , family and friends

Ive seen 2y/o gobblers with 1& 3/8 spurs with amber tipped 9 inch beard ....

After 3 years it's only guess work , I've killed a few 1 &5/8 and my guess they are 4 year or more

30 years ago shooting birds like this was very common in south central  , now with all the pressure on public and private ...its getting more rare .....takes genetics....nutrition ...and time to get big spurs

[dzsmith]

id say simply genetics personally. I think where im from in Mississippi its easy to identify a bird under 3 years of age simply by what you already said. Small head, spurs under an inch. However ive seen some giant headed, giant fan....excessively low body weight gobblers with 1 1/8-1 1/4 spurs that I figure to be old birds and that's as good as they got. Killed a public bird that wouldn't gobble a few years ago. he weighed 13lbs when a 2 year old bird anywhere in the state averages 16-18lbs. I guessed that bird to be about as old as they get. also anything over 1.25" on a Mississippi eastern is rare where I hunt....though people seem to be killing more and more of them. the first Osceola I killed has 1 1/8 needle point spurs. there was no doubt it was a 2 year old bird. 9" pencil beard. tiny feet. and 14lbs....the second one weighed 17.9lbs had 1 3/8 thick needle point spurs, and a ragged pencil 7" beard. The guy who leased the property told me 18lb birds were about as heavy as it got in that area on his property. Flaggler county, and he sold hunts off his lease and kept up with the stats from year to year. I don't truly know how old the bird was personally, but when they dropped me off at the gate that morning they told me, theres one old bird here, and he keeps the others away, nobody can kill him.....well I killed him by 830 that morning. they believed him to be old and were a bit surprised he didn't have slightly bigger spurs but even here 1.5 were pretty rare.