Turkey Population

[hickslawns]

I can say I saw this tag reduction coming a mile away when a certain person started posting on other forums crying about no turkeys yet the same person for years showed off him and his 40 friends taking 2 birds a piece……

When them Turkeys dried up tho bamooo tag reduction… rolling my eyes if people feel it was because of hunters complaint.

Cheers best of luck out there and FJB!

So I'm not the only one who noticed? Interesting.

@"J" I've seen turkey carcass in the woods more than once and we are very low turkey density here. Hard saying if caused by predators or just unrecovered birds.

 

[Spencie]

Skunks, possums, Raccoons and Black Rat snakes. Those are your main eggs culprits.

A buddy had a cam on a turkey nest. Crows ate 5 of the 8 eggs.

 

[LonewolfNopack]

A buddy had a cam on a turkey nest. Crows ate 5 of the 8 eggs.

Not surprising. Black vultures are increasing in numbers and are a predator as well.

 

["J"]

Not surprising. Black vultures are increasing in numbers and are a predator as well.

They’re everywhere down here…. You’ll see a half dozen on every roadkill. When they can’t find an easy meal, they’ll create their own…

 

[giles]

They’re everywhere down here…. You’ll see a half dozen on every roadkill. When they can’t find an easy meal, they’ll create their own…

They prefer live or extremely fresh.

 

[Big_Holla]

No one kills crows, coons, opossum, etc. nowadays. Neighbor used to run his coon dogs on our place and hunt them. Then it turned in to run the dogs just to tree them and only kill one's that give them trouble with the dogs. Now he doesn't even do that anymore. Sure wish I could find someone to do it nowadays, heck I'd consider paying them to do it. Shoot what you can when you can legally, even on small parts of land if you do your part at least maybe it can make a difference in a few turkey nests here and there.

 

[LonewolfNopack]

USDA is now offering black vulture permits to select livestock farmers who are experiencing predation.

 

[Jackalope]

We could all kill an unlimited amount of predators on our property but unless our neighbors are doing it on a landscapes level I don't buy that it will help longterm. Just way too many varmints out there, and science has proven that when one is killed its spot is backfilled by immigration. I do think predators are a big cause of this issue but this is nothing new. Turkeys and especially turkey poults and eggs are at the bottom of the food chain. If we had the proper habitat this predation would still happen but not at nearly as high a scale, and the turkeys would be able to rebound naturally and accordingly. Our landscapes have changed, even if it isn't to the naked eye. Theres a 90% chance the woods everyone on here hunts is infested with invasive species that weren't there 10 or 15 years ago. I certainly don't think killing predators is a bad thing, and it may help on a smaller scale, but we need to think big picture as well.

Can confirm. When I moved into this house I had a huge problem with them in the trash cans . At first I was catching singles and doubles on almost a nightly basis. Then after a month, it started to go a few days between catches. After months of trapping the same location, I started getting younger coons. Interestingly enough my sow to boar ratio was like 10 to 1. Still can't figure that one out. All total in the first 6 months I trapped 38 coons. For the past year, I only set traps when I notice the bags in the cans are torn up. About once every two weeks or so and I'll usually catch a single female.

I think the fall in numbers is a complex and multifaceted problem that can't be blamed on predation alone. Invasive, especially amur honeysuckle has severely hurt productive nesting areas and made the forest floor devoid of food and suitable habitat. Habitat loss combined with completely inconsiderate farming practices such as overuse of herbicides, clearing of fence rows, and not giving two shits about nitrate runoff I predict has a large impact also. I have long since been an advocate for making farmers responsible for nitrate run-off stream pollution the same as if they backed the tank up to the stream and poured it in themselves. I think they should be charged based on the watershed of the land and nitrate-based fertilizer consumption. Reduction in annual charges can be credited for reduced nitrate usage and planting of cover crops, especially ones that produce nitrogen to offset needed applications. There should also be repercussions for removal of trees and vegitation along creeks that help remove and reduce that runoff. Once upon a time farmers cared about the land and tried to be good stewards of it. Now I don't think they give a shit as long as the dirt can be amended via chemicals to produce higher yields of corn and beans

 

[giles]

I am a crow shooting mofo! Love shooting them noisy bastards. If you leave them lay, the others won't come back. So you gotta pick them up if you want to kill another one. They also respond great to distress calls of any kind.

 

["J"]

USDA is now offering black vulture permits to select livestock farmers who are experiencing predation.

Long time coming!

 

["J"]

I am a crow shooting mofo! Love shooting them noisy bastards. If you leave them lay, the others won't come back. So you gotta pick them up if you want to kill another one. They also respond great to distress calls of any kind.

If you hang a black vulture from a tree, you’ll see the local ones move on…. Or so I’ve heard….

 

[Jackalope]

 

[ThatBuckeyeGuy]

A buddy had a cam on a turkey nest. Crows ate 5 of the 8 eggs.

When I was young we had an older gentleman come out and crow hunt the farm. That was years ago , he's the only person I ever knew that actually hunted them. I pop them when given the opportunity but now I'll make it more of a habit