Missing Wild Turkeys

[AGarbers]

We used to have 20 wild turkeys that hung out at our corn feeders but when I pulled the feeders prepping for deer season, the turkeys left. While we see a turkey every few months, they never returned even though I restarted the feeders after deer season. That was a year ago so by my estimation there should be 30-40 turkeys running around. I am wondering if poaching isn't happening. Turkey are exceedingly prone to poaching if the roost tree is known. I am hoping that isn't the case but I don't have another explanation.

 

[phylodog]

Its possible they found an area they liked better when the feeding stopped and they began to wander. I'm beginning to understand that they aren't quite the creatures of habit I thought they were. We scouted our farm last year in March and had 24-30 birds hanging out in one flock. When opening day rolled around there was not a bird to be found. We hunted for two days with no sightings and no gobbles. Before leaving our farm on the third day to hunt somewhere else I put my drone in the air just out of curiosity and flew the entire area and they were simply not there.

We have turkeys at the moment. We spotted a flock of a dozen hens several times and had two groups of three toms running together on another part of the farm. Hopefully they'll be there come turkey season but I'm not holding my breath. Thankfully our backup spot is absolutely covered with them and they've nowhere to go without crossing a lot of open land.

 

[bwframe]

Turkeys around here know how to read the calendar.

 

[LockStocksAndBarrel]

Turkeys around here know how to read the calendar.

Ditto here. Scads of them all over the place. Season opens...THEY GONE!

 

[singlestacksig]

west nile, raccoons, dogs, bird flu, lack of other food ( can't live on corn alone) ... lots of causes of decline of the flock..

 

[cncswiss1]

coyotes

 

[Mgderf]

Sounds like fowl play to me.

 

[DeadeyeChrista'sdad]

Oooooh. Sounds like joke probation to me.

 

[ChrisK1977]

I too usually see a lot of turkey while hunting. This year I have seen three.

 

[DRAIN SURGEON]

I used to have 20 to 25 come through untill neighbors on both sides started riding four wheelers and dirt bikes. No more deer or turkey sightings.

 

[Leadeye]

Its possible they found an area they liked better when the feeding stopped and they began to wander. I'm beginning to understand that they aren't quite the creatures of habit I thought they were. We scouted our farm last year in March and had 24-30 birds hanging out in one flock. When opening day rolled around there was not a bird to be found. We hunted for two days with no sightings and no gobbles. Before leaving our farm on the third day to hunt somewhere else I put my drone in the air just out of curiosity and flew the entire area and they were simply not there.

We have turkeys at the moment. We spotted a flock of a dozen hens several times and had two groups of three toms running together on another part of the farm. Hopefully they'll be there come turkey season but I'm not holding my breath. Thankfully our backup spot is absolutely covered with them and they've nowhere to go without crossing a lot of open land.

I'm impressed that you can spot turkeys with a drone, I wouldn't think those things could see that well through the trees even with the leaves off. I usually hear them long before I see them when out hunting.

 

[AGarbers]

It could be there is just too much food in our area to hold them in one area. We have many oaks and hickory on our property, and from what I can see as I travel around, that is much the case for miles around me. According to Steven Backs of the IDNR, oak and hickory forests are what are needed for turkey, but then that also makes me wonder why we don't have a greater density. I read that good Indiana habitat should sustain 25 turkey per square mile. With the patchwork of woods and farm fields around me, I can't imagine why I'm not seeing more. I would say it is heavy pressure by predators (the neighbors' dogs do run loose) but every report I read claims turkey can maintain their numbers if given good habitat. I have thought about trapping the raccoons and opossums but from reports by the biologists, as the predator populations decline, their litter rates increase to fill the void. Other reports claim that as turkey populations increase, their poult survival rate goes down.

 

[AGarbers]

I would think this would depend on the quality of the drone camera. The Wisconsin DNR took me up in their helicopter to show me how they could count deer and turkey in the winter, and it amazed me how much we could see, even with the leaves on in September. I did spot many deer and turkey as we flew and I imagine we were a lot higher that the normal drone.

 

[AGarbers]

Sounds like fowl play to me.

Funny...

 

[mom45]

I had two dozen coming up in the yard to eat from my corn piles every day this fall. I haven't seen a single turkey since the neighbors all started deer hunting. I never stopped putting out my corn for them. I think they are out in the woods eating the acorns.

 

[gregr]

Turkeys have a pattern, kind of like deer yarding. It`s dependent on several variables, so it`s not a cut-and-dry answer. Turkey may have a kind of a "wintering range", as well as a "summer range". It has to do with food abundance, as well as other factors such as depredation, etc. In my limited experience, I`ve seen turkeys both, use the same areas all year long, and, use different areas in winter versus summer, and this is the same, roughly 15 mile area. We had thought the turkeys had either vanished, all been killed off, or moved completely and permanently out of our area, and the answer "seems" to be, they are using the same general areas, but in a different fashion and at times other than what we had grown accustomed to.
I cannot speculate as to why the flocks I`ve had experience with have moved, on the timing of their movements, or as to whether they`ll ever resume the same patterns on their older, established habitat. I recon it`s different for farmland turkeys, versus woodland turkeys.

 

[Field King]

who did you fly with?

 

[phylodog]

I'm impressed that you can spot turkeys with a drone, I wouldn't think those things could see that well through the trees even with the leaves off. I usually hear them long before I see them when out hunting.

I don't know that it would go this way every time but on this day the turkeys actually tolerated the drone a lot better than the deer. This was my first outing with the drone, I wasn't really looking for deer or turkey but ended up finding both.

[video=youtube;4w2aUi6eFmQ]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4w2aUi6eFmQ&t=136s[/video]

 

[frenchiectfd2203]

I can't wait for spring turkey season, hopefully my hunt goes better than last years. Swing and miss!!

 

[AGarbers]

who did you fly with?

Don Voland from the Lake Geneva area.