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2022 Turkey Hunting Thread

PEEJAY said:
If you were legally allowed to shoot a bearded hen...would you? Had one with a big old beard today at 6 yds with 3 jakes strutting. Legal in my state. Thought about it!
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They are legal here in NY but no, I would not. That bearded hen can still lay eggs and I have to wonder, will her offspring have larger beards??
 
I just saw a lone Jake today and again, no Gobbling!!!! I heard hens yelping an hour after sunrise as the fog lifted. This property has always had gobbling Tom’s every time I’ve hunted there. Not sure what is happening. Plenty of hens it seems sooooo not sure what to make of it. All winter there was a nice gobbler fock of seven or eight on the property too. All long beards…. where’d they go???
 
woodsdog2 said:
They are legal here in NY but no, I would not. That bearded hen can still lay eggs and I have to wonder, will her offspring have larger beards??
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So at what point is the beard large enough?

I'd shoot it to get rid of the unnatural thing! I've gotten some trail cam pics before but never seen one in person (nor went looking for it).
 
Gator said:
So at what point is the beard large enough?

I'd shoot it to get rid of the unnatural thing! I've gotten some trail cam pics before but never seen one in person (nor went looking for it).
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It’s actually not unnatural at all. Rip that beard off and the hen looks like any other hen. Most hen beards are thin and whispy and have a kink in them about halfway down the beard. Don’t shoot them you’re killing your future flocks.
 
PEEJAY said:
can you fan out a hen tail? theyre just so small and if im hunting for meat i would shoot a jake. if im hunting for tailfans beards and spurs then its a waste. It was about a 7 or 8 in beard tho. I had her on camera earlier this yr i think, could be more than one i guess. my biggest hold back was she is gonna give me more birds to hunt next year.
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My point is in the grand scheme of things, killing one won’t hurt anything. I do get the she will lay more eggs but chances are her eggs are gonna get poached by raccoons or possums. If you kill one in your lifetime it’s a cool add to your Turkey lifetime story! At least that’s what I think.
 
Does this Turkey identify as a Tom or a hen though? You could be misgendering the Turkey. In the case that it identifies as a tom with that beard it would transphobic not to shoot it… you know?
 
gcr0003 said:
Does this Turkey identify as a Tom or a hen though? You could be misgendering the Turkey. In the case that it identifies as a tom with that beard it would transphobic not to shoot it… you know?
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PEEJAY said:
can you fan out a hen tail? theyre just so small and if im hunting for meat i would shoot a jake. if im hunting for tailfans beards and spurs then its a waste. It was about a 7 or 8 in beard tho. I had her on camera earlier this yr i think, could be more than one i guess. my biggest hold back was she is gonna give me more birds to hunt next year.
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When I first got interested in turkeys I figured I would shoot one if it was my first bird. I still haven't gotten a turkey and there's 0 chance I'd shoot one now. There's several of them in the flock on the property I hunt. My area of the state doesn't have a ton of turkeys and I'm not willing to hamper that any further. Perfectly legal here and I won't give anyone any grief for shooting one but that's just my opinion on it. I've kilt some predators trying to help the turkey population. I'm not gonna go and undo that by taking a hen out.

At least 2 in the pic below. Got a pic of one this year with a beard that's gotta be 8-10"

03300433.JPG
 
gcr0003 said:
Does this Turkey identify as a Tom or a hen though? You could be misgendering the Turkey. In the case that it identifies as a tom with that beard it would transphobic not to shoot it… you know?
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I say if it can lay eggs… current gender complexities notwithstanding, it’s a hen!!! No matter what it thinks it is!!
 
I just listened to Eastman’s Hunting Journal, Wingman Podcast yesterday evening with Dr. Chamberlain of the University of Georgia on Turkey behavior and he’s the same one the THP crew is working with. They’re trying to identify what’s happening to the turkey populations, the timing of hunts etc. I feel like anything we can do as hunters to keep as many turkeys alive so they can lay eggs as possible is a good thing. They made a good point, with elk and wolf predation…. Now think of all the predators a turkey has that can eat it and or raid the nests. It’s almost a wonder we have any huntable populations. Elk may have wolves, lions and man but turkeys have all of them to dodge.
 
woodsdog2 said:
I just listened to Eastman’s Hunting Journal, Wingman Podcast yesterday evening with Dr. Chamberlain of the University of Georgia on Turkey behavior and he’s the same one the THP crew is working with. They’re trying to identify what’s happening to the turkey populations, the timing of hunts etc. I feel like anything we can do as hunters to keep as many turkeys alive so they can lay eggs as possible is a good thing. They made a good point, with elk and wolf predation…. Now think of all the predators a turkey has that can eat it and or raid the nests. It’s almost a wonder we have any huntable populations. Elk may have wolves, lions and man but turkeys have all of them to dodge.
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Good point good sir! Did they mention habitat lose being a problem? Ohio number shows half the number of Turkeys being killed in 2020 compared to I think like 2005. Less number of hunters too. Wouldn’t think hunters are the problem on this one for once. Not saying their not though!
I think it’s so weird the Turkey population seems to be declining country wide. If you even look at just the hunting seasons across several states and how they have changed in the last couple years it’s crazy. Delayed season dates and bag numbers reductions. The general consensus is their are less hunters too. Crazy stuff man! Kinda scary as a fellow turkey hunter lover.
 
I went out scouting last night on a new piece I got permission on. I went to the brush edge and a coyote started howling, yipping, and barking at me. I went further in and up the hill. The dang thing followed me up 100 yards and then got in front of me and started barking again. I was pissed to say the least. I have not heard a gobble in Western New York yet this season and neither has my brother-in-law. Getting frustrating, but we have 25 days left. Hopefully the morning will at least yield a gobble.

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jdyansick said:
I went out scouting last night on a new piece I got permission on. I went to the brush edge and a coyote started howling, yipping, and barking at me. I went further in and up the hill. The dang thing followed me up 100 yards and then got in front of me and started barking again. I was pissed to say the least. I have not heard a gobble in Western New York yet this season and neither has my brother-in-law. Getting frustrating, but we have 25 days left. Hopefully the morning will at least yield a gobble.

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I’m hoping we are on the middle of the two peaks of major gobbling activity and it will begin to pick up soon as it warms up and there are more insects for them to eat. My buddy acquired this property in 2004 and this is the first time, I mean the first time ever I have not heard or seen strutters on this piece during the season.
 
Bowtie747 said:
Good point good sir! Did they mention habitat lose being a problem? Ohio number shows half the number of Turkeys being killed in 2020 compared to I think like 2005. Less number of hunters too. Wouldn’t think hunters are the problem on this one for once. Not saying their not though!
I think it’s so weird the Turkey population seems to be declining country wide. If you even look at just the hunting seasons across several states and how they have changed in the last couple years it’s crazy. Delayed season dates and bag numbers reductions. The general consensus is their are less hunters too. Crazy stuff man! Kinda scary as a fellow turkey hunter lover.
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I agree, overall habitat loss is the biggest problem for all game and non game species bar none. Just in my town,
Woods and fields that were open space are now “country homes” beautiful places but more habitat gone. I read that in New York State alone, 40,000 acres of open space are developed each year in this state. We need to stop urban sprawl and incentivize redevelopment in areas already historically developed zones in each of our communities.
 
PEEJAY said:
If you were legally allowed to shoot a bearded hen...would you? Had one with a big old beard today at 6 yds with 3 jakes strutting. Legal in my state. Thought about it!
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Negative. Had a bearded smoke phase hen at 30 yards years ago. Let her go.
 
I know very little about wild turkey biology, but I got to thinking last night randomly about age structure in wild breeding populations. If only the male birds are shot and the females get a pass then I was thinking this could lead to having many older hens in the population, possibly beyond their reproductive stage (if that is a thing in turkeys). Think about it like this. If there were a set number of people on an island in the beginning and they were in their 20's and the population was split 50/50 male and female. Over time, something came along and killed 50% of the males each year but left the females alone. Eventually you have many more females than males and many of those females would be in their 60's, 70's and 80's and older. The older females would be using habitat resources but no longer adding to the population. Maybe this is what is happening in turkey populations.

That was just a thought that ran through my head last night.
 
I've missed most of this season with sickness (cold turned into ear ache that then ruptured and left me dizzy and hard of hearing) but I went out this morning listening to hopefully find one for tomorrow morning and sure enough I found one actually gobbling. Took me a while to narrow down where he was with this ear but I got a good read on his location. It was getting ready to start raining so maybe that's why he was talking so good? Either way, it's supposed to be raining tomorrow as well so hopefully it all comes together
 
NMSbowhunter said:
I know very little about wild turkey biology, but I got to thinking last night randomly about age structure in wild breeding populations. If only the male birds are shot and the females get a pass then I was thinking this could lead to having many older hens in the population, possibly beyond their reproductive stage (if that is a thing in turkeys). Think about it like this. If there were a set number of people on an island in the beginning and they were in their 20's and the population was split 50/50 male and female. Over time, something came along and killed 50% of the males each year but left the females alone. Eventually you have many more females than males and many of those females would be in their 60's, 70's and 80's and older. The older females would be using habitat resources but no longer adding to the population. Maybe this is what is happening in turkey populations.

That was just a thought that ran through my head last night.
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In my area I think predation gets them well before they get too old to reproduce (based on the number of kills sights I find in the woods each spring). Just my opinion which very much could be wrong.
 
Gator said:
In my area I think predation gets them well before they get too old to reproduce (based on the number of kills sights I find in the woods each spring). Just my opinion which very much could be wrong.
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That's interesting. I scout a lot and cover a lot of ground, but I rarely find a kill sight of anything, turkey, deer, or anything. I'm sure it happens. I used to see a few deer kills on the lease I was in. I chalked those up to coyotes. I have heard for years that the biggest problem we have with ground nesting birds is fire ants. Supposedly that is what did in the quail populations.

I think populations ebb and flow over time in spite of human's best efforts to make things go the way we want them too. When I was a kid dove hunting was big. Opening day of dove season sounded like WWIII had broken out. Now, very little. The quail were plentiful too when I was a kid. Not anymore. I see a few coveys a year.
 
NMSbowhunter said:
That's interesting. I scout a lot and cover a lot of ground, but I rarely find a kill sight of anything, turkey, deer, or anything. I'm sure it happens. I used to see a few deer kills on the lease I was in. I chalked those up to coyotes. I have heard for years that the biggest problem we have with ground nesting birds is fire ants. Supposedly that is what did in the quail populations.

I think populations ebb and flow over time in spite of human's best efforts to make things go the way we want them too. When I was a kid dove hunting was big. Opening day of dove season sounded like WWIII had broken out. Now, very little. The quail were plentiful too when I was a kid. Not anymore. I see a few coveys a year.
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Yeah I find a few every year, just a pile of turkey feathers scattered about. Fire ants? You must be deep south. Man I hated those things as a kid!

When I first started hunting this place close to 20 years ago. There were no turkeys but the place was loaded with foxes. Now we are loaded with coyotes, rarely see a fox but have turkeys. So as you mention, things definitely swing back and forth over time!
 
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