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South Carolina Turkey Study

That is a good read.

Pushing the opener back seems like a no brainer. You could actually stagger the opening date, with middle/west TN maybe a week later and the rest two weeks.
 
I've said it a bunch. Just 10 more days would make a difference I think


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Sometimes game managers get 'analysis paralysis'.... in other words, they get so bogged down in studies they can't make a decision on what to do.

Pushing season opener back 2 weeks is just a simple no brainer once you understand average nest initiation dates in Middle TN are April 10-14th.

The current season framework with it opening 2 weeks prior to nest initiation when combined with such a tremendously front loaded statewide harvest (2/3 of all birds killed in TN are in the first 10 days of the 6 weeks season) PLUS a 4 bird limit AND no restrictions on jakes just makes for an unsustainable resource.

Season kill numbers will be interesting for sure this year....
 
Mega: When would you say average nest initiation occurs in SW Tn...same as middle TN? I looked at dates from the last 5 years worth of tom'killling on my place. Exactly half the gobblers were killed between April 1-7 and the other half between April 18-30. Applying the research to those April 1-7 birds being available to breed, nest initiation might increase by some percentage.

Here's my question: Does the hypothesis hold true even if that other half of toms is still out there getting the job done...see what I'm getting at? Put another way, so long as there are enough toms to breed all available hens throughout the entire nest initiation window (even re-nesting if necessary) production is sustained. But when the 1 or 2 available toms on a given property are removed on April 1 and April 3 for example, reproduction may suffer.
 
Boll Weavel,

I honestly have NO IDEA when nest initiation occurs in the rest of the state, only the 2 counties I hunt in middle TN. I've found multiple nests both during season, as well as many more destroyed during hay cutting. It's pretty easy to determine embryological age in a broken egg by examining the development of the poult, count backwards to when setting occurred, then count back another 14 days or so to determine when nest was initiated. Initial fertilization would have been about a week before nest was initiated. It's also possible to do the same thing just observing poults with hens once you know how to age live poults (at least until they are a month old... after that it does get much harder to get within 1 week).

Theoretically, all you need is one mature gobbler left in the population to make it through the season to fertilize every hen in that area. The problem with that is the same thing can happen in turkeys as it does in other animals or even humans. Some gobblers just aren't fertile enough to service every female available. Some are capable, and will mount hens, but miss the cloaca of the female and result in unsuccessful fertilization. Plus, the more males in the population, the more aggressive they become breeding, competing with one another resulting in higher percentages of fertile eggs.
 
What no one knows or seems to know is how many fertile gobblers that are rendered subordinate refuse to interact with hens because of the their position inside the flock. If the dominant bird dies who's to say they automatically move in. There's part of me that wonders if killing the dominant gobblers early leaves many hens unfertilized.

I know this is a dead horse beating, but with changes in tactics many dominant birds are killed during youth season or the first weekend. We all just assume another gobbler moves in, but does that actually happen?
 
Here's my take on all that.

I would say in my area of southern middle Tennessee is anywhere from April 7-15 on average is nest initiation. Count 12-14 days for it to lay the complete clutch. So incubation will start somewhere usually around April 20-30 or so. Average hatch is usually around Memorial Day. It fluctuates of course, but I think this is on average. I have seen poults a day or two or three old actually during turkey season, during that first week of May at least three different times that I know of. These are the early breeders though. Most poults I begin to see (when we used to see a bunch that is) would be the last week of May to first week of June. (This is all in my area of southern middle Tennessee)

About gobblers moving in after another bird is removed...
I think if there are gobblers in the area they do indeed move in. But with the extremely low density some of these areas have once a gobbler or two is killed the first week of the season many hens may not have been bred at all. Think about this. They are wild animals that God created. All they know in the springtime is to survive and reproduce. I do not think that the hens just think to themselves "I'm not going to raise young this summer." I think they will actively seek another gobbler if the one they were with is killed. Also, I've read that wild turkey fertility is extremely high. Some of the Jakes probably aren't fertile, but the two year olds about have to be. Now, do they get scared to breed because they've been beatin into submission? Possibly but I can't see any wild animal doing that at all. But I do think it could happen.

Mega is right about the amount of males in the population. Increased male presence does drive the libido, fertility, and reproduction up in the males. They know that they have to keep gobbling and fighting in order to breed.

I stand by my argument that the season is opening too early, too many gobblers are killed too early before hens breed. Also hens may need to breed again if nest is broken. Another thing that effects wild turkey fertility-hens only have to breed once to have fertile eggs, but the more breeding they do the higher fertility they do have.

So my proposal would be to: leave limits and fall seasons as is, except combine the two throughout the hunting season. Delay spring season 10-12 days, maybe for extended hunting time add a week or so at the end. It may be hot and miserable but the birds are still out there and still gobbling, albeit may not be as good.
And if there was any way to reduce the decoys it would help tremendously. Our overall harvest numbers would be down, but in turn we would have way more birds to chase and play the game with.

A whole nother chapter on this would be about managing properties conducive to hens and poults... but that's another story.


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I haven't turkey hunted in a few years only because I no longer have any turkey hunting ground. The last few years I did I saw swings in our bird populations leading up to a major decrease where I hunted in SW Tn. One of those swings was in regards to nesting habitat. We always had a healthy population of birds during the winter months but as spring and nesting time approached those birds moved off of us to more favorable nesting grounds. As our landscape became more favorable to nesting we started picking those birds back up during the spring. Just a thought here but most of our turkey hunters are also deer hunters. Most of those would advocate having sanctuaries for deer. I don't recall ever hearing anything about the same for nesting turkeys but why not???

Elsewise, I think our continued limits WHERE I HUNTED are absurd considering the steady decrease in populations. That also includes the killing of hens during the Fall season. That absolutely makes no sense to me. Blanket regulations don't work for all. Seasons and limits need a finer tuning.
 
Mike Belt":2zqq8zlq said:
I haven't turkey hunted in a few years only because I no longer have any turkey hunting ground. The last few years I did I saw swings in our bird populations leading up to a major decrease where I hunted in SW Tn. One of those swings was in regards to nesting habitat. We always had a healthy population of birds during the winter months but as spring and nesting time approached those birds moved off of us to more favorable nesting grounds. As our landscape became more favorable to nesting we started picking those birds back up during the spring. Just a thought here but most of our turkey hunters are also deer hunters. Most of those would advocate having sanctuaries for deer. I don't recall ever hearing anything about the same for nesting turkeys but why not???

Elsewise, I think our continued limits WHERE I HUNTED are absurd considering the steady decrease in populations. That also includes the killing of hens during the Fall season. That absolutely makes no sense to me. Blanket regulations don't work for all. Seasons and limits need a finer tuning.
Click to expand...

I think for one because turkeys ain't the cash cow, which is fine by me because if they were there wouldn't be enough to go around.

But also I believe that it's much harder to have turkey nesting habitat than deer. Deer can live anywhere, just let it grow up. Turkeys need successional habitat on a rotating basis


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