4 Wild Turkey Myths Busted

With turkey information and folklore on the mind, I reached out to Patrick Wightman to be taught extra about misconceptions within the turkey woods. Patrick is a analysis scientist on the College of Georgia, a fellow turkey fanatic, and is armed with field-proven information regarding the wild turkey.

“Probably the most frequent myths is that turkeys might be precisely aged by spur size,” claims Wightman. “Analysis has proven this methodology to be inaccurate greater than 30% of the time. By capturing birds as juveniles and monitoring their age at harvest, we’ve seen many cases the place this methodology results in misidentification. For instance, I had a 2-year-old hen harvested with 1 ¼-inch spurs, whereas at the least a 5-year-old hen had ¾-inch spurs and a 9-inch beard.”

The predominant principle is {that a} hen’s spur will put on down over time as a result of environmental components. A hen that lives in a rocky setting will by the way file down its spurs over time by combating, scratching, and chipping. Conversely, a hen that inhabits a house vary comprised of solely tender soils gained’t have the day-to-day abrasion to put on down its spurs. Genetics additionally possible play a job in spur size, simply as some birds develop a thicker, or a number of, beards. Osceola’s are inclined to have the longest spurs, whereas Merriam’s and Rios have a lot shorter spurs on common.

“One other frequent perception is that toms roost in the identical or comparable location each night time. Our analysis means that that is really unusual. Most toms use a number of roost websites throughout their giant residence ranges (3,000 to five,000 acres) all through the breeding season. Nonetheless, sure areas look like vital communal roost websites, utilized by a number of toms inside a reproductive season,” Wightman mentioned.

Roost web site choice appears to differ because the breeding season progresses. In early spring, when birds are nonetheless flocked up and peak breeding is underway, the birds will sometimes roost in the identical communal location. As hens break free from the flock and begin searching for out nesting websites, that’s sometimes when much less and fewer of the flock returns to the neighborhood roost. While you start listening to much less speaking on the roost, it’s not solely as a result of the flock went quiet, it’s extra possible as a result of the truth that the flock has break up up and is roosting individually from each other.

Wightman shared that, “Each March, I hear individuals say, ‘Toms are gobbling now and can give up earlier than the season begins.’ Nonetheless, years of analysis on a non-hunted inhabitants present that gobbling follows a constant sample 12 months after 12 months. Within the South, gobbling exercise begins in March, peaks in mid-April, and continues by means of Could earlier than declining in June. As a substitute of turkeys ‘gobbling out,’ analysis suggests that after hunters enter the panorama, they negatively have an effect on gobbling exercise.”

Areas with lively looking stress typically see a fast decline in gobbling after the season begins, possible as a result of dominant toms are harvested or remaining birds turn out to be extra cautious. When dominant gobblers are harvested, gobbling exercise quickly decreases, suggesting social disruption within the flock.

In my earlier years I used to assume all hope was misplaced after bumping the flock that I used to be after. Since then, I’ve had some fairly enjoyable encounters by efficiently calling in birds that ought to have been a misplaced trigger. The key lies throughout the meeting name.

Regularly, turkey flocks are being damaged up by predators. Naturally, the flock desires to reassemble and start speaking to one another, to verify the opposite birds’ whereabouts. After bumping the flock, for those who’re capable of sneak again in, you may assume the position because the lead hen and provoke the meeting name.

Simply final spring, whereas looking with my spouse, I shot a gobbler down in a canyon. As we started mountaineering up and over the adjoining ridge, a decent, slender canyon with about 500 toes of elevation achieve on both aspect, we heard the rest of the flock begin speaking once more, with enthusiasm of their yelps. Pondering it was fairly odd, given the commotion of the shotgun echoing within the canyon beneath, we determined to provoke the meeting name ourselves.

The end result was a factor of magnificence. The complete flock pitched off the knife-back ridgeline, flying throughout the canyon and touchdown on high of us, similar to a flock of mallards touchdown within the decoys. We don’t want to handle what occurred after a tom virtually landed on my spouse; that’s a narrative that we’ll save for one more day.