Well, I hate to say I told you so…

[WOODIE13]

Don’t see how any conclusive info can be generated without closing the season for a couple of years. I’d be on board with that. I’d love for my kids to have turkeys to hunt. Closing it may not solve a thing or it may shed some light on the issue. I appreciate all who seek to find the missing link. Some will be wrong along the way but the fact that they are trying holds more weight than those who bash their efforts in my opinion.

True, but some love the limelight, saw that too many times...just like COVID19.

 

[buckpasser]

Don’t see how any conclusive info can be generated without closing the season for a couple of years. I’d be on board with that. I’d love for my kids to have turkeys to hunt. Closing it may not solve a thing or it may shed some light on the issue. I appreciate all who seek to find the missing link. Some will be wrong along the way but the fact that they are trying holds more weight than those who bash their efforts in my opinion.

Did you listen to the podcast I posted or look up the study???

Here are some relevant facts:

Turkeys went from near zero to boom within our old regs

Toms don’t lay eggs, hatch eggs, or raise poults

No hens have ever been known to be without a breeding mate

The delayed season theory was a bust

The distraught hen theory was a bust

With all that stated, tell me how a closed season would help or what it might prove? Sometimes “just do something!” is understandable. In this case, it’s dumb.

 

[Mexican Squealer]

Sounds like you got it figured out…awesome

 

[buckpasser]

Sounds like you got it figured out…awesome

I apologize. That probably sounded like it was directed at you. I don’t have it figured out, but noise makers like the turkey doc have greatly profited on a personal level while taking away hunter opportunity for zero gain for turkeys or anyone.

 

[WOODIE13]

Maybe emulate Virginia, highest harvest, plus a fall season

 

[Sixes]

Maybe emulate Virginia, highest harvest, plus a fall season

Are you sure about the highest? From this link, it looks like TN, KY, Penn were all higher with NC basically tied.

2024 NWTF Spring Hunt Guide - The National Wild Turkey Federation...

www.nwtf.org

After looking at your regs, it looks like the noon cutoff is not for the whole season, so the regs in VA are not a lot different than here.

Not trying to argue, I'm just trying to see what point you are trying to make.

I bet you see big flocks of hens up there too, where down here, its more common to see 2-3 hens together and a lot of times 1-2, when as little as 4-5 years ago, it was common to see double, triple or more in a flock.

 

[WOODIE13]

Are you sure about the highest? From this link, it looks like TN, KY, Penn were all higher with NC basically tied.

2024 NWTF Spring Hunt Guide - The National Wild Turkey Federation...

www.nwtf.org

After looking at your regs, it looks like the noon cutoff is not for the whole season, so the regs in VA are not a lot different than here.

Not trying to argue, I'm just trying to see what point you are trying to make.

I bet you see big flocks of hens up there too, where down here, its more common to see 2-3 hens together and a lot of times 1-2, when as little as 4-5 years ago, it was common to see double, triple or more in a flock.

I live in WV, just using VA as an example of birds taken from an article I read.

WV had more turkeys taken than GA, both fall and spring if I'm not mistaken. We shut down at 1.

Based on the square miles between the two

Fall and winter, large flocks, spring the most hens I've seen personally was 5...jakes, 6 to 8, toms...3 to 4.

Killing hens never hurt, just like jakes.

Will bet WV surpasses GA this year with spring and fall seasons.

You game?

 

[WOODIE13]

Last year's results...think this year will be more.

Shoot the jake...or bearded hen

 

[WOODIE13]

Or have a glass of shut up, shutting up...

Everyone is so bitter not killing all those big breeding male gobblers...oh well

Think that is a VIABLE cause, but trophy hunters don't care

 

[WOODIE13]

Legalize bearded hen harvest for Kmack's sake

 

[DSGB]

Habitat loss is probably the biggest factor, IMO.

Map for Grasslands

Grasslands and their wildlife are vanishing. The North American Grasslands Conservation Act works to reverse this trend by protecting places vital to animals and people.

www.mapforgrasslands.org

 

[Sixes]

Not sure what got you riled up, you stated VA had the highest harvest not their own highest harvest.

I don't care what state kills the most turkeys, I would just like to know why our population dropped so far so fast.

I despise competition among hunters, so no, I am not game. Why does it matter how many are killed per state.

You obviously took something that I typed in the wrong way. I read VA rules and other than the 1PM cut off for the first couple of weeks of the season, they look to be the same.

Do you want me to say that Virginia is the greatest turkey state with the greatest turkey hunters?

It's not a competition, it's a matter of losing birds.

 

[Jack Flynn]

Run and gun and youtube have hurt turkey hunting tremendously. You cannot run around the woods all day calling at the top of your lungs hoping to get one to gobble. When a few people did that it was successful a lot of the time. Now every person that hunts is doing just that, and they learned how to do it on the tube. Take a 12,000 acre piece of wma land and turkey's are gobbling everywhere before the season. Drop about 50 people in there all calling like on the tube cutting and yelping like a banshee and bragging we put in 10 miles today and nothing. And the birds just about shut down. Watched it happen for years now. The tube taught hunters slam doors, call from the time they get in the woods. Don't have a clue how to walk quietly, and don't have a whisper mode. Now when the season goes out less than a week they are back to gobbling and tracks everywhere again. There's so much pressure the birds just go to the bordering lands and carry on. If grown birds were getting killed by predators, we'd see the feathers and we hardly ever do. Anyway dnr is a Gov agency and they cannot think outside the box, just passed down lore if you ask me. I talked with one of the regional directors a few weeks ago and told him to do something even if it's wrong. What you're doing isn't working. The reply was I do what I'm told lol. Uh this burning thing on the wma's is a problem even though they say it's not.

 

[Gut_Pile]

The simple fact is, we are killing more than we are making. Until something happens that improves surviving poult numbers, harvest needs to go down

 

[kmckinnie]

I don’t think 2 seasons is enough to tell what’s happening. Not saying it’s right or wrong. This new set up will take a few more years to tell.
I only killed one. My wife got 2. I have not hunted since I got that one. Seen a few turkeys here and there. Seen a hen today. Think she was up off a nest feeding. I’m going to start coon and small varmit traps again. The coon population is doing great around here.

I have no Solutions or answers.

 

[buckpasser]

I don’t think 2 seasons is enough to tell what’s happening. Not saying it’s right or wrong. This new set up will take a few more years to tell.
I only killed one. My wife got 2. I have not hunted since I got that one. Seen a few turkeys here and there. Seen a hen today. Think she was up off a nest feeding. I’m going to start coon and small varmit traps again. The coon population is doing great around here.

I have no Solutions or answers.

The study I posted was approx 8 years in progress. We do now know that the delay helps none at all.

 

[Nicodemus]

Go back to a Fall season, from Thanksgiving week till February 28, mature gobblers only, present already legal weapons only, limit 2. Plus, doing this will cut out a fair amount of hunters.

 

[buckpasser]

The simple fact is, we are killing more than we are making. Until something happens that improves surviving poult numbers, harvest needs to go down

I’m not killing any hens. Were you saying that we need to kill less gobblers for more “other hunter opportunity” or do you still think leaving Toms will somehow make the overall population go up? If you do think that, are you opposed to the science and data shown by Dr Craig Harper?

I’m still confused as to why people think killing Toms at our current level is making the hen/poult population drop. Help me out.

I could see their point if Toms only bred hens post early April, and we shot them down to a near extinct level. At our current point in history no hens are going unbred. At least none have ever been proven to be without a mate. The science is proving that hens breed more often and with more Toms than ‘Ol turkey doc had led us to believe. Can you believe it?

 

[buckpasser]

Go back to a Fall season, from Thanksgiving week till February 28, mature gobblers only, present already legal weapons only, limit 2. Plus, doing this will cut out a fair amount of hunters.

I’m gonna be painfully honest here Nic. I would abide by that limit, but not that season. If they did that I’d just start hunting March 15 and stop when I had 2 dead. I feel pretty certain I could get away with it indefinitely.

 

[Nicodemus]

I’m gonna be painfully honest here Nic. I would abide by that limit, but not that season. If they did that I’d just start hunting March 15 and stop when I had 2 dead. I feel pretty certain I could get away with it indefinitely.

That's the way the season was here when I was a youngun. Only difference was the limit was 3, hens and gobblers.

A mature gobbler is a very worthy challenge in the fall and winter.