Spring Gobblers "Struttin' Their Stuff"! - Missouri Spring Turkey Season

The Spring 2006 wild turkey season in Missouri was a successful 3 weeks worth of hard work and a lot of fun and excitement! The birds were really on the move and engaging in all of their normal mating rituals. In just one short statement, they were "struttin' their stuff". The weather played out very well during the season and no doubt aided the success of the harvest.

During the first week the season the action was at full speed. In my neck of the woods the birds were actually responding to calls and frequenting open field edges as early as three weeks before the season even opened. Week two was still quite active with a lot of vocalizing by both hens and gobblers. During that week the birds really seemed to pattern their haunts and roosting areas which did help to give the hunter a slight boost of insight on hunting location and possible set-up locations. The third and final week of the season seemed to really slow down as many of the hens had already chose their fellow and mated. It is just my humble opinion, but in 30 years of hunting I have found that once a mature hen has mated a few times, she will then just shut her mouth as if to say "the shop is closed, boys". The remainder of the gobblers still looking for hens that last week had grown more weary of calls and were becoming stationary with diminished vocalizing. By that time the ol' boys were simply getting physically tired from the weeks of walking several miles each day searching out receptive hens and the energy spent mating several hens.

According to my research with the Missouri Department of Conservation, the season harvest of birds were good throughout the state. The total of birds checked statewide was 51,018 with 40,744 being adult aged males(gobblers). These numbers are right on target and carried well with the previous 2005 Spring season harvest totals which numbered 53,798 checked birds state wide.

I was quite happy to see that the number of adult males harvested this season had increased over last year showing that the efforts of the conservation department and realistic regulations are working. Even more a credit to this season's success is due to ethical hunters holding out for mature birds rather than taking juveniles(jakes). These numbers are quite impressive and a real testament to hunters and the conservation department when you consider that just a mere 70 years ago that there were only a handful of wild turkeys left in the state. In the 1800's up to about the 1940's the state was plentiful with true wild turkeys. Matter of fact, it is stated that in that era many farmers did not even bother to raise chickens specifically for the dinner table as there were turkeys everywhere and they were served at dinner on a regular basis. Through those years though, the amount of overhunting and poaching took its toll on the turkey numbers and they started to decline drastically. Even more detrimental to the birds was the constant clearing of land and loss of natural habitat which condensed the species range and made them far more vulnerable to predation from coyotes, fox, bobcats and nest-raiding varmints such as raccoons, skunks and birds of prey. By the 1940's, the wild turkey had all but disappeared from Missouri. The conservation department realized the loss of the birds and started acquiring more state-owned land and keeping it closed to hunting, offering the few birds that were left a haven and source of natural habitat. To follow suit, the farmers and ranchers started rotating crops and leaving more wooded areas on their farms and ranches for the birds also. In just a few decades with those efforts, the turkeys were and are back once again in the state, strong in number and doing very well.

At this present day and time, the ethical hunter and landowner are the wild turkey's greatest ally. As one of many hunters and landowners, I have learned and I am still learning ways to keep habitat for turkeys and continue to study them in efforts to keep them going strong for many generations to come. It is such a great feeling watching a flock of wild turkeys feeding in a field or through the open woods. Some of my best memories are of cool crisp mornings, sitting against an old oak tree in the edge of the woods waiting for those first gobbles to ring out across the valley and just hoping that he will answer my old call and come within shooting range. But even when you come home empty handed, your hunt was successful just to get to hear or see one of these awesome birds! Long live the majestic wild turkey.