While many publications seem to be crediting an increase in the number of turkey in Texas from 40+ years ago, a significant number of counties still don't even have populations of either species of turkey. I would think that many of the counties in the middle of the ranges would be suitable for turkey. What is keeping them from making a comeback in these areas?

They were hunted out.

Hard to bring em back after that and it's slowly working in parts of E.Texas.

Works well were you have LARGE landowners who are will to be the seed property for a bunch of transplants for 5-10 years.

When I was in high school (mid 80's) I heard they tried to re-introduce some turkeys in Leon County.

I never saw one. I did see lots of fat coyotes though.

It's unfortunate for those counties in Texas to be turkey-less. Here are some Archer County turkeys to pep you up OB.

I get why they are gone. But I would think the reintroduction would be going better in some of those areas based on habitat alone. Or to see a more natural expansion of the current range. I would think county like Brazos or a nearby county would have a better wealth of forage for Turkey than parts of the hill country or West TX.

Turkey and coyotes exist in all other areas of the state. Not sure why they couldn't in Leon County.

He had turkeys released on our 400 acre property in Colorado County maybe 6-8 years ago. Never saw a turkey after the day we released them. Biologist think the hogs had a significant impact on their nesting in the area

Aggie1205 said:

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Turkey and coyotes exist in all other areas of the state. Not sure why they couldn't in Leon County.

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I would think so too. But whatever they did, didn't take.

I'm not a turkey biologist but again, I'd say its a combination of the current landscape use and trouble getting a foothold.

You pick out some stretches of land along the Brazos, between OSR and 21, down by Millican and release 50 or so birds in multiple locations in each of those areas every other year for 10 years, you'll start seeing some birds, but you'll also be forcing a lot of competition between them.

I think they birds they've released and patterned don't migrate out much from the area where they get released (but I could be completely wrong on this).

AgySkeet06 said:

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He had turkeys released on our 400 acre property in Colorado County maybe 6-8 years ago. Never saw a turkey after the day we released them. Biologist think the hogs had a significant impact on their nesting in the area

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Do you remember how many were released?

I think 10 or 12 on our property. I think more were released closer to sheridan on other properties. The releases kind of followed sandies creek if i recall correctly

We are on a lease in Concho County and turkeys have become as bothersome and plentiful as pigeons. Within 5 minutes of our feeders going off, the turkeys are there in large numbers eating the corn. They travel in groups of 20-30 and eat everything on the ground in 10 minutes. I would be glad to offer some or all of them to other counties.

TP&W had a great article (maybe a year or two ago) on post release studies. Mentioned the success another state (I think Kentucky) had releasing turkeys and growing the population compared to Texas. Apparently they do much better in places where you have wooded areas adjacent to open areas.

My FIL has about 100 acres in the middle of the Angelina National Forest. 75% of his land was cleared long before his time. He picks up Turkeys on game cams all the time. But again, you have that nice blend of open land adjacent to the pine forest. A small east Texas success story.

I had a masters student from LSU on my property in Lavaca county doing a turkey count/survival rate around the county last year. The project was to try and diagnose why Lavaca county was doing so well compared to the neighboring county of Gonzales. I mentioned to him Lavaca co was 1 bird vs Gonzales is 4 bird could be an issue. He had I think 24 hens with tracking units and he would track them and set up game cameras over their nest to see what/how many hatched. It was pretty cool, and had a lot of info on how long they would sit on a nest, and if one nest failed how many more nest they would make per year. We have plenty of birds in Lavaca, Karnes county in my opinion.

I'll play with this later tonight or this week. This requires an actual keyboard.

Yeah, coyotes aren't a huge factor with turkeys. Heck, like quail, I can make a pretty easy argument that their removal is detrimental to overall area turkey populations.

labman said:

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We are on a lease in Concho County and turkeys have become as bothersome and plentiful as pigeons. Within 5 minutes of our feeders going off, the turkeys are there in large numbers eating the corn. They travel in groups of 20-30 and eat everything on the ground in 10 minutes. I would be glad to offer some or all of them to other counties.

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This is also my opinion of turkeys. They are bothersome and plentiful like pigeons. Unlike pigeons they are loud, stupid, and always in the way. If it were possible or legal to kill all of those annoying sons of *****es then I would. The only good turkey is a Butterball turkey, deep fried.

Buddy of mine has 400 acres in Lamar county in Roxton, TX. He's about 56 years old and hasn't seen a turkey on his property his entire life. Lots of woods and open fields on his place.

Then last weekend he checked his game cameras and freaked out that he had a few on camera.

Most of the white part of the map that is East of Interstate 35 is improved pasture.

Protein feeders have lead to a resurgence of turkeys in south Texas.

This is one of the better point. A bunch of that is the Trinity watershed. From a wildlife management perspective this is the most heavily converted landscape level watershed in the state. Upland birds and improved pastures do not go well together. As you decrease the amount of bunchgrasses found in an area, turkey nesting success goes down.

Fire ants and feral hogs don't help, but are borderline boogeyman status.

In the manner of all the hog threads for all the turkey haters

Have shotgun, will travel...

I believe that about the lack of bunch grasses, but on the other hand we are seeing turkey numbers explode in places like Minnesota where the landscape is heavily altered into small wood lots and row crops.

Aggiedent,
I'm familiar with the location of your FIL's place and he is ground zero for the super stocking efforts. Glad to see those birds are still around. Your FIL is a true East Texas conservation hero

"heavily altered into small wood lots and row crops."...that's still better than improved pasture (especially the prevalence of grain crops near small wood lots). What you describe is often found in the areas where the easterns in Texas have somewhat well.

Note even in Texas, even dropping Rios east of 35 has only been marginally successful. When easterns have been brought in from other states, they have not done well except for certain pockets.

Last I heard, TPWD had gone to more super saturation stocking. But I'm 2 years removed from regularly.