Thanks for posting Longbeard. This information pretty much falls into line with the article written by Bob Frye in this month's Game News.

 

...I saw some poults over the past weekend that I had to do a double take they were so small. What threw me of was there were 2 mature hens and 5 chicken size poults. When I stopped to get a better look, they started across the lawn to the driveway and lowandbehold there were 8 TINY ones...I'm talking Tractor Supply Easter time chicks-ina-tub tiny.

 

...I saw some poults over the past weekend that I had to do a double take they were so small. What threw me of was there were 2 mature hens and 5 chicken size poults. When I stopped to get a better look, they started across the lawn to the driveway and lowandbehold there were 8 TINY ones...I'm talking Tractor Supply Easter time chicks-ina-tub tiny.

New poults in August isn't unusual. Most years I have seen a fair number of new poults in August and some years even into September.

Dick Bodenhorn

 

RSB, would those you talk of be like a third, or fourth try at a viable nest, being so late…or what?
Interesting.

 

I have a mature tom on one property still strutting for his hens in the morning.
5 hens. No poults

 

RSB, would those you talk of be like a third, or fourth try at a viable nest, being so late…or what?
Interesting.

Nest failure at least a time or two and then starting over is probably the leading cause for late hatching poults. Those nest failures and starting over again is actually a good thing and nature's failsafe step in long term benefits to the turkey as a species. More on that and the why it is good in a minute.

The second cause of late nests is that some of the younger hens aren't mature enough or experiences enough to have the nesting and incubation instincts until late into the spring and summer. That results in some later nests.

The reason nature doesn't want all of the nesting at the same time, hence the failures, is so a week or two of bad weather can't wipe out an entire year of poult recruitment. A couple years of losing your entire year of reproduction could be devastating to the species as a whole. Without those late nests and with all of the turkeys nesting and hatching at the same time a few weeks of wet weather could take out a high percentage of the entire year's poult production. With the nesting cycle extending over months instead of just weeks it is likely more poults will survive any bad weather periods.

Some years you have more wet weather and few poults survive, but with the spead out nesting period a significant percentage will likely hatch out during a good weather period and survive.

Dick Bodenhorn

 

Would still like to see a study or info on what happened in areas that once had lots of turkeys and now have nearly none. I'd be tickled to death to see a late hatch or any hatch....or any turkeys period.

 

I feel like PA is way behind the curve on the issue. And hearing our lead turkey biologist say that overall, the PA turkey population is stable, was VERY concerning to me. That tells me they don't see the reality of what has happened and is happening. We might see a little relief with a couple better springs in terms of weather...but there's a larger issue.


I've seen way more hens without piults this year than I have with. I have a pic of 7 or 8 hens with 0 poults. One of them had at least a few a couple weeks prior.

 

On average,a hen needs to recuit 1.1 poults for the population to remain stable.Seeing some hens without poults isn't alarming. I was seeing three adult hens several times per week on my property with no hens.Last week 4 hens showed up with 20 poults.We had three really bad springs in a row here.Last spring and this past spring were much better and the population is coming back.

 

Even though I agree that some areas have fewer turkeys now than they had in the best turkey years I am not so sure we are seeing any major reduction in turkey poult sightings or recruitment rates. I have found that frequently, in fact usually, hunters have perceptions about the good ole days of past seasons that don't line up as close with reality as they do with just fond memories.

The reason I say that is because the whole time of my career we reported all turkey sightings through June, July and August along with the daylight miles we traveled. They then established a turkey sighting per mile for each county every year and used that to establish turkey population trends.

Starting in2007 they broke it down to where we were also recording not only turkey sightings but the number of hens and poults. That then allowed for establishing the poults per hen ratios for each WMU. They continue to use that same method and now collect that same data for each WMU based not only on the Game Commission personnel sightings but also the public reports of sightings.

I saved that annual data I collected for WMU 2F in my computer when I retired in the early spring of 2012. I have no data available for the years between 2011, due to my retirement, and the same data from 2016 when they started collecting and recording the data from the public surveys.

I am going to post the number of poults per hen I saw in WMU 2F, my normal patrol area, from 2007 - 2011 then the same data collected from the public sightings for WMU 2F from 2016 - 2022. They are still collecting the data for 2023 so it is not included.

Year.............poults per hen
2007.................2.13
2008................2.93
2009................2.13
2010................3.49
2011.................3.29
2016................2.89
2017................2.52
2018...............2.29
2019...............2.73
2020...............2.26
2021................2.69
2022...............2.96

As you can see the poult per hen counts are about as good now about average and what they had been back when everyone thought turkey numbers were pretty good. As you can see we did have a couple years, 2010 & 2011, when they were higher than normal. It is also possible that higher than normal count extended into the years after I retired and for which I have no data. But looking at the years since 2016 it appears the poult per hen count is about average with what it traditionally had been.

Is it possible hunters are now trying to compare an average turkey recruitment and turkey population with those abnormally record high years instead of the reality of what an average and normal turkey population and year actually was in the past?

Dick Bodenhorn

 

In the 90's at our camp in Sullivan County we could find several flocks of fall birds that numbered into the 100s. Now you really need to scout just to find a small flock here and there. I don't even go up there anymore in the Spring, but the guys that do tell me to not even waste my time. 5-6 guys will go up and not hear a gobble.
That's what I'm comparing the turkey population to. What were the PPH numbers back then? You have to have Hens to have PPH.

 

I hunt a ton and at my camper alot all year round in west central Venango county, 1B. It`s really bad. Not many turkeys to start with and have seen 0 poults as of last week. It`s pretty bad in my area where my camper is.