The Spring Legion Podcast
Welcome to a year-round discussion on the wild turkey and those who hunt them. Hosted by Hunter Farrior, founder of Spring Legion and author of Ballad of a Turkey Hunter, the weekly podcast is geared for all outdoor communities and dives deeper than the usual tactics and calling tips. Holding true to the brand, topics are built upon respecting the heritage and challenges of hunting, with a never-ending appreciation for all that the spring season provides. Enjoy insight from special guests like Dave Owens of Pinhoti Project, Cuz Strickland of Mossy Oak, our friends at NWTF and Muscadine Bloodline, and so many more widely known for their impact in the turkey hunting community, as well as the deer, duck, and waterfowl realm, who exhibit the obsession of which only a real turkey hunter may truly understand. Thanks for listening.
The Spring Legion Podcast
Eastern Turkeys: Dr. Chamberlain - Roosting, Breeding, and Behavior Tendencies
What makes the Eastern Wild Turkey America's most challenging gamebird? Join Hunter Farrior of Spring Legion, Dr. Mike Chamberlain (@wildturkeydoc), and Matt from the National Wild Turkey Federation as they dive deep into the mysterious world of Eastern Wild Turkeys from their Kentucky turkey camp.
The conversation opens with back-to-back hunting stories that perfectly illustrate why Easterns have earned their reputation for outsmarting hunters. As Dr. Chamberlain reveals, "Easterns are the most heavily hunted subspecies with decades of hunting pressure...they're used to dealing with us." This hard-won wisdom passed through generations of turkeys explains why success rates remain so low compared to hunting other subspecies.
You'll discover fascinating research about Eastern turkey behavior, including their complex roosting patterns where birds use multiple locations rather than returning to the same tree night after night. This explains why hunters sometimes return to a spot expecting the same bird, only to encounter a completely different turkey with different behavior patterns – a revelation that might change your hunting strategy forever!
The discussion takes a critical turn toward conservation as the team explores how Eastern turkeys depend on hardwood forests for winter nutrition and return to the same breeding grounds generation after generation. With hardwood forests disappearing at alarming rates and specific breeding grounds being disrupted, understanding these complex habitat needs has never been more important for ensuring the future of the wild turkey.
Whether you're a seasoned turkey hunter looking to improve your odds against these forest-dwelling game birds, or a conservation-minded outdoorsperson concerned about wild turkey populations, this episode delivers crucial insights directly from the experts studying these magnificent birds. Listen now and gain a deeper appreciation for America's most widespread – and most challenging – wild turkey subspecies.
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Speaker 1:What's going on, y'all? We are in mid-season form for the spring turkey season of 2025. And currently in the very pleasant, very mild state of Kentucky at a turkey camp, I guess you could call it, yeah, and my name is Hunter Ferrier, with Spring Legion, joined by Dr Mike Chamberlain and our buddy, matt from the National Wild Turkey Federation. Today we are going to tell a few stories maybe more than one, maybe just one, depending on how it goes of some eastern wild turkeys. We're going to dive into the subspecies of the eastern itself, of the eastern itself, and I don't have much of an agenda but, to save time, we got a couple of good stories. I want to hop in before we get into the nuts and bolts of the subject.
Speaker 1:Dr Chamberlain, if you'll tell your story of the hunt yesterday, y'all can just mirror image it for mine, because mine this morning went down about the exact same way.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah yeah, yesterday was weird. We we actually roosted a bird friday and thought we were on the the x right we thought we were in a catbird seat.
Speaker 2:He, we got above him, thought he was going to fly down onto a, onto a bench that was right, right in front us and we never heard him gobble and thought we either spooked him walking in, which seemed unlikely, or we were dumbfounded.
Speaker 2:Meanwhile you're listening to the bird gobble its brains out and we couldn't hear it because we're thinking now the terrain is so rugged that he was far enough below us that we just couldn't hear the bird.
Speaker 2:So we went on a foot race for what ended up being 14,000 steps on my phone to loop all around to the east and north and cover a bunch of ground and we never got in the game and it was pretty frustrating.
Speaker 2:And then, about midday, uh, we decided to hike up behind the, literally behind the camp, and got up on top of the ridge and and called and boom, bird cuts us off and we start getting closer to him and next thing, you know, there's two birds coming and I'm looking left and there's a bird right. I don't know which direction to face and then suddenly there's a fan in front of me at 15 yards and he a bird right. I don't know which direction to face and then suddenly there's a fan in front of me at 15 yards and he, a bird, had snuck right in there and we don't know if it was one of the birds that was gobbling or not, but so I had to do the switcheroo real fast, point the gun in the in the opposite direction when he went behind a tree and and I ended up killing him. And it was uh, he was, he was a great bird, eventful for sure.
Speaker 1:That's how you want it to happen. That's, you know not how you drew it up, but if you could draw one up, that's how I draw it up. And I was lucky enough to get in there and with Mr Mark, Mr Tussett, we went in there same spot as you're talking about and I'm glad you shot the not gobbling as much bird, because we were left with the two really gobbling birds. They lit it up this morning. They started gobbling really early and flew down, probably in the same bottom as you're talking about. We actually sat on them for a good 15 minutes and decided collectively that it's going to be a minute. I'm sure they are with hens and it's. It's these hills out here. Play, play, uh, play some tricks on you because uh they this?
Speaker 1:you can hear them tapering down, you know, off the ridge into into a hollow, but it's very, I mean they're very loud, you can tell they're on the ground now and you got about two gobbles in there and it's a big drastic. And then that third one, you almost don't even hear and they, they're walking, I mean a matter of feet, but it's a, it's a very steep feet and once, once they kind of get out of here, and not distance wise but elevation wise. We decided, made a little loop just to check it out.
Speaker 1:We knew just give them time and it's easier to be patient when 32 degree weather and we're moving than it is sitting by the same tree so we were way above them, wanted to keep the elevation on them, made a round or two and hooked around this horseshoe and actually heard a bird kind of back on the other side and I think we was trying to get him to gobble again and we heard these again, and it's hard to walk away from them when you do you know, and so you know that, that that clock kind of starts ticking faster and faster, that patient clock we're like, well, maybe they are done with them hands, maybe they are moving a little bit, and it really hadn't been that long, it just felt like that long kind of came back and I sit down and and really on the same top and the same, the same head of the ridge as you were talking about, and I looked down and there's a pile of feathers right there, about 10 yards from me. That's got to be where dr chamberlain shot he is, because and I look up and I remember you mentioned in the log and your story last night and I'm like there's that log he was talking about and they were, they were still down right if they're at my 12 o'clock, all this dust and I'm two and three, and they started easing up and easing up. We hit them a couple calls, some loud, almost chalky, assembly long yelps we had one hen in there doing that earlier, so hit that a couple times. They responded to it more than they did anything else and a lot of dry leaves, those thick, spongy feeling leaves. I was able to scratch around them a little bit.
Speaker 1:They never gobbled at them. They might even heard that, I don't know but. But they started moving back up and they started being a little bit right. I wasn't positive and then that was right about the time they got fired up, cut us off a couple times and then they went silent and the silent period lasted a little bit longer than I wanted it to, because they hadn't really shown their hand quite yet when we decided to hit them with silence.
Speaker 1:And they hit us back with silence. And you know, then you're kind of like, well, I would have loved for about five more minutes before we did that, because then you'd have a direction, so you knew they're headed at you, but you don't know which way to point your gun, like you said. And then a couple scratches. You work your way up as a tier system there. You go from scratching to maybe some birds and clucks, maybe a soft yelp, and then you've got to really do something loud to make them gobble. And they gobbled and they had moved to the right and I'm like, okay, I feel a lot better now. I'm tired of straining my eyes at this one little spot. And then, um, it didn't, it didn't tell us too much because they did, they were just barely right and was closer. And then I'm right-handed and and they were, they were really coming right. They got one or two more times and they're really coming.
Speaker 1:Then I hear the footsteps and he pops his head up one time and at this time I'm really fortunate to have that that last gobbled and it was very, very close, it was really fun to uh. I mean maybe 12, 15 steps to the, to the crest of that ridge that we're on, and they had to have been 10 yards on the other side of that. So it was very loud and I'm trying to course the footsteps and and I I swing all the way right and kind of almost over over correct myself to where I'd have the little bit of the left hand side to uh, to adjust to and and and sometimes I get my feet under me because I'm thinking in my mind like if they start really going right, mr tussie's now to my right and left, mr mark's on up the ridge a little bit. If he goes in the middle of the ridge we're going to buy nobody shooting him. You know there's a, there's a very good chance that could happen if he really skirts it and uh.
Speaker 1:So in my mind I'm like, get my feet under me if he starts. Really, if I've reached my end, I'm standing up and shooting while I still in the hollow, because he was definitely close enough but luckily didn't have to and um, and that process was able to see the crown of his head a little bit and uh, just enough to know where to point the gun. And the two more steps and it was over with. But I literally had to step over your pile of feathers to pick him up and he wasn't 15 yards max. So within that 15 yards he was probably. He's about five yards from where you shot yours did the same exact thing.
Speaker 2:Did he hop over that log or did you think he walked around and they walked? I was staring at that log because I remember you said hop over that log so I pointed to that log.
Speaker 1:I'm like they do that same thing, I know where to. I've got the rundown already yeah so, but no, they did they.
Speaker 2:They stayed about halfway up that ridge I couldn't see the bird as he was coming to me but because of that ridge, so I couldn't you might have been a tree behind me, maybe, I don't know. Yeah, because when we didn't see the log until we stood up I really stood up is when we're like. I wonder if he hopped over that log or whether he walked around the end of it um no, I sat next to your feather, so he must have you know.
Speaker 1:Come up there, and if that was the crest to yours, I must have been a little closer to that yeah, yeah, yeah yeah and um, but no, I remember seeing that log.
Speaker 1:I went I'm gonna sit where I can see that log. I know that, yeah, but it was a lot of fun, very appreciative of the folks. Let us come out here and enjoy good company and talk wild turkey learned a whole lot. Obviously we boutonniere dissected the bird when we got a background. I mean, where else you gonna do that? You got dr chamberlain here to tell you all these questions that you have and answer them and stuff like that.
Speaker 2:And and um, but no, it's been a good time I mean, I had a blast even, even even with the cold. Yeah, this is a really pretty part of the world. I've I've been through here. I've never turkey hunted here until now and this is a. I can see why the population is robust here and this is. This is pretty high quality turkey habitat and and going and hearing the number of birds that we've heard, even despite the cold, has been cool.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. Well, matt, give us a rundown on the little kind of the not the segment, but the series that has kind of been going down with the subspecies of turkeys that NWTF is kind of putting together, just informing everybody on kind of the agenda there.
Speaker 3:Right, yeah, so we just wanted to talk about each subspecies a little bit this spring, the characteristics of each and maybe the challenges each subspecies is facing nationally. They're probably all facing similar challenges that continue to grow, or similar challenges that continue to grow, and Mike and his team have done a great job of trying to combat and figure out some of what's going on. There's so many variables. I don't know how you do it. I guess you have to prioritize sometimes what's more important.
Speaker 2:Which dumpster gets on fire first?
Speaker 3:That is a tough task, um, but the eastern is just so prevalent right it's all you know um. Mike, can you talk about the? Just the history a little bit of the eastern um and its distribution, yeah, east of the mississippi, and just how it's how it's uh progressed over the years yeah, I, obviously the eastern subspecies is the most widely distributed subspecies.
Speaker 2:I mean they cover, you know, from the center part of the United States all the way to the Atlantic Ocean and I mean you've got pockets of easterns all the way out in the west. You know that were created during restoration. So you'll see the eastern subspecies not just quote-unquote in the east, you'll see them widely distributed and they are the most frequently hunted subspecies. So you know, very, very popular.
Speaker 3:Interesting to know what's the furthest west you've encountered in eastern.
Speaker 2:You actually see pockets of easterns out all the way to Idaho and Washington area. You know, in many cases what happened during restoration is as you know. I mean turkeys were desired and it didn't really matter which subspecies uh, went somewhere for you know. For instance, if you wanted birds out West, you went and got birds, from whatever populations you could get birds from. And and um, and that's why you see pockets of of the Eastern subspecies out, you know, in places where historically they didn't occur.
Speaker 1:Right. So is there a specific habitat or a specific you know? If you could paint a picture, to paint an eastern ideal life span? You know where it's going to be most successful and most fruitful? I guess you would say of long ago they got rios. There's parts that look like kind of nebraska-y and there's parts that look like south texas, and it depends on you know the elevation, which I would think is has something to do with why rios are there. They thrive there but an eastern knot what.
Speaker 1:What makes them if, if you were to just dump them all out, and and what would rios live in the rest? Not do as well? Well, what you?
Speaker 2:I think the answer to the question is just. If you look at the species name, the subspecies name of the eastern wild turkey, it's Miliagris gallipavos sylvestris and sylvestris means forested. So, basically, you're looking at a forested turkey, and so the eastern subspecies is closely tied to the forested habitats. Not that the other subspecies aren't, because turkeys all roost above ground at night right, so they have to have some type of woody structure to roost in.
Speaker 2:But when you think easterns, you're typically thinking, uh, some degree of forested habitat, and we used to think that you know, if you go back and read the earlier writings of scientists like henry mosby, back in the 1940s and 50s, it was at one point believed that Easterns needed a lot of forest, like big, big chunks of forest, and obviously that's not Now. We know that not to be true. I mean, you see Easterns thriving in areas like where we're sitting right now. That is, in portions, is densely forested.
Speaker 2:But there's also a lot of a lot of open habitat and and that's kind of, when I think about the eastern subspecies, I I think of them thriving in areas that have intact hardwood forest, that have, uh, early successional plant communities like the, the pastures and openings that we're seeing here in this area. They're living on that edge.
Speaker 2:They're living on the edges of those ecotunes, if you will, those places where these habitat types are meeting and they're also, you know, linked to some type of disturbance. Right, if you see, in most places that you see really, you know, thriving populations of Easterns, in most places that you see really thriving populations of Easterns, there's some type of disturbance going on, whether it's cattle, like livestock production in this area, whether it's prescribed burning as you go farther south into the piney woods, juxtaposition of forest to agriculture as you go up in the northeast and up in the.
Speaker 2:Midwest, but forests are the common denominator.
Speaker 1:Yep Cool.
Speaker 3:Start to pot a little bit. Yeah, we always say Easterns are the toughest to kill.
Speaker 1:I was going to ask you that.
Speaker 3:What characteristics? What makes them so difficult?
Speaker 2:I don't think there's any question that they're the most difficult. I mean in my opinion.
Speaker 3:You're biased. You're from southeastern.
Speaker 2:That's true. I think part of it is that Easterns are the most heavily hunted subspecies. I mean, and if you look at you know time, since restoration, the wild turkey in the southeast has been hunted for many, many, many years and so you have southeastern birds in particular that have literally decades and decades of of hunting pressure on them and they, they behave differently as you as you know because I think they're sage to that they're across many generations.
Speaker 2:They're used to dealing with us and, you know, in some of my travels when I go other places, like you and matt you and I were talking about a little while ago, some of the places that I visit, that I'm lucky enough to visit, see very little, little hunting pressure and there's no kind of precedent for hunting pressure in some of those areas and the birds behave differently yep and uh, I figured sylvestris just meant they were slick, I didn't know they were in the forest.
Speaker 1:Well, they are slick. I have seen it spelled with an I and with a Y before. Do you know anything about that? Is there a difference? It's supposed to be I.
Speaker 2:It is supposed to be. I, yeah, okay.
Speaker 1:Because that's I know, the 10th Legion opens up with meleagris gallipava sylvestris, and he talked about the bird itself, but he's talking about an eastern when he's talking about the smart one. Um, just want to let everybody know. But yeah, so, um. So if you're going I'm thinking as a hunter and as a conservationist here, looking for turkeys where you would find them most prevalent, where they do well at, of course, I mean, pressure is one of them.
Speaker 1:But is diversity a bigger parameter than say anything else or food sources, or can they do all right without ag land? Obviously they can, but you know it's different up north versus south. You've got a bunch of pines down south and I was listening to some other podcast a long ago talking about pine tree selectivity and going back to old studies and stuff that they found that being a very, you know, almost like the pines are good for something you know in abundance. But is diversity in that, um, in that I don't know what you would call it tree, it's basically plant communities, okay yeah, I mean, diversity is key for turkeys in general, not just the eastern subspecies, but.
Speaker 2:But if you look at how turkeys function across their annual cycle and you know we're sitting here in Kentucky and you know, as I look around I'm seeing winter habitat which is, you know, like those hardwoods on that ridge right across from where we're sitting you know that's winter, that's valuable wintering habitat and turkeys in the east in particular are hard mass driven birds okay, and and unless you go into areas where you don't have a lot of mass producing hardwoods, you you have to have some other seed source what you mean acres by that right.
Speaker 2:So if you, if you go into some of the agriculturally dominated parts of the eastern subspecies range, you're going to see some winter forage, whether it's some type of waste grain, silage, livestock operations, something that's giving the bird winter forage if there aren't acorns present.
Speaker 1:Which is another question. I've had the red oaks or I guess it was red oaks not many acres on the ground where I'm from this past year. I know there's cycles and patterns that they'll have, but that did have me wondering where I would usually find turkeys would be, where they might have washed down in the hollows and ravines and stuff, and I can't find an. I can find more turkeys than I can acres right now or I could all winter, but um is there. Would there be a an impact even to to worry about or think about?
Speaker 1:as far as you know fat pads or anything that could come about with that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean turkeys are. If you look at how they're supposed to function, going into breeding season, they're supposed to gain weight during the winter. You know. So, like if you're a deer hunter, you start thinking about well deer, you know we're thinking deer are losing weight. You knowucks are losing weight during the hunting season and they're thin by the end of the hunting season. It's the reverse in the turkey world.
Speaker 2:They're supposed to be getting fat during the winter and gaining weight so that when they come out of winter they're at their heaviest body weight of the year and so that will allow them to withstand the rigors of gobbling, strutting, displaying, not eating as much, laying eggs, incubating eggs. So both sexes need to fatten up during the winter. So when we have mass crop failures, that creates a real energetic issue for turkeys because they're not able to get as heavy as they should be or as they would be in a great year, and so that trickles down into reproduction. So you, you expect to see and we see this commonly with our when we're trapping, turkeys can be very difficult to trap. The eastern subspecies can be really hard to trap in in years when you have a bumper acorn crop, really, because they don't they are going to go find places, like you just mentioned, where they can stockpile on acorns and not move much, and they don't.
Speaker 2:They're going to go find places, like you just mentioned, where they can stockpile on acorns and not move much, and they don't want to eat corn in a rocket net right, not like years like this year I mean we this year across all of our study sites in the south. We did extremely well. We were done trapping in half the time that often it takes us because they were wanting resources and the corn at the rocket net was the resource.
Speaker 1:We got the real gold. Yeah, yeah, yeah, cool. I'm trying to think of some more eastern.
Speaker 3:The northeast. They have the most difficult as far as trying to get into the spring in a good condition and what's important there I'm just thinking about the NWTS Force and Flux Initiative trying to increase mass production up that way.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean the one, and I think it's certainly an issue in the northeast. As I see kind of the eastern landscape from a turkey's perspective, just the loss of hardwood forest is a problem. You know, you don't have to travel much to pay attention and see that we're losing hardwood forest at an alarming rate and those forests are being either converted to some other land use, they're being developed, whatever the case may be. So if you're in the northeast, yeah, I mean going into areas that are hardwood dominated and seeing the loss of those hardwoods. The other issue you run into with hardwoods is often the approach is like a custodial type management, meaning nothing, you do nothing to them right.
Speaker 2:You just kind of let them sit there and and and that's not always the best approach. In fact, you know there's a body of research showing that you can go in and manage hardwoods, for instance, using selective timber harvest practices and things that are going to stimulate acorn production and are going to create forest regeneration. That is better than if you're not touching it at all. And you know, one of the other issues we're facing with hardwoods, particularly when it comes to regeneration, is just deer overabundance, you know, I mean deer are selectively browsing these younger oaks that are seedlings, and that creates problems.
Speaker 2:We were talking about that yesterday here in this area because these open areas, you know, are getting a tremendous amount of deer activity and we were actually talking yesterday about what to plant and how to maintain it and deer were at the top of our discussion because they're very dense in this area.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they are A lot of them. So that's something I've wondered. I know, like in whitetail there are like a Wyoming whitetail and a Mississippi Delta whitetail, look a lot different, act a lot different. Is there any kind of? I mean, if I go hunt one in Michigan, an eastern in Michigan, he's going to sound, act and look a lot different than one if I hunt in the piney woods of south Mississippi. Are they all the exact same or is there any? I mean, this ain't gonna be science related, it could be just third gen conversation. Um, can they be different sub subspecies? We?
Speaker 2:act different. We haven't gone to that extreme genetically. Um, obviously you're going to see things like differences in body size and you know just the fact that if you go from michigan to south mississippi, just if think about that, I mean, if you just think about how much difference the landscape would look from northern michigan to south mississippi, and if you drove that, how many different habitat types you would see.
Speaker 2:Yet the eastern subspecies occupies many of them, right, that just speaks to me, that to how, how, um flexible and adaptive the subspecies is because they inhabit all of that and they thrive, and in many, many different forest types and vegetative communities. And um, before I forget it, one of the things that to me, when I think about Easterns versus everybody else, is roosting, because the Eastern subspecies in a lot of cases, like we've seen it right here I'm looking at this hillside in front of me there's 500 trees over there that they could roost in. Yet we know from talking with the landowner here and from from mike and mark that they've been roosting for generations in one little pocket over there, where that bird was at yesterday morning and um.
Speaker 2:But if you look at at easterns, what we found with research, uh, is that they have roosting areas, but not necessarily the same tree being used in that area. So, in other words, when we look at some of the GPS data, we may have a tom that has 10 roosts that he uses in his home range. He may only use seven of them every now and then and the other three he uses regularly. He may, you know, he may spend three nights a week at this roost and two nights at these other two roosts. But when you look at the, the actual roost locations, from where he the tree he was in, he's not always in the same tree, really, he's, he's in an area, right, it may be 50 yards, 60, 75 yards from one tree to the next, but all of the toms in the area are using those same roost. Does that make sense? Yep, so there's. When you, when I go out west, you know I can take, I can go to farms that I've hunted and I know you know which limb?
Speaker 2:I know exactly that two cottonwoods right there, that they're gonna be in those two trees and that's not really the case, as you get where we're at now and so what you're saying is so and this is support and debunk a lot of folks theories of they're always this is a roost tree.
Speaker 1:it could it be a roost tree, just not the same turkey. So Because they'll go in there and I'll speak for myself, thinking you know that turkey's gone, he ain't coming back, or that turkey's going to be in here, Could it be a different turkey in there?
Speaker 2:Yes, A lot of times we see that routinely that bird A will use a roost for a few nights. Suddenly bird A goes three-quarters of a mile down the road, bird b comes in that afternoon and roost in the exact same spot or in the same area, close enough to where you or I, as a turkey hunter, would say that's the same bird he's gonna go east exactly, and instead, it's an entirely different bird that may, in some cases, have not even been in that area for some time, and suddenly he's there and he acts different and we think well, what did I screw up?
Speaker 2:In some cases, it's just a different turkey.
Speaker 1:And he's just being a turkey. Well, I know they're fun to hunt.
Speaker 2:Makes me think back to times that I've done that when I've hunted the same spot. A few nights, a few days in a row and man third day I was locked in. Man, I got this joker. This morning he is flying down, headed southeast, down that logging road. He's going to take a left and go to, and the next morning he flies down and heads north. Yep, it's like man I quit it makes him fun.
Speaker 1:It's almost funner thinking it is the same turkey. He just knows what you're doing every time. But but everybody is. You know it couldn't be a different turkey, or I mean, the good news is you go in there and bump the stew out of one and you come back and you're so very cautious to just hunt him like a you know but new ball game. He might not even been the same one, he might not know your calls yet um, but it's like you said it's more fun for us as hunters to overthink oh yeah, it wouldn't be fun if we simplified it can't use that call again, because he heard that right, yeah no, I'm the same way.
Speaker 1:Um, I'm trying to, if is there anything else? I wanted to talk about some of the the newer stuff y'all doing with the DNA and everything, before we wrap everything up. If that's available to talk about, okay, make sure that's not well, and I mean that's the the dna project is.
Speaker 2:I mean, one of the things we're doing with wild turkey dna is is, at some point, we're we want to really dig deep into some of the questions that have just popped up in this podcast. You know so. For instance, when you go out west and you see these areas where easterns were relocated 30 years ago, are they still there? And and if they are, are they genetically the same as the the easterns we shot this morning? Um, or are they hybrids? And and people may say, who the hell cares? And it.
Speaker 2:Well, the way I look at it is if we go into populations that are doing very well, quite well, and we realize that there's some degree of hybridization amongst some subspecies and, and perhaps that's one of the factors influencing the fact that that some of these populations are doing well, that's an important piece of information versus what we're seeing in some of our eastern populations, in which I can say this because we have the data to demonstrate it is we're seeing some of our populations that have very low genetic diversity, and that's actually, in some ways, what prompted wild turkey DNA in some ways, what prompted wild turkey DNA, although this, as we know, this first year we're kind of focusing on birds that have odd plumage, because we're trying to understand color phases in turkeys and if they even exist.
Speaker 3:And if they do.
Speaker 2:What do they actually look like? Versus? Are some of these color phases not wild turkeys? Are they some type of interbreeding or with with? A domestic breed or a heritage type breed, and if so, what does that look like and where are they? Is that a problem? We don't know.
Speaker 2:But if we can't, we're just dipping our toe into the first pool to generate enough questions to to you know, to move forward and and as we've been doing this genetics work with, actually with eggshell membranes from hatched eggs that we've been studying for many years now, we are seeing some pretty low diversity.
Speaker 1:Really.
Speaker 2:And that could be problematic. It could, yeah.
Speaker 1:So well, I'm not going to say how do you fix that, but we were talking about earlier, just uh, how a hen and a long bear breed. You know she'll, she'll breed with several of them. And then we were raised the question of you know, how much is a dominant tom's value in a flock? Or you know you're getting a lick up there and which one not which one do you shoot, but how?
Speaker 1:what's the impact of of just wiping out a whole spot? That's just, generation after generation, a good spot for them to breed. And if you disrupt it too much not disrupt it like fire, but if you clear cut it, you know you're gonna put a number on it.
Speaker 2:They got to kind of redo a bunch of stuff, feel like, and yeah, and, and that one thing we are seeing is that the places that turkeys breed you see this much more. It's much more obvious as you move out west, because roosts are limited, but here in the east still there are generational spots that turkeys go to every year to breed.
Speaker 2:And many of those places are associated with roosting locations that have been used for 30 years plus. If you go in and disrupt that spot, so, for instance, maybe the roost is gone or the area that they've been going to breed is clear, cut and replanted into something else, or it's converted to pasture, or whatever you create the scenario that is problematic for turkeys, because they're not just going to move to the next hilltop and just continue their business and we didn't realize this.
Speaker 2:This is why you do research. We're clearly seeing that there are just some places that they have been going for generations and they're going to keep going there and so identifying those places and prioritizing those for conservation to me is important. And we're there right now. We're now analyzing. I've got a student. Her dissertation is focusing partially on this. Okay, so what's different about these spots versus every other? You know. So if you had to identify, there's 40 places on this 200,000 acre site the turkeys have been going every year for for a decade. Now, what's different about those sites? You know, can we, can we identify at a broader scale what to pinpoint? Is there something that we could identify at a broad scale that would help us say there's a 90% probability that that area right there in this county, that county over that's a breeding area. That's kind of where we're headed Protect?
Speaker 2:that area, or at least prioritize them and make people aware of the fact that these sites appear to be potentially more important than others, and maybe that will allow us to focus some research at broader scales to try to identify what those places look like.
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Speaker 1:Really, it's very clear. It's high, you know they can see they're safe, something of that nature, or you know, I guess it's just on a good route.
Speaker 2:One thing we've already seen is that, you know, for turkeys in this now again, a lot of my work is southeast, midwest, right. I don't have any ongoing research in the northeast, so a lot of the landscapes that I've worked in and continue to work in hardwoods are a premium, particularly, you know, think, piney Woods, woods, southeast hardwoods are key, and so we are seeing that that these breeding areas that they have been going to for generations are closely linked to hardwoods. They're closely linked to certain elevations, um, and they are often, you know, lowland to mid-slope hardwoods juxtaposed to open areas, and so you start kind of google earth right yeah, you will, and you start zooming out and you think, oh okay, well, that looks kind of that's like that that's
Speaker 2:like that versus uh, this is is the antithesis of that. This is, you know, all pasture, all pine plantation, and the other thing that we're seeing with turkeys, which makes these types of analyses tricky, is that turkeys can make do with a lot. For instance, we're studying turkeys in some landscapes that have very little hardwood left, and they're still there, they're persisting in those areas, and that even puts more of a premium on those hardwood left, and they're, they're still there, they're persisting in those areas, and that even puts more of a premium on those hardwoods. You know so turkeys are adaptable and, like we've talked about particularly the eastern subspecies, I mean they live. They live in a lot of different landscapes they're tough too.
Speaker 1:I mean they're, I know they go through some stuff as as much as any. But tough on the turkey hunters a good bit.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they're tough on us, um but um after you get your tail kicked, for you know, for six weeks down here you, it's nice at least, speaking personally, it's nice when I'm like, okay, I'm about to head out west for a week and a little competent boost. Yeah, I'm to feel a little better about myself when I get back.
Speaker 1:Of course something's going to happen. Not always. We were mentioning yesterday if you do wind up, you're lucky enough to kill two days in a row or something like that, you start expecting there is an average there. If you're batting 300, I'm content with that. 3 of 10, but use your two, two of 20, right back to back. It's going to be a long 18 days to follow. It's going. It's going to come back around lady luck's going to swing back the other way.
Speaker 2:It always happens it does.
Speaker 1:Um matt, can you think? Any other questions? We only have 36 minutes. We can ramble on or wrap up whatever you want to do do you bat 300.
Speaker 2:No, hunter's a better turkey.
Speaker 1:I don't bet 300 I'll be lucky if I do. I I want to log it one day because I bet you is less than what folks would think. Probably less than what even I think. If you, if you add some hunts up, I'm at it literally like oh, one on one single turkey one time, so you average that into all of them and so I've had some spells the last few years where I don't think I'm.
Speaker 2:I'm like you. You mentioned two days in a row. I may have like three days in a row on a trip somewhere, particularly if you're hunting in different states. You know you may get two birds and back-to-back days or something, and you know you're batting a, batting 100 and you know, or a thousand and like then all of a sudden I'll go through a dry spell. It's like that has me question and everything that I've ever thought about myself and my ability and my clothes, my shoes, the way I walk, my calls, my truck.
Speaker 2:It's like something is wrong and I can't get this monkey off my back.
Speaker 1:So start changing deodorants and toothpaste brands and everything, because something's got to give. Yeah, what?
Speaker 3:about hunter success rate? Uh, is it very similar in the southeast? As far as if you had to, if you had to put them in order of subspecies as far as success rate, I guess you would go out west Gosh.
Speaker 2:I don't know. And ghouls would be so hard to? Yeah, ghouls are tough because you have to be extremely fortunate to draw.
Speaker 3:You're right, sample size would be so hard.
Speaker 2:Unless you go to Mexico, and then I, based on my own experiences there, success rates are very, very high. I think I mean speaking personally I'm much more successful when I'm you know if I'm chasing rios or merriams or or goulds, but in those situations I'm also going to places that are you know that the bird populations are good and versus me hunting around my house in georgia, and you know I'm going on properties at times that if I hear a bird, I've had a good day, right, you know, and I'm chasing one that has seen every possible trick that hunter can throw at him, and then I, you know, I'm trying to kill that one bird and it gets tough so.
Speaker 2:So I think part of it is just where you're at, but the agencies that track hunter success, it's very low across the board. As you know. It's very low.
Speaker 3:And when you say low, you're 20%.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean you're talking. You know a third of turkey hunters or less are being successful at harvesting a single bird much less multiple birds and when you look at the surveys that have been done on hunters that kill, you know two or three birds in states that allow that it's single-digit percentages of hunters that are being that successful.
Speaker 3:Right, and they've always said it's always 80%. 90% of the folks who kill multiple birds are the same folks. I've always heard that it is that's true, that's true.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you know that's the guys and gals that are just fanatical about it you know, and, and I mean we're- talking amongst ourselves here you know I mean we're, we're those people that that love to do it so much that you know I've got, I've got some friends that that I would call they're kind of acquaintance turkey hunters you know, and they're good friends of mine that go every weekend, but after about four weekends well, four Saturdays of getting their tails kicked, they're fishing Find a new one.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I haven't fished in several years. I don't think and don't have any desire to, because when turkey season is over, I'm tired and my wife's mad, and you know. So. It's yard work and painting and this, that and the other, and she won't listen to this podcast so I can say that Hopefully not, she won't. Good, she won't. She hears me enough when I'm at home.
Speaker 1:That did raise a question. So I don't want to open a can of worms I don't know if I want to say it but limitations on limits and stuff, if you're. If you're talking 90 of hunters kill more than one at all. I'm sure less than that kill the third or fourth or whatever it could be. Would that be a an effective means of conservation there, if you're?
Speaker 2:well, I mean the approach agencies are just going to take? Is they're just going to take limiting, you know, permits, or limiting opportunity? They you can't really get into a ball game and I don't I'm not a state agency, but I I'll you know explain kind of how they would. They're viewing harvest as a numbers. Okay, and it doesn't really, whether Hunter or Matt or Mike or whoever they're viewing it, as we want harvest to be whatever's sustainable whatever that number is, and hopefully grow, of course, but if not growing, at least sustainable.
Speaker 2:And they're just looking at it from a sheer numbers game. Okay, and what it takes to to limit numbers to to whatever their target is right yeah cool versus, you know, take an opportunity away from a small segment of hunters.
Speaker 1:Yeah which I don't know, man. I know folks are changing, times are changing, things are changing and you know um, speaking personally, I've seen two good hatches, I feel like in a row back to back in mississippi and you know that's encouraging. I don't know if that's just the places I'm at and stuff, but I'm. I mean there's a lot of times I didn't see. I can't remember the time where I've seen more than one or two jakes in a little group in in around where I hunt in mississippi and I'm seeing groups of seven and eight and up to 13.
Speaker 2:No, there's some positive momentum going on. In the southeast in particular, there's several states Louisiana and Arkansas are both starting to see evidence that the population got as low as it was going and now is trending upwards. Now that's certainly not a reason to take your foot off the gas and say everything's great. You know it's not, but you're seeing successive increases in harvest and production, which is great. Other states, like Georgia for instance, harvest has been declining for years and, knock on wood, at least the last couple of years. It looks like it's stabilized and so hopefully it now follows the trend of some of these other states and starts to increase.
Speaker 2:But then you've got states like, for instance, South Carolina, that the population just continues to decline and that has the agency grappling. For you know how do we kind of slow the? Bleeding if you will, and that just if you look across the southeast. That just speaks to how complex things are.
Speaker 2:You can have something going apparently quite well in one area and go one state over and the situation is not the same. And then even within certain states, you see particular regions of the state where the populations are doing quite well, and then the next region over or down or up. That's not the case. It just makes the agency's jobs more complex?
Speaker 1:Oh, I bet it does, and I think it's worth. Like you said, don't take your foot off the gas, but I think it is worth. You know bringing up that, hey, there are areas that are doing good. Keep doing what you're doing. You know if you have been doing habitat stuff, or you know just self-maintenance, in terms of as a hunter, you know self-control is another one. You know making sure that you're aware of what's going on around you. Don't go wiping out a whole property, um, but uh, I mean, I think, with the take the pulse of the area, right, yeah, just take a feel of it.
Speaker 1:And I think folks really, I mean I'm thinking three or four years ago when folks you know, when y'all know, when the radars all kind of went up, everybody's ears perked up. What are you talking about? Turkey's numbers are going down kind of everywhere and everybody you know some panic buttons were hit and some folks were like no, it ain't nothing. And then they went out and they're like, oh, it might be a little bit true actually.
Speaker 2:And one thing I'm saying that I did not see, and a part of this is just social media and you know, we communicate differently than you did 10 years ago. But one thing I see a lot now is I get a lot of questions about I have this property, this is what my neighbors are doing and my point is the recognition that turkeys are using you don't own. Unless you own a large piece of land, you don't own turkeys.
Speaker 2:You don't have turkeys that are your turkeys and, like in this particular area we're sitting in, these birds are leaving winter ranges and traveling to their spring ranges and that's putting them on different properties year-round, and so I get a lot of questions about, framed around the notion that well, I'm doing this and I think I've got about this many turkeys that are using my property. What could I do to work with my neighbors? How big do you think? How much area are turkeys covering in my? You know my?
Speaker 2:part of the world and and in the recognition that that this bird covers a lot of ground in many cases and and I think that's cool because it to me it speaks to the fact that people are thinking about the whole annual cycle for the bird okay, how would I become part of the bigger picture here? And and that's maybe it was that. I'm sure it was there 10 years ago, but but I get a lot of questions about that.
Speaker 1:I don't know. I mean, and you're, you're the smart guy, so you know the stuff. But but you know, kind of dipping down into being an audience of other podcasts that you're on and other folks other biologists and specialists are on, a lot of things probably ain't intended to be informative or informative, just the the recognition of yeah, they don't stay on your property all year, you just only you go when they're there and you leave, and they leave too. You're just not there to know they're leaving too. You know every time you come back they're there. Well, that's because it's March 13th and we come back, you know.
Speaker 1:But just being aware and just knowing that's even a thing and knowing that you might, you know you can trap the heck out of coons.
Speaker 1:But if you blow one acre over ain't and the other other side of you hitting it doesn't really you know, you got to really get on the same page as some folks and time it up right, and then you know, put the pedal down a certain time and you know and hope for the best and really hope that puts at least a dent in some of the decline or the habitat stuff as well, I'm sure, and but, but even just being informed.
Speaker 1:Folks, I think, are. It was a subject of discussion for a year or two and folks educated themselves and figured out good questions. To ask and wonder, I feel like, was a big step. Obviously there was a lot of stuff that I didn't know, what I didn't know, and I googled what I didn't know and I found you know, and I Googled what I didn't know, and I found, you know obviously, a lot of podcasts, just like this one and other ones that you've been on and stuff like that, and you know, I think it's got the folks at least not worried, but folks concerned and conscious, well being concerned and aware.
Speaker 2:you know that's not a bad thing.
Speaker 1:No.
Speaker 2:Having concern over a resource as important as the wild turkey is not a bad thing. No, being being having concern over the resources important as the wild turkey is not a bad thing. Right, being aware of the issues facing it is always better than not right, and I think the fact that you have such free information exchange now that you didn't have even five, six years ago really allows people to become educated and at least be. They may not like what they're hearing, but they're at least aware of the conversation. And if they're aware of the conversation, then a lot of times they become part of the conversation. And that's that, to me, just speaks to how important turkey hunters in general, that how much concern they have for the resource and how they it's become it's part of how they it's become it's part of their lives right.
Speaker 2:It's part of who we are, so we want to see it protected. We want to be able to do what you and I have done the last, you know, the three of us have done the last two days, which is go out and chase turkeys in places where they're thriving and harvest a bird and be thankful and blessed, you know, to be able to do that.
Speaker 1:Good deal, man.
Speaker 3:Well, we're nearing the time, right here unless y'all got anything else you want to add. Not really that big picture mindset. That's always been a struggle is how to get people to see the bigger picture and not just their success and what they're doing, and Mike just talked about that. You've seen a change in the last.
Speaker 2:What five years? Yeah, for sure, For sure, Since COVID, basically.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And I mean what I close is isn't today the 15th Somewhere around there?
Speaker 3:14, 15. Yesterday was the 12th Opening day in.
Speaker 2:Kentucky. Okay, so it's April 13th. We don't have a lot more of this left.
Speaker 3:Slow down.
Speaker 2:Appreciate every moment you have. I was thinking about that yesterday when I looked at my phone. For whatever reason, I thought it doesn't matter. But it was April, whatever. I thought, oh wow, we only have a few more weeks of this. Unless you travel, you've got to soak up every moment.
Speaker 1:Amen, we've been doing that and we're going to keep doing that, and I appreciate y'all being here.
Speaker 2:Absolutely.
Speaker 1:And everything and all that y'all do for the wild turkey and those who hunt them, For those who don't know you can follow them at turkey duck or the wild turkey dock.
Speaker 2:Wild turkey duck, wild turkey duck and um and and it's wild turkey dna is the new yep, if you go on on facebook or instagram, if you just type in wild turkey dna, you'll go to that, um, to that site which is really cool, you can follow those socials and we're we're going to start posting more as we learn more about the birds that we're collecting samples on, which will be cool.
Speaker 2:And if you're interested in any of the research, at least that I've been involved in, if you go to wildturkeylabcom, all of it's archived there. Everything I've ever done every podcast, every article, everything, I've done is archived there and we're actually putting a lot of short content out over the next few weeks on on that website, like what we shot this morning yeah just informative little reels to show people about turkeys and the places they live, and so that's uh, that's a resource that I'm I'm really hoping to build over the next year.
Speaker 1:It's very interesting and very informative and I know a lot about turkeys and I learned a lot in the past hour and a half you know just hanging out with folks who know more about them and having a good specimen to poke at and point to.
Speaker 2:You know, I mean that's a lot. Yeah, that bird you shot. He became a science experiment after his death, that's for sure.
Speaker 1:He provided some value, that's for sure, even afterwards. So, fellas, appreciate y'all being here and yeah, good deal. Thank y'all for listening. Realism is all that matters in the spring turkey woods, and the guys over at Houndstooth build their turkey calls with a consistent realism as a number one priority. Cut, stretch and press right down the road. In Tuscaloosa, alabama, a Houndstooth turkey call has become a familiar addition to a many-year turkey vest across the southeast. Learn more about a variety of friction, locator and mouth calls today at houndstoothgamecallscom, and be sure to use our special discount code SLP25 at checkout for 15% off your next round.
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