Are your turkeys disappearing?
The reason I ask, is that in the past 6 or 7 years, turkeys in the parish I hunt have slowly disappeared. At one time, I would see 20 to 30 a day while deer hunting. I would have many gobblers cruise through my land every Spring. Now I'm lucky to have 2 longbeards aroundmy propertyeach Spring. I have about 4 to 6 regular hens on my place, where it used to be 20 or 30.I have talked to many concerned hunters about this problem. I haven't noticed a successful hatch in years. At first I thought it was caused by clear cutting and predators. This is what everyone in north central and northwest LA. thought. Well, I heard some news the other day that was disturbing to me. The Forestry dept. has been fertilizing pine trees for years in north LA. This fertilizer is not only killing the gum trees, but it is obviously making the turkeys sterile. This is straight from a forester's mouth. This makes sense now. I hope and pray the word is out and action will be taken. If not , then Wild Turkeys will be non existentwhere I hunt. Someone told me the NWTF has heard about this and will try to do something about it, but I don't know for sure. Has anyone else notice turkey numbers going down in their area? I believe I will contact the NWTF and see if they know what's going on and if they are or will take action.