Weather and the Turkey season
I have Weather related breeding and feeding questions, but some background info first.
I do not have the ability to travel great distances to hunt, due to time constraints and must hunt within an hour or two of home.
In Idaho, our season always starts April 15th.
Two years ago, the season started at about the time toms and hens were beginning to breed.
Last year it got hot early, and the birds were about done with what nature intended, by April 25h.
This year the breeding season will be very late. It hasn't been warm enough to melt off the great amounts of snow we have received.
The areas that hold turkeys near home does have some bare ground on the south facing slopes and in the tree wells
- but there is still 2-3 feet of snow out there - and no sign of turkeys.
My buddy and I scouted hard on Saturday, and saw one set of tracks - on top of 2 feet of hard-pack snow, and a mile and a half from town!
We know birds in the area wintered well
- they have been fed by the locals and several of them have told us that every morning 100's are in and around the town.
HERE'S ARE MY QUESTIONS:
How does this significant difference in yaerly the weather paterns affect the breeding cycle of birds? Surely hens won't lay eggs until they can nest on the ground and survival rate is likely?
Will the need to breed be enough of a reason for the WILD TURKEYS have to leave their "Bed and Breakfast" and go into the surrounding forests to do what nature intended?
What the heck am I supposed to do? - I'm not taking a bird out of someone's yard!