Spring Turkey Habitat
Spring turkey habitat piture series as an attempt to take away some of the mystery of what terrain hunters will face during spring turkey season.
A page that shows aerials and ground level pictures of one of our average spring season turkey hunting lease land contracts.
This aerial shows the core roost, daily feeding and strutting area. These areas are largely to the west of the N-S creek as some of the southern road side may be observed from the road. The northern east field is blocked from road observation by a slight ridge and the flock uses that side of the creek as well.
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The red 'X' marks the spot seen in this ground picture. The spot where we most often scouted strutting. |
Facing SW from the X, they roosted on the bluff, flydown was to the wheat and day long movement between the two creek bottoms.
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On the day we went to this land lease we went specifically to scout it for contract renewal confirming farming practices and to take these picture for this web page. While we did see the flock at first light from roost through flydown and some mid day activity the early morning low light, a small lens camera and simply not being fast enough cost us live turkey pictures. |
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A larger aerial view of the surrounding habitat. Take note of the field color changes being able to read pasture from forage to row crop is a valuable skill beyond that of trees and brush. These aerials have all three to include pastured timber areas. The only sure method of learning is to have an aerial in your hand when on the land and deal with the variable of when the aerial was taken and the current land usage. Aerials are good contributory information - never a decision making tool for leasing or hunting in their own right.
A further out resolution of the larger surrounding area show the better habitat as the land to the east opens up wide due to flat land efficient agriculture.
This effect of transitioning farming practices from largely pasture - of the higher elevation land around our lease and the lower elevation - better soil conditions allowing grain crop production makes this lease productive while some very good looking river bottom timber to the west appears to be more or at least as good a productive habitat (but it is not due to cattle) as the land in the top aerial.
This is the difference between actually scouting ground on foot before lease contract signing and simply leasing over the telephone as many non-residents attempt to do. As good as this land looks and the region of the state that it is in and it's productivity to date all combine to make this an average land lease suitable for the money we are paying for it and nothing more.
