2010 Spring Turkey Season Summary
Once again, for the third year in a row, our spring turkey hunters were up against rain, wind and cool weather. Especially early in the season. Despite tough weather conditions, there were plenty of birds to work and plenty of seed leftover for the 2011 season like the 2 jakes below.
Due to a discouraging Missouri and Iowa forecast, we anticipated a decline in the total number of spring turkey hunters for the 2010 season. We had a total of 282 hunters. This was 16 short from 2009. We had an additional13 (over 2009) hunters attempt to hunt multiple states, so we ended up busy as ever.156 hunted Missouri, 153 Kansas and 33 Iowa. 66 hunted multiple states. Six took on the challenge to hunt all three states.
Many farms with good turkey populations were not hunted for the entire season. This was more so in north Missouri. Several of the counties closest to KC received the most pressure. An example was Miami and Atchison County, Kansas and Bates and Caldwell County, Missouri. They were hunted most frequently by local hunters. Local hunters need to realize many of the clubs remote farms with sparse human populations can produce slam dunk turkey hunting opportunity.
Out of the 6 that attempted to hunt all three states, 2 were able to harvest 5 toms and a third harvested 4 toms, 3 with a bow. One was able to close the deal in 5 days, while the second tagged 4 toms in 4 days, but the 5th bird took 4 days. The third, who mostly hunted with a bow, took over 20 days to fill 4 tags.
The heaviest bird reported was 28 pounds. The longest beard was 12 ½ inches and the longest spur was 1 4/8 inches. Several reported multiple beards. The most we heard was 4. Various hunters tagged out quickly. The quickest reported was 4 mature toms in 3 days, all killed at first light. The most days hunted to fill one tag was 28. In this case a local hunter hunting close to Kansas City.
The Miller family had an outstanding season filling 11 out of 11 tags in 10 days. Dad as mentioned above, harvested 5 mature toms in 5 days. His 9 year old daughter Julie, harvested 4 mature toms in 4 days. His 15 year old son Mike, tagged a jake and bearded hen his one and only day in the field.
Julie with her 4th tom.
Shaun and Nichole enjoyed talking to all of the members throughout the 2 month long spring turkey season. Nichole moved to the country and had turkeys strutting in her front yard. She can now appreciated the beauty of the spring turkey breeding ritual.
Enjoy the summer!
