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As Iowa fall turkey season is for residents alone we expect that all Iowa hunters know the wildlife regulations and they do not need be repeated in this article. For those that need to access the regulations the Iowa DNR website has the most current and complete listing available. For those Iowa residents and Mid-America Hunting Association members that seek a fall turkey hunt they will find plenty of opportunity and the remainder of this article is how to maximize their hunt on MAHA lease land.
With Iowa fall turkey, archery deer and upland bird season overlapping much of the time the best time to access our Iowa lease land for fall turkey will be before the upland bird season. Most hunters will make a fall turkey hunt concurrent to a deer hunt especially more so during the earlier part of the fall season. To turkey hunt later during the upland bird season while not a disadvantage will find the fall turkey hunter with a greater number of others in the field chasing some early season Iowa pheast and quail. That is not much of a deterrent again earlier in the season due to the warm temperatures keeping the bird dog hunters at home waiting for the more dog friendly cooler winter temperatures. In terms of the Iowa archery deer hunter, he too is limited competition for making a good fall turkey hunt. Iowa’s limited and very competitive archery deer tag draw system keeps bow hunter numbers low and frequently few in the field on most days throughout the season until the peak rut in mid-November. Again, we see the theme that the fall turkey hunter in Iowa will have far less other hunters in the earlier part of the fall turkey season than later. The Iowa archery deer hunter being a case in point will reach his peak field days during the peak rut in the middle two weeks of November. Before and after that peak rut period the archery deer hunter is a minority in the field. That same Iowa deer hunter may use the late Iowa fall turkey season in December or the archery only into January as excuse to return to the field after an earlier successful deer harvest. This one singular advantage that Mid-America Hunting Association brings to the self guided hunter of not having a limit to the days to hunt compliant to state and federal regulations allows that hunter to maximize his recreational pursuit. We probably will all agree that at the end of the season we always feel like we should have spent more time in the field during the season on a hunt. This one small snapshot focused on Iowa fall turkey hunting is just that resource to gain us more field time. Multiply that by the opportunities in Kansas and Missouri then all of us can easily get to the point where when the seasons do finally come to an end we can breath a sigh of relief in that we will be able to stay more on the weekend and not have to go hunting! A realization few attain outside of our organization. At this point, we hope to have established that the few fall Iowa turkey hunters that we do have or will have from future readers of this article will find they will never be denied a fall turkey hunt and that our southern Iowa hunting lease land will have plenty of acreage and turkey flocks to hunt. The management aspect of separating fall archery deer hunters and later upland bird hunters requires each turkey hunter to reserve individual farms he wishes to hunt. As he turkey hunts that farm to success or failure he can cancel any remaining reservations or change hunt location. The intent is to insure all have as high a quality hunt as possible and to that end there are hunter pressure management caveats. In the case of Iowa fall turkey hunting the provisos include insuring all that are hunting any one lease do so without falling on the heels of others that were there before them. Another that works well and in a further positive mode is for the fall turkey hunter to get some latest flock sightings as provided by earlier field reports from other members and the MAHA staff. It is very common for upland bird hunters to report turkey flock locations in a sincere effort to help others in the Association. While less frequent, the same occurs for many deer hunters. There are a good handful of deer hunters that can credit their getting their eyes on a trophy whitetail due to upland bird hunter reports of as short as the day before. Our Iowa fall turkey hunting it is an easy proposition for the Iowa resident with a fall turkey tag. The first year member will gain to the lease number recommendations where to hunt. Fall turkey scouting is not necessary and may be subsumed to the lead days of a fall hunt. Our telephone reservation system is flexible to the work day (M-F; 9 - 530) of getting a place to hunt with that reservation insuring the fall turkey hunter is not competing with an archery deer hunter or in the more rare occurrence another fall Iowa turkey hunter. The bottom line is that we have removed the obstacles to Iowa fall turkey hunting for any Iowa resident hunter that really wants to fall turkey hunt.
Another take on Iowa turkey hunting |
The first item to be established about Iowa fall turkey hunting is that the open season is for Iowa residents only. Non-residents may not hunt fall turkey in Iowa. Non-residents may hunt the regular Iowa spring turkey season, just not the fall.