Toughest turkeys on earth?

I know the yankees will chime in and say how hard theirs are to kill but I believe that La,Ms,Al,Ga,Fla and maybe Sc have the hardest turkeys to kill once they get to their 3rd spring. What do you guys think?

I have hunted Mississippi, Tennessee, Kentucky, Nebraska, and Alabama...of the places I've hunted, Tennessee has the dumbest most suicidal birds and Jackson County, Alabama has the biggest arse hole devil mountain birds I've ever witnessed. Now I would probably kill more if I was patient and just sat somewhere all day, but I like to run and gun and if they ain't gobbling, I go the hell home.

I ain't gonna argue with that, the best hunters are from the south too. Them northern and western birds are easy if you kill hem here with any kind of consistency,

Toughest turkeys on earth are where ever I hunt

Alabama and Texas are the only two states I've hunted. Them turkeys are most definitely suicidal out there compared to here. I won't lie though, it's nice hunting them after fighting with these here. It was a big confidence booster going out there last year. I'm going again this year for that booster also, March 29th-April 1st. I'd like to go somewhere else, but I've got an all but free place to go out there, so I'll go somewhere else when I have the time and dough.

Sheeesh put me on some of those suicidal Tennessee birds lol I kill my share but I have found very few easy ones,

I just wish my place had turkeys I could hunt like we did 7 or 8 yrs ago

I've hunted MS, Alabama, Oklahoma, Nebraska, and Texas. I would call none of em really easy. A wild turkey is a wild turkey. Texas and Nebraska just have better hunting (more gobblers) than where I normally hunt. Toughest - Management Area 3 year or older gobbler from MS. He's heard it all. Now, at the end of the season when his hens are gone, he is very killable. I also think if you can kill em consistently in MS/AL, you can kill em anywhere.

I have hunted alabama, Tennessee, Kansas,Texas, Montana ,Wyoming,Missouri,Iowa and kentucky. Northern Missouri/ Iowa birds kicked my dick in the dirt. Kansas follows in second. For me the issue with those birds is they are field dwelling demons. They pitch 150 yds out into the middle of a field and that's where they stay all day. The sun doesn't seem to heat those birds up enough to push them back to shade of the timber. They might pitch out in the open here but give it till about 10:30 an they are looking for timber to get out of the suns heat on those black feather. That when they get the only judo chop.

Fixed it for ya....

I've hunted turkeys in Al, Ga, Ms, Texas, Nb, ND, Fl,Ok, and homegrown Al birds are easily the hardest, esp any WMA birds or Wilcox Co birds. Wilcox Co has more surenuff UNKNOWN turkey killers, and always has, that any other area of the state.

The toughest ones are the ones that have been fooled with a lot by bad turkey hunters......... I don't think it matters a whole lot where they live.
Me and T Winters and another guy went out to Kansas a few years ago on a cheap hunt with an outfitter that specialized in deer hunts ....... He basically just showed us 3 or 4 farms and turned us loose.
We worked them over pretty good and bragged to him about how many turkeys he had. Went ahead and booked another hunt the next season for he second week of May.
Ol boy realized he had another cash crop with turkeys and booked a bunch of hunts that next spring....... By the time we got there in may them birds were terrified of their own shadow.
I spent three days trying to kill a turkey in that open country that I don't believe I could have killed with a shotgun if I had stayed out there all summer. Terry did end up killing a couple but he's real dangerous about stuff like that....... Me and our other buddy never cut a feather out there.
I remember making the comment that I'd like to get back home to Skyline so I could find some birds that hadn't been fooled with bad.
Those stupid rios turned into world-class bad turkeys from one season to the next.

I agree with brentm. Pressured turkeys equal bad birds.

I've hunted some very tough turkeys in VA and FL. The toughest ever were one year in UT. (Speaking of spring gobbler season).

It seems like it depends on many factors.

Jackson County, Al devil mountain turkey have been the hardest ones I hunt. Some don't but overall these mountain birds are dang tough to kill.

I havent hunted alot of states but I believe if you can kill a Alabama WMA bird then you can kill almost any bird anywhere else.

On a side note, I did kill two of those WMA bastages last year and 1 the year before.

I have hunted in several states as well,and so far I have had my tail handed to me more here in Jackson county more than anywhere I've been.Several years ago I hunted with Jim Neighbors down there in those swamps,and those birds were alot easier mostly because of terrain.He declined a hunt up here,said he didn't think it would be worth the trouble. Those Midwest birds just never shut up,so if you have enough property,and patience you can kill em pretty regular.Iowa has some of the hardest gobbling,biggest birds I have ever seen,and I got lucky up there and killed a monster of a bird. I would have to say rite here in the south east corner of the usa is the toughest birds to kill.

Quit trying to impress us.

Turkeys can be turkeys anywhere. Toughest birds I've hunted were at a place that the terrain made it a whole lot more difficult than it should be.

Turkeys are tough anywhere if they don't talk. I am still recuperating from what I refer to as "The Silent Spring of 13". I didn't realize how stupid I could be until I spent all of last season hunting turkeys with a bad case of lock jaw. A slice of humility is par for the course, but a whole number 4 wash tub full was inhumane. I don't even want to speak about the one gobbling turkey I hunted last year. He basically slipped up behind me and slit my throat. I can't explain this past season, I have a good many turkeys to hunt but I have never had them treat me as cruel as they did last year.

Hey, I gotta brag when I can.

Toughest birds on earth......Pearl River County, Mississippi on Wolf River WMA.

Bankhead birds

I've heard they are bad ones.

I'm gonna have to say eagle creek WMA in TN

thats just because ya'll ain't hunted Wilcox Co..

They are all hard for me!

You are speaking the truth, I think they hate you.

They have to be toward the top.

at least it's mutual!

Alabama and Florida birds are the toughest. I think it's because there are more hunters down here. Southern Indiana birds don't gobble they yell get ready here I come. It was nice before they started leasing out the reclaimed mines...

I have. I live there.

then you know the truth about which turkeys are the toughest...

I've hunted them in 9 states, and still think the most difficult place for me to kill a turkey is 10 miles from my house on the Coosa WMA. Its 30,000 acres of vertical cutover. There's only a few places where a turkey can possibly survive, and all the hunters are lined up in them.

You hear a turkey gobble and think he's pretty close, I can be there and set up in 5 minutes. 2 hours later you finally get close enough to call, and you are cut up and bleeding and probably have a couple of broken bones. Then one yelp and the turkey flies a half mile in the other direction. Its a frustrating place to hunt.

Wilcox Co birds are stupid compared to them.

Agreed, think you can call a turkey? Thoose birds will make you feel dumb.

This is my only state I've hunted but I about think now the hardest turkeys to kill are the best gobbling turkeys in the woods. I almost cringe when I hear one gobble 50 times before I get set down. The only thing that makes me feel better is when they answer back & then tone down. I may be wrong but I cant remember ever killing a bird that gobbled 100 plus times in a morning.

I think 4+ yr old public land birds anywhere. The one's that may give you a courtesy gobble to clear his morning throat then shut up the remainder of the day. The ones I like to call a "hermit". His heart is so shriveled up into a piece of coal, sweet hen music doesn't even pique his interest except around 2pm every other Thursday. I have fooled with at least 2 like this in my life. Never killed either one of them. I don't think Ray Eye could have killed either one of these birds unless he shot him off the roost, which I thought about trying on several occasions.

Just like always....folks are scared to death that BhamFred is gonna whip their arse if they question him on anything so I have to step up. What a bunch of WIMPS!!!! He is just an old, grumpy fart. Nothing to fear.

Seriously though Troy and Todd...I am curious. What makes the Wilcox County birds so tough? I haven't hunted enough places to have any kind of opinion whatsoever. Love hearing any and all of you veterans' opinions on any and everything turkey related. I'll hang up and listen....

There is no significant amount of public land in Wilcox Co anymore, so a lot depends on where you are in the county. On some of the big plantations that have little pressure, they are as easy as turkeys anywhere in the state. Even the smaller tracts can have easy turkeys on them. I killed my biggest gobbler on my uncle's place in Wilcox Co and he was also the easiest. Made one call to him, and he flew 200 yards and lit in gun range. Hunt was over less than a minute after I set up.

Back in the 60s, there was a lot of public land and there was an area called the Hills that stretched for miles and was wide open. There were some tough birds in there, but even as a HS kid I always managed to kill some. That's what Troy is thinking about - he thinks it is 1965.

Wilcox County people kinda look down on the rest of us because that is one part of Alabama that always had turkeys even during the dark old days when most of the rest of the state didn't have any.
Far as I know, they are all pure-bred Alabama turkeys and not transplants like much of the rest of the state......... And they represent a couple hundred generations of turkeys that have been fooled with and called to by some pretty talented turkey hunters. Therefore they are genetically superior to the rest of the state's population.
That's the way folks down there see it anyway. Kinda like texans that think all their stuff is better than your stuff just cause it's from Texas.
I wouldn't know I've never hunted down there but I have a good friend that used to live down there and he says they are definately tougher than Jackson county turkeys.

I never hunted Wilcox County, but I loved hunting Monroe County. They have a pile of birds in that area. I killed 3 turkeys at my club one year and every one had multiple beards.

Good thing they don't hunt Clarke Co.......that's where the population was the greatest in the dark day as I understand....and where repopulation efforts focused the trapping efforts mainly.

Bankhead and Sam R. Murphy 2 tough places period

This

Well here is my opinion.

Wilcox county has always had turkeys. The old timers here used to claim there was a different species here. They referred to them as mossy head turkeys because they had feathers that extended higher up their head. I talked about that with a wildlife biologist at a NWTF banquet and he explained that those birds are simply the old pure wild turkeys that existed here before any restocking or cross breading with domestic stock took place. My father says that they used kill mature gobblers that would only weigh 13 pounds. To this day we kill mature birds on our land that weigh less than 17 pounds all the time. These turkeys aren't descended from one that was dumped out of a cage or ever lived on a farm. They are as wild as it gets and they have been hunted hard for a long time. Turkey hunting here is just as big as deer hunting. There is not only a lot of turkey hunters here but a lot of them that know what the hell they are doing. Stupid turkeys don't last long in Wilcox County. And the smart ones get fooled with a lot. The guys who consistently limit out around here (and that ain't me) are as good at turkey hunting as anyone on the continent. I have no doubt of that.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it. LOL!

All of the SW Alabama counties have some tough turkeys for sure. My arch nemesis happens to be Conecuh County. I am snake bit when it comes to turkeys in Conecuh County for some reason. Wilcox County is very diverse in land types, so you can pick your poison there when it comes to turkeys. I would trade our turkeys for east Alabama turkeys any day of the week. Our turkeys get educated by some of the best turkey hunters in the country and they don't need no help to begin with.