Personally turkey hunting to me is like crack to a drugie it is something that causes me to go without sleep, food and other things I have a problem and I admit it. I've yet to find a club or piece of private land that can support my habit two years in a roll without giving a year or so to recover. I'm trying to jump around and kill one here and there to keep from over harvesting but its hard to leave a gobbling turkey alone. This is just from my experince may not be your problem in your area.

Gobbler, I found time for you.

Greater illegal hen mortality has been associated with earlier opening dates (Normal et al. 2001), and substantial illegal hen mortality has occurred in areas when spring turkey season coincided with peak breeding (Kimmel and Kurzejeski 1985).

Other studies have shown considerable hen mortality as it relates to earlier opening dates (Wright and Speake 1975, Williams and Austin 1988, Davis et all 1995).

Mean nest incubation initiation is April 20-30 for south and central Al and as late as May 1-7 for north Al (Whitaker 2013). Meaning laying began approximately two weeks earlier.

On Thomas WMA in 1980, Everett determined average hatch as May 22-28, and ranged from May 1-June 24.

Peak gobbling periods in Clarke Co as determined by Davis in 1977 were April 5 and April 25. If peak gobbling coincides with breakup of winter flocks (first peak) and nest initiation (second), and that occurs in early April and late April in south AL, then it is certainly later in north AL.

Gardner found that the earliest hatch date was May 6 and 80% of poults hatched the last three weeks of may.

Metzler found that in North AL peak hatch occurred the first week of June.

I can go on and on and on.

Another observation of mine is the ones who seem to have the biggest problem with change are the ones happily killing their limit each season, not experiencing a decline, and are determined to do it their way regardless of what the research indicates, and with no regard for the resource.

Matt,
Have you seen this article by any chance? If you had, what did you think about it overall? Not looking to argue a point one way or the other. Really like seeing both sides.

http://s3.amazonaws.com/file-storage.DEP...sertation-1.pdf

I get on here quite a bit, but don't post much. I hunt in Alabama until our season opens up back home. The public land in Alabama is leaps and bounds ahead compared to the public land in Arkansas. Wanted to let you know how much I appreciate seeing you post on here. It is not possible to please everyone and never will be. But you have no idea how much more the sportsmen in Alabama and everywhere else for that matter, respect you to take fire on a public forum.

Predators are the main issue.

Put a little money towards that.

Amen. I've proven it way too many times. If you take the raccoon, bobcat, and coyotes off of a property, you'll see a turkey explosion.