I’m Not a turkey hunter so I’m here for a little help. We’d like to get started planting a few strips for doves but I don’t want to disturb any turkey nests in our fields.

I've seen hens on the next in August, but I don't know what the latest might be.

I’m planting 4 acres of millet next weekend. I Bush hogged the field and of April without disturbing any nests. Hopefully It stayed short enough for nothing to nest there between now and then

Right now we’re still somewhere in the neigborhood of less than half the nests have hatched. Another quarter will hatch this month, last quarter in July , followed by a few stragglers in August. Not exact but good rule of thumb based on hatch data i’ve looked at.

If you plant now and the grass is of any substantial height then you are gonna hurt your soul when that momma flushed out from her crushed nest or gets all wrangled in the bushhog.

Wheat on plowed ground end of August.....

Just like you like corn in a feeder to deer hunt over?

Rolled up to the fields yesterday and found the wheat and grasses were laid over so we planted a few strips of proso millet. Man it was hot.

I saw some polts the other day. Saw 11 jakes this morning

Peak incubation (the most hens on the nest) is April 15 in AL. Therefore peak hatch is May 15. Obviously, you see some hatched the last of April and will see some late hatches (hens renesting after nest destruction) as late as July, rarely August. However, the FAR majority of poults will be hatched or hatching and on the ground now and for the next couple weeks.

How long usually til mama brings them out on journeys? Saw some the size of quail this past week. They couldn’t hardly fly but were trying. Mama was doing a good job keeping them together.

Some of our yard turkeys could get off the ground pretty good at about 3weeks. They couldnt fly like a grown one but if they got loose, you wouldnt catch em.

I've been seeing poults for a few weeks now, saw them flying good this weekend, looked like big fat doves.

Found nests with eggs in July Northwest Alabama.

Where is this data? The median hatch date in Mississippi is June 14. This adds together all nesting activities to get at half the successful nests hatch before their date and half after. The earliest region had a median hatch date of June 4 and the latest June 14. April 15th seems more like the nest initiation which would make it on par with Mississippi. I doubt moving over a few parallels is gonna make that big of a difference and again median hatch date is a stat that provides a bigger and more accurate picture of the entire nesting season.

This is Michael Chamberlains data for GA, however, I have seen Alabamas and it is nearly identical. I have also discussed this with him personally and, according to his data, even though it notes "proportion of hens laying and incubating" the inference is that there are more hens incubating in around the 2nd and third weeks of April than any other time and there are more broods hatching around the 2nd and 3rd weeks of May than any other time.

Saw poults that could fly today in bibb co

2 hens with 4 poults today on the Lawrence/Franklin line near Mount Hope.

Saw poults in Monroe county this weekend. About the size of a crow.

Coming along well in Pike Cty, eating up my seed.

Here's another load of them, hopefully they all survive.

Love seeing these pics. Looks like some good mommas

This and fawns have led us to doing more earlier in the year plot wise. On the fields we want to plant later by the end of turkey season we now will hit them with gly and let them die. Since doing that we have only found one turkey nest, and no fawns.

I found a nest today while trying to clip some arrow leaf clover that had gone to seed and dried up. The hen was actively sitting on it so I got the heck out of there and left the cover. I hope she can hatch this clutch. It’s pretty amazing she’s still trying to hatch some babies this late.

It’s not late. Again, consider Mississippi’’s medians hatch date in the central region of June 14. Central Alabama is literally due east of that so you can expect similar figures but there hasn’t been a study on median HATCH dates in Alabama.. There is data out there for Alabama on when hens go to nest in Alabama and start laying but those figures don’t account for a myriad of factors. For example, a large percentage of Jennys don’t nest their first year, they shouldn’t be included in any count. It throws things off. Also renests are complicated and draw things out.

The real number is the hatch data on actual successful nests and Mississippi has looked at that in depth. They found the statewide median hatch date was June 11 and the regions range from June 4-June 14th. So...if 7 days ago east central Mississippi hit the 50 percent hatch mark, it makes sense that west central Alabama is right there with them. Turkey babies don’t recognize state boundaries. This means that half of that region’s successful hatch comes in the last two weeks of June and beyond.

Curious if you have a publication on this?

https://www.mdwfp.com/media/256594/2019-turkey-report-spittin-drummin.pdf

Mississippi’s yearly Spittin and Drummin report.

I would suspect these are later than reality as it is observational data. Chamberlains data is radio telemetry which is usually highly accurate. Good data none the less.

Nice pics, that is encouraging to see. I am hoping to have the opportunity to have some land that I can manage and share with family and friends.