It seems obvious with the high cost of fertilizer there will be a lot of chicken litter spread this year. What studies have been done on the effect of chicken litter on the turkey population?

https://www.researchgate.net/profil...-to-wild-turkeys-Meleagris-gallopavo.pdf

There is starting to be some research into it. Also references at the end of this pub

I looked it up lots of studies have been done. Not good for the turkeys. I call the Alabama game and fish. The person I talked to discouraged it big time. When the hen walks through it and brings it back to the nest it kills the poults When the poults walk init they get it on them and die. It has a affect on the eggshells when she is sitting on them as well. We call a wildlife biologist and he said the same thing. We went with regular fertilizer on our hay fields and not Chicken mature.

Using chicken litter is by no means a new thing . .

I bet usage will be the same as years before , all of it

No doubt. It is hard to get as is. Back in the 90's folks could get some spread but now if you do not have it locked in with the farms you are out of luck. We have been getting litter from the same farm since the early 90's. If you don't have a chicken farm within a few miles of where you want the litter I doubt you could get any. They also changed the law somewhere around 2000 I think where it can't be spread in certain months.

Thank you! Lots of potential causes for poor turkey health.

More widespread now. We used to never see it down in the valley but it was heavily used on Sand Mt. Now it's used all over the county.

DO NOT HUNT AROUND CHICKEN HOUSES, CHICKEN LITTER OR ANY HAY FIELDS THAT CHICKEN LITTER HAS BEEN APPLIED!! I contacted the cab and this is what they told me

All ill say is..where i grew up was covered up with turkeys in the 80’s an 90’s..when they staryed putting litter on pastires and buildin chicken houses in the area..it took about 3-5 winters an they disappeared..daddy said he just started realizing he wudnt seein any in the fields..hearin gobbles less and less..until they just up and were gone..i know folks found some dead under strange circumstances..by the late 90’s it was a rare sight to see a bird..the lst one i saw was in 2001..there have been very few sightings since..i dont care what anybody says..litter killed our birds over the course of about 5 years..now..there are getting to be a few more seen now..cause the people who put the litter out died or got to old to farm..chit ortah be against the law.

More chicken houses now . It all gets used .

What ain't used is stocked pile till it is on a farm some where.

Notice around farm in winter therell be mountain of it piled up

Wasn’t there a lot of talk about 2 or 3 years ago about chicken litter being the reason for reduced turkey populations. There was a lot of talk going on about it, it might have been 4 yrs ago!

I’ll bet a gold nickel hay cutters kill more turkey, eggs included, than litter. But I know nothing

Be surprised how many die to farm .

I've sprayed hens on nests as I went over them .

Cover crops on no-till is worst than hay fields.

I ain’t sayin chicken litter doesn’t kill a turkey, but I know for a fact since 1993 chicken litter has been spread on every piece of property I hunt that is private land. EVERY FIELD AND PASTURE, EVERY YEAR, FOR 29 years (family owned). I know what I know from being here. 53 houses in the family lots of chicken chit. I would make a statement, but for the sake of you poaching bassturds here every year I won’t. I ain’t seen a dam turkey on it in 25 year

I had worked at a place I hunt for 7-8 years killing nest predators. Turkey population had flourished. One year of chicken litter being spread by row cropper reduced the overall turkey population at least 75%. This happened in the past 12 months. The litter was the only change at the property

My limited experience with litter was from 15 years ago. Lots of turkeys and then a source for chicken litter was found. Next year, very few turkeys and the trend lasted 5 years. Also had some timber harvest in that time period, so multiple possible causes. This year the litter is being spread again. That is an anecdotal experience but the reason I asked the question.

Double edged. If we didn’t have chicken farms/litter around here our only industry would likely be timber related. Tough to see places that were cleared with mule and chain to be planted in pines IMO. I’m going with injectable sludge on some of my places this year to see what that’s about. It’s free to me and my buddy gets paid to get rid of it. Dang right a hay cutter will smack a nest but we’ve gotta do something for a living. What a quail and rabbit likes will suit a hen well though, I try to leave them some real estate like they had in the good ole days

I doubt chickens will poop any more this year than they ever do. All that litter always gets used somewhere and it will again this year. The turkeys will be fine.

Chicken Litter IS the reason for the demise of turkeys in Alabama. But everyone wants to blame other things as there is too much money in it. You can either actually be interested in addressing the demise of turkeys or just PRETEND you are like Alabama F and G . Chicken Litter is one of the biggest problems IMO by far.

In Trinity our neighbors many years ago first used litter and no turkeys after. From a good flock to zero in a year. The only thing difference was Chicken Litter being used for the first time.

It is effecting the population even here in Marion county as well. All of my neighbors agree it is Chicken Litter.. We have big ag fields around us. They just finished spreading.

I prolly wiped out the flock yesterday… spread 50 TON down by y’all

I see turkeys living/feeding pretty regularly in fields that have litter spread on them every year. Exactly what is it about the litter yall think is killing the turkeys and why dont it kill the ones im seeing?

Domesticated chickens has a resistance to disease that wild turkeys don't. Same with tame turkeys

It is like when we gave the Indians blankets. Hey here is some small pox and a bunch of other diseases too. Did not work out well for them.

When I was a kid I killed several turkeys picking bugs out of piles of chicken litter. The guy that owned it just augered it off in piles for his cows to eat. Place was always covered in turkeys and still is.

Its funny how little attention this thread has got, and it’s probably the closest to actually being the legitimate cause in a lot of locations. But, it may get into some pocket books so we need to ignore it.

It’s more about making them sterile from what I recall.

Exactly. Instead lets shorten the season, not use decoys, and other half arse measures . You cannot fix a problem until you CORRECTLY identify the problem. Pretty simple.

It is kind of like blaming mass shootings on the guns and taking them from everyone rather than deal with the fact that pyscho tropic drugs are being given to kids, video games making kids think shooting is cool and single parent homes not instilling values and morals.

You have to identify the real problem and address it. Not run around with half arse "Dominant Gobbler" Theories and other BS.

It killls eagles and armydillers too I think

Are we talking broiler litter . Like 8 week or younger birds ? Or hen house litter ?
Broiler litter is prob 90% of what is spread locally ( next to NO effect on turkeys )cocci and enuritis aren’t fatal to turkeys
Wet hen litter is a different story .( the litter can harbor stuff from adult birds that is detrimental to turkeys) like blackhead being nearly 100% fatal to turkeys .
If you have no idea what I’m talking about then you probably shouldn’t be having the chicken litter debate . FYI blackhead I guess could be in broilers but with new litter practices it’s not likely to be .

Im talking about broiler houses. His family at the time had broiler houses. I've washed my share of slats out of laying houses as a kid though. Probably worst job I had, rather work in hayfields