How to manage Spring Turkey hunting on your lease. We have 2200 acres with 16 members,of which untill last year only 4 members were turkey hunters. Now there are as many as 10 that want to
Turkey hunt.I am not a turkey hunter , but I am the club President ,and want to try to listen to all members compliants.
One suggestion is that for Turkey hunting privilages you pay extra $200.00 in club dues.
The serious turkey hunters tell me that 10 turkey hunters on 2200 acres is to way to many. I was wondering how some of yall would handle the issue?
Suggestions welcome .
Thanks

CURIOUS on why to raise the rate for turkey hunters.

4 or 5 turkey hunters, at most, on 2200 acres (3 would be even better). Break the property up into four or five 450-550 acre blocks. Limit access to those allowed to turkey hunt, based on membership seniority. If you want to charge more for those that want to turkey hunt, that's fine too but unless you limit the number of hunters to maintain hunt quality, all you'll end up doing is pissing people off.

Because it’s too crowded as is, and they’re getting more use out of the property than deer only folks.

As a turkey hunter, I’d gladly pay more.

Buuuut, this is also why I’m not in a club

ive never turkey hunted but plan on doing so just to see what the hype is all about..

^^^
Yea - what abolt said - 10-12 is complete cluster - 4-5 max

Breaking up in 250 acer areas b good. Usually u hav sign out zones like - stand 1,2,3 an area - stand 4,5,6, an area (if your plots named by number)

Wow - 10 plus on 2200 is cluster waiting to happen

And I thought majestic was gonna be packed this weekend. They expect 40 members on 13k acres

I had a similar situation with 800 acres. For years, me and only one other guy turkey hunted so it wasn't an issue. On the rare occasion when both of us hunted, we just coordinated via text. Well, one year we had a couple new members who wanted to turkey hunt so I just divided the property in to four approximately equal parcels and had people tag out, first come first serve. Except for opening weekend, I don't think we ever had all four of us show up at the same time. We dabbled with the idea of separate dues for non-turkey hunters but it just worked it's way out. We just said all memberships were the same price and had turkey rights but fortunately, not many people ever turkey hunted. We also didn't have many members and when screening new members, I always asked if they turkey hunted much and fortunately most people were honest.

Where is Majestic?

We have im guessing 6-8 members who turkey hunt almost 6k acres. I will try it for the 1st time ever this season.
ITS 1ST COME 1ST SERVE AT OUR PLACE.

Charge an additional fee for turkey hunting. If they are serious turkey hunters they’ll pay it. We keep our place at 1 turkey hunter every 400 acres.

Divide the weeks of turkey season up by assigning each week a "1" or "2".........Put numbers in a hat and have the members draw out a number......5 of them will hunt the "1" weeks and 5 of them will hunt the "2" weeks

SEEING all these replies i may rethink my decision on trying out turkey hunting. Seems more politics involved than deer hunting.... Sheesh!

If there’s not enough turkeys to go around for all to kill one (1) don’t hunt it. Kill all the breeder is not a good idea. 10 gobblers killed on 2200 acres doesn’t sound bad but I wouldn’t do it. If they all kill 1. Some may kill 2.

Everybody is a turkey hunter opening week or if they hear about some hitting the ground. Your dedicated hunters will just have to wait until after then to get serious just like they would in most any club.

Get your certified killers to section the map into huntable units. Turkey hunters pin in and out of turkey units. If reporting harvest do it only to you directly, not a paper log, and keep it secret until after season closes.

This year would have to ride out like it is. The following year you would ask for suggestions in reference to the situation among club members. If they can’t come to an agreement, you as club president would make the final decision. Let the majority take the heat off of you. There’s no good way to do it. You can’t hunt turkeys like you do deer. You may have to only allow 4 or 5 turkey/ deer memberships at added cost, starting from seniority down. You will probably lose a few members.

We have 3,000 acres on our club. I wish we only had 10 turkey hunters. And yes it is a cluster. Can’t get our president to do anything to help. I’m curious to know what works out for you as well.

In more than one club i hav had dickheads sign n middle of nite saying they got there at 4:30 am - i caught both the pricks - they just wanted best spot and in each instance i was there about 4 am 😀 - i waited on the pricks 😀

There will be drama in clubs

We also wont let anyone sign out before 5 am..

For starters, I am not a turkey hunter but have been involved with running a few places. Most of the time we went with a 1:500 ratio and sometimes even more. Just depends on the data.

Get a good calculation of "turkey" acreage. Not all habitat is turkey habitat. After that get a rough idea on what your turkey current population is and how to sustain/grow it. For instance. If you only have 800 acres of the 2200 that is good habitat that holds birds along with an average bird population, then I would say max 2 hunters with a 3 bird limit per membership. Typically these "turkey members" come at an additional price per membership that needs to cover any chufa planting or management practices strictly for turkeys.