Depends on how much competition for food is driving the amount of movement of each individual across space…….Coons that just spend all winter going back and forth short distances to corn feeders to make a living are gonna likely have lower mortality than ones that have to scavenge across large areas to meet their food needs…..Typically with most any specie the more something has to move and the further it has to travel…..the higher the mortality rates are gonna be…..We’re likely propping up much higher coon populations through Feb 11 and then sending that inflated population off onto the landscape to pillage and plunder during the early spring….I would imagine that the higher populations start exploiting other available food sources during this time period….It would only stand to reason that more coons exploiting resources in the spring would equate to more nests being raided.

I feel like every turkey hunter should atleast run a couple dozen dog proofs every now and then. If you can make the time to hunt them then you should atleast make some time to help them

as with any animal population . more food more animals . they are heather , survival rates go up . it concentrate them around the food source. creates less computation. on and on and on .

dont take a study to figure this out .


coons are predators more food they have less ground they need less ground they need the more you gonna have . same with any predator .

I’m starting to think that TDog93 and 3%Outdoorsman are related.
TDog, how much does your Rottweiler weigh?

I think his point is that by feeding raccoons they are unnaturally being congregated in areas that are also attracting turkeys. I’m pretty sure MSU released a study on nest success in relation to proximity of feeders a few years ago. I’ll try to find it.

The amount of corn being put out is insane….There’s an estimated 235,000 deer hunters….I rarely ever track for someone not baiting but lets be conservative and say that 50,000 of those hunters put out 20 bags of corn each season…. …..That alone comes out to 50 million pounds ……How many extra coons does 50 million pounds of corn produce statewide??

Don’t get me wrong………I’m not really trying to bash the dominant gobbler theory…..Its the fact that we’re reaching that far down in the bucket to find something to blame things on when something as glaringly obvious as coons and corn is staring us right in the face……. At some point how can you even act like there’s a legitimate conversation about to be had about this other stuff when there’s an elephant in the room of that proportion that’s being ignored??......It’s like “Are you serious Clark?”

The way we’re going about it is probably the worst possible scenario too….We’re pouring it to them during the winter months when things are supposed to be the leanest….This fattens up the females causing them to produce more babies than what the land is actually supporting……BUT that’s not all…..We’re then yanking all of that feed from them on Feb 11……likely leaving a lot of hungry coons on the landscape scavenging for food just prior to turkey nesting season.

But meanwhile we're looking to see if the issue is possibly turkey t-levels…….C’mon man.

You take away the corn and the coon numbers are still the same. The only reason somebody thinks the numbers are exploding is because they see them on camera at a feeder.

I agree with this. They’ve always been there, now you just see it. Coons went unchecked after Coon hunting became unpopular many moons ago. Who recreationally hunts coons in Alabama anymore?

You would be surprised. Lots of guys with coon dogs in my area. They let the dog tree and leash the dog. Very few kill the coon. Those guys manage coons the same way we manage deer. They feed them to concentrate and keep them healthy and some guys even worm them.

If you got a coon problem it’s your own fault. And feeding them corn makes it a heck of a lot easier to kill.
If the coons are full on deer corn they shouldn’t bother the turkey eggs…

Nope , things is when deer season is over so is the baiting .

Correct……that’s why we’re likely making the situation that much worse with the pattern of our feeding……Its not just that we’re inflating the coon population above actual carrying capacity……We’re doing that AND we’re suddenly cutting the feed from that population overnight……When you release this over inflated abundance of coons back onto the landscape on Feb 11 when the feeders run dry, they are going to start exploiting the natural resources that they use as food during the spring and summer….....turkey nests likely being one of those resources…...Think of it like over grazing…….

So don't feed corn and they eat the natural resources year round!