Aldeer.com Forums Alabama Deer Talk ALTurkey Talk -- Beards and Spurs The Numbers

After the second weekend, this season's total continued to gain slightly over last year's.......at 8,108 this season so far compared to 7,586 last year at the same time........I'll wait to make another map but many of the counties that started out way behind showed gains in catching back up.......Thought that was interesting and something to watch moving forward

Jackson county had about 65,000 acres off limits until April 1.

People better quit checking birds. It's a lose lose. Chuckie is a dominant gobbler theory believer. Check too many and he'll say we are killing too many need tighter restrictions. Check too few this year, and Chuckie will say we are still in a population decline and we need tighter restrictions. When Chuckie checks his turkey check tally, the number he should see on opening day of the season is 0, and on the last day of the season, the number he sees should still be showing as a 0. It's not like he's using any sound biological data to make any of these limit and season start date decisions. Why give him the any ammo whatsoever to support his viewpoints? As noted above, he'll just have something to twist whichever way he feels he wants to go.

Big increase in kills this week over the same week last year......now at 9,719 total compared to 8,301 at the same point last year. Here is the updated map by county

Probably be back down after this weekend with the weather and Easter

So if you compare the numbers from the first weekend to the most current map its pretty apparent to see that some counties started out in the hole due to the heavy rains that weekend…….Since then, a majority of all counties have added or gained 20-30% ish percent in a very similar large scale trend …….yet many of those counties that started in the hole are still behind what they likely would have been…….If the season ended today you could say that the delay saved birds……..However, there’s still several weeks to go and those coming days is what will determine if those birds are indeed saved or if they end up getting killed just the same. If you look at a county like Autauga or Coosa for example, it kinda leads you to believe that maybe its going to be the latter…….

Still at the end of the day Gobbler said it……..Either way that doesn’t mean that harvest is a limiting factor on population growth ....

What delay? The season started last year on 3/25, same as this year. In 2021 I believe it came in on 3/20.

The weather "delay" that occurred in some areas because of the heavy rain the first few days.......Suppression would probably be a more accurate term

The 49% in Bibb co increase is probably from people poaching at my place! Used to hear 6-7 birds on any given morning now I’m lucky to hear 1 on my place. Luckily I just made friends with a neighbor that is in law enforcement. Hopefully that’ll cut down on the bs.

👍🏽 gotcha. When you said delay my mind instantly when to season dates.

What do you think is causing 40-50% swings all across the southern counties??.......That seems like a lot.

Let’s ask a bunch of turkey hunters to volunteer information

Dont have to ask they literally post it all over the interwebs these days

That’s true. Hope y’all fellas have a happy Easter

So we should pass last year’s total tomorrow and are on pace to have the highest harvest in the last 4 years…….That really doesn’t tell the full story though if you dig into those numbers a little further. Over that 4 year period many of the counties in the southern 1/3 of the state have seen pretty significant increases in harvest rates while a large portion of the northeastern quadrant have been on a 4 year decline……..counties like Cherokee, Calhoun, Cleburne, Talladega, along with several others……Even ol mighty Jackson has dropped from killing 700+ birds down to 500.

Here's a few examples of those counties.......These are the last 4 year's numbers keeping in mind that there's still a little to add on to this years.

Counties in decline

Cherokee..........466....386....359....293

Calhoun..........380....336 ....298....269

Cleburne..........344....243....229....192

Jackson..........771....717.....551....529

Talladega ..........333....233....197....188

Tallapoosa..........393....244....265....210

Damn , Tallapoosa used to be loaded with them in the early 80s
.
I used to hunt the old Dadeville lumber company land I saw droves of turkey ever time I went deer hunting

Some of the counties on the increase…….

Coffee..........153....170....237....257

Conecuh..........149.....188.....205.....256

Covington..........242....263....303....350

Baldwin..........234....241....276....314

Barbour..........375....327....432....462

Thanks for sharing. How are these numbers gathered? Does include private land kills?

Took me a while but it’s on the outdooralabama.com site

https://game.dcnr.alabama.gov/Report/County/Turkey