Last spring, I had a hen turkey with ( I think 11) poults. She basically took the same route ever morning.
Seemed every day, one poult was missing. Until there was none left.
No idea what got them but guessing great horned owls as there are several here.

Im guessing Im older than most on this site in my 80s, but I grew up with the miracle pesticides, herbicides, plastic, and new farming. I remember DDT being banned and Endrine and know agent orange all too well. I really thought that the ecology, save the planet folks were nut cases but changing my tune now. I have seen the decline in insects, birds, and small game drastically. I remember Smokey the Bear being a good thing and all fires were bad. I know for sure now fires need to burn and much better than herbicides. In the late 80s land management agencies started prescribed burning to reduce fuels and increase forage and some fires got out of hand and now they spray. It is sad not to see grouse anymore, meadowlarks and turkey. I my self sprayed to reduce weeds and saw what it did to wildlife. Nesting cover gone, insects and now seeing long term effects of herbicide build up in soils. I had one pasture that I use to get doves like crazy not anymore. We have pretty lawns, cheaper food, shiny apple and other fruits and vegetable's without blemish but at what cost. Hard to believe in Wyoming reservoirs they are warning about heavy metal build up in fish. Seems like more cancers, mental issues and birth defects in people. Im thinking we are pooping in our own nest.

I agree. 30 years ago we still had a lot of widespread trapping. Positive fluctuations in the fur market brought out past trappers or their children. A lot of those big time trappers in the 70’s and 80’s are gone, or have got rid of their traps, etc. i remember when there was a little resurgence in fur prices in the mid/late 90’s. I still had traps from trapping in the 70’s and 80’s. My highschool son and his buddy got into trapping as did a lot of other people. It was difficult to find untrapped ground. Now, if coon prices went to $15, there would probably be very little interest. I would dang sure not set out a full blown trap line. A lot of high school kids would not have parents with traps or knowledge of trapping like we did in the 90’s.

What few folks still trap around here have bought a dozen dog proof traps to remove some coons around their corn feeder. I let my 8 yr old grand daughter choose the trap location - I set the trap and placed it in the spot she chose - and she baited it - and we caught - 14 coons and two possums in two nights with ten dog proof traps. In the 1980’s, I was setting pocket sets in creeks and blind trail sets with 1.5 coil spring traps with fish for bait instead of cat food and was doing good to average one coon per two dozen traps. Anyone can catch coons and possums now because there are so many and they are so uneducated. But trapping your own 350 acres isnt going to make a difference in the big picture - just like the best habitat in the world on 350 acres when your two cattle farming neighbors on both sides dont give two cents about turkeys. There is very little done at scale anymore.

It is not just gamebirds. Fawn recruitment is also declining

https://www.outdoorlife.com/conservation/whitetail-fawn-recruitment-declines/

In my area timber practices have changed by the big timber companies and that has made for a decline in the turkey population. IP was the major timber company in my county up until around 2000. They would burn different blocks of timber each year and the turkey population was exploding. They sold out to a lot of smaller companies and they never control burn anything and the population has drastically declined. Now there is a 15000 acre WMA in my county that is managed for the red cockaded wood pecker, and the timber company control burns 1/3 of it each year. The turkey population in the WMA has exploded just like it was before IP sold there land here. Control burns make a big difference in the turkey population

Spinach in the supermarkets have 40% less iron now than when the Popeye cartoon came out. Girls are an average of 1 cup size larger breasts and start menstruation 2-3 years earlier than they did 30 years ago.

A recent study of boys 13-17 showed time periods of up to 30% less testosterone attributed to microplastics in their body.

I ain’t a ‘world is coming to an end’ or ‘climate catastrophe’ kinda guy, but THERE IS NO WAY that what is utilized in our fields is not affecting game populations. Its certainly affecting us.

and will also make a difference with quail. Only problem is, it is not done at scale anymore. My county is about 350,000 acres of primarily rural land. I would bet there is not 5000 acres burned a year anymore - if that.

I don't dispute that nest destruction and poult predation is occuring and has an impact. However for the studies to be irrefutable there needed to have been studies on nest success and poult predation through out the rise of turkey populations. Specific nest and poult death studies not roadside surveys/poult counts. It may, or may not be found, that as the population was increasing there was still a large amount of nest destruction and poult predation but the remaining poults were surviving. Interesting deer study: A few years ago our department of conservation did a study on fawn survival. One of the areas with collared does was on our farm. Four does collared. After the does had their fawn they had about 24-48 hours to catch the fawn and collar it (after that amount of time it was near impossible to catch them). I went out with them a few times and talked to them a lot. If the fawn died they would locate the spot and try to determine cause of death. They basically always knew it was a coyote or bobcat but less than half the time could they determine and record the death being caused by a predator. Finding fawn parts did not constitute a predator caused death as the fawn could have died from something else and the coyote/bobcat simply found and ate it. Point being that in the fawn study biologists were very concerned about determining/recording the cause of death. In the poult studies the assumption is that poults are dieing=must be predators, although like claycreech mentioned no actual evidence that is the case.

So you believe all the breed able hens are laying eggs and hatching them successfully and then the poults are just walking along dying? Same with the deer?
Now this is despite the fact everything expect maybe squirrels will eat a poult/chick in a heartbeat…I can tell you on 5 different properties that the quail and turkey populations have increased after several years of trapping. BUT, the habitat is prime habitat for those locations too.
You do realize there are people whose only purpose is to make sure there are huntable populations of quail and turkeys? Everyone of these guys will tell you, without trapping that ain’t happening. I’m not talking just during trapping season, year round trapping.
Georgia has an open season on beaver, coyote, coon, and possum. Other than the Planatation’s and a few landowners, I’d be willing to say there’s probably less than 100 folks in the State trapping right now. The few I know of are hitting it hard and will be until August or so. Any late nesting hen or quail depends on it.
Y’all worried about saving some for seed for the next year, lol. We’re trying to make them extinct! From April last year until this past April my son trapped over 900 predators in cages and footholds on 5K acres. He’s already close to 200 since April 1 this year. He wants to break a thousand by next April.

Not at all hence my first sentence. I believe that habitat and predators are the go to answer. North Missouri has some of the best habitat in the United States so that reason is gone. There have always been predators so I can't accept the claim that they are wiping them all out. Across the board department of conservations preach habitat and predators. They are missing a lot by solely focusing on those two items.

Focus on what you can control and see what comes of it. Had a landowner tell me “I” was the reason he had the turkeys and quail. I told him, no sir. When you select cut the property and started burning 3-4 years ago is what brought about the change. More cover and better cover helped that place more than anything else.

I reckon we can beat this dead horse some more, but the bottom line is if you’re a turkey fanatic, the future ain’t looking very rosy.
And it ain’t just turkey in precipice decline, although most folks don’t notice/care about other less popular species.
And I’m darn certain the biologists ain’t gonna figure it out lol.

I'm telling you guys it's predator birds. Back in the day around where I live the old timers kept everything that ate chicken killed. I can't leave mine out during the day now.

I mean if I lose a full grown chicken a day what's the amount of hatched poults that fill up a hawk?

I just threw a fit on the phone to a buddy while ago about the otters getting into my stocked pond . Sorry if there's any MDC employees on here but my ancestors killed some species to extinction in Missouri for reasons other than fur or food .

There weren’t any hawks/owls when turkeys were thick for so many years?
Drives me crazy when trappers complain about otters. Go catch them for Pete’s sake!
My wife has a dozen laying hens that wander our yard and woods daily for the past 4 years. We’ve never lost a single one to a predator, and I live out in the sticks!
EVERY predator out there is a threat to turkey from the time they fall out of a hens butt in the form of an egg until that turkey dies from whatever cause. It’s been that way from the beginning. This turkey decline is too widespread and too consistent to be happening strictly because of predation. I have no doubt that it’s a contributing factor, but nest predator densities vary greatly with the changes in habitat.
I’m my opinion of course lol.

I agree with you Clay. They don’t know what they don’t know. All we can do is control what we can control.

On the topic of raptors…I’ve seen raptor traps that used to be used, legal or not. So yeah, back in the glory days raptors were being thinned out.

I dont know that anyone is saying the turkey decline is strictly a result of predation. According to the vast bulk of research (correct or not), it is the number one DIRECT cause. Poor habitat by itself does not directly kill many turkeys, but that poor habitat may lead to greater levels of predation, or lack of food leading to starvation - both direct causes.

I started trapping in the 1970’s and hit my peak in the 80’s with several years, I lived in a tent all winter for two or three months and did nothing but trap. I pretty much quit in the early 90’s, but started back in the mid to late 90’s, and quit again until 14 years ago when I moved to my farm full time. I cant speak for other areas of the country - but here in SW AR, the density of predator increase from the 80’s to the late 90’s was starkly evident, just as obvious as the increase from the late 90’s to present day.

While this thread references game birds, in many areas it is most ground living small animals. We also have almost no rabbits and no cotton rats. Tall Timbers quail research found management to improve cotton rat populations also improved quail populations. When cotton rat populations are low, more predators turn to quail. When cotton rat populations are high, more predators concentrate on cotton rats. They have found supplemental feeding improves cotton rat body mass index and increases litter size - just as it does quail.

Just 15 years ago, I always wore a pair of snake boots when out at night. Some days I might see ten or a dozen snakes, or more. I dont see ten snakes in a year, now - on the same ground. In the 80’s and 90’s my wife and I used to go out on warm rainy early spring nights and drive around and pick up a one lb coffee can full of salamanders, spade foot toads, and other amphibians for an old Herps professor I knew. I have not seen a salamander of any kind in the last 15 years. Mink are gone. Muskrats are gone. Red Fox are gone.

Outside of predators, what we do have in abundance are deer, hogs, and squirrels - and fawn recruitment is declining. Why have these animals not become scarce in these parts when so many others have. All three species are actively hunted. Deer and hogs are large enough where they and their young are not subject to high levels of predation by the smaller predators, and squirrels nest off the ground, often in protective nest cavities in trees. Also, by nature, their habitat demands are not as narrow as are many game birds.

Speaking strictly for my own state, below is the bow hunter survey results for predator sightings reported by bowhunters on their annual survey over many thousands of hours.




According to their sightings, not mine, all predators with the exception of red fox have increased over the last 20 years, some substantially - 20, 30, 40% or more. Again, this is my state and is probably more exaggerated than more northern states as our predator fur species - coon, possum, skunk, and coyote have basically been worthless as far as fur prices go - for longer than more northern states. While many of these animals are omnivorous, they all eat meat when available. Where is the extra food coming from for the increasing population of the predator base. I used to bush hog a five acre field and see maybe 50 or more cotton rats. Now, I dont see any. I used to have rabbit and bird dogs, but rabbits and quail do not exist in huntable numbers. I used to wear snake boots because of high snake numbers, and now they are scarce. Salamanders and other small amphibians are gone.

My land joins 55,000 acres of federal land that has changed very little in the past 20 years - or even 60 years for that matter. It is not far fetched to think if most common predatory mammals are increasing 10 to 50% - their prey species are going to suffer. This is rural land - timberland and cattle farms. No row crop.

I first hunted and trapped 45 years ago where I now live on my 350 acres. As someone with a degree in wildlife management and a minor in botany, and having worked in natural resource management for 34 years, and having continued to work my own land for another dozen years - it is very difficult for me to discern any major changes in land use practices in my area. Our turkey population reached its peak 20 years ago. Fescue was prevalent in the cattle pastures then. Little prescribed fire was used in his area back then. Quail were already gone, but cotton rats, snakes, and turkeys were numerous - as were feral hogs.

But, I dont know if general use of pesticides and herbicides by farmers and timber management has changed. Spring rainfall patterns have changed. There was a 600 acre row crop area that recently sold due to inability to raise crops over the last eight years due to wet ground. It has since been planted in trees. I have seen hotter weather than what we have recently seen. I have seen cooler weather. I am sure there are more subtle changes I have not recognized. The only thing blatantly obvious is the increase of predators and the decrease of prey species. I do understand that research is often concentrated on the obvious. But, some of the long time turkey researchers have beat the nesting success research into the ground and are now investigating diseases, social hierarchy, and a vast array of other subjects. Hopefully, one day they find the golden egg - but more likely it is going to be a whole basket of things, many if which will not lend themselves to implementation at scale.

https://www.academia.edu/89275053/R..._demographics?email_work_card=view-paper

Tall Timbers has probably done more bobwhite quail research than any other facility. They have been very successful in their management practices and strongly believe controlled fire is of utmost importance. They developed a predator survey and quantified what percentage of scent post visits indicated a density of predators that limited quail populations. The difference in the number of predators that allow a flourishing quail population and the number of predators that depressed quail numbers is actually not that different. It goes to show - at least in their area - it MAY not take the removal of a lot of predators to make a difference.

Good stuff WhiteCliffs. Always looking to read up and redefine, change or strengthen my opinions.

I always try to keep in perspective that much of the information provided on these forums is anecdotal - what someone has seen, but not necessarily scientific proven. However, I do give folks on a forum like this more credit, where much experience is garnered over years instead of a few instances. I also consider that everywhere is different - what I see may not be what you see - and it may not even correspond to what has been proven by scientific research somewhere else. But it is interesting nonetheless. I always enjoy reading other folks point of view and experiences.