Pennsylvania Gobblers

[Outdoor814]

Not sure what the other Pennsylvania turkey hunters are seeing but the last few days at work I've watched a flock of nearly 60 birds forage around a feeder. All the birds look very healthy. And most gobblers had large beards. Good to see large healthy flocks of birds. I'd say there pretty thankful for the mild winter this year.


I know I'm getting pumped to talk to birds.

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[briar]

I dont' live that far from you, look me up sometime if you would like to get together for a hunt. Fun hunting gobblers with a buddy sometimes. Ron

[Outdoor814]

I've been seeing them a lot lately. Got lots of pics last time I picked up my cam. It's pretty wild how long those beards get without the winter build up breaking them off.

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[bowmike]

had 3 on the mountain about 80 yards behind the house sounded off when I was testing my boys new one sider box call. yeah my mind is blown until June!

[Outdoor814]

Right! It's nuts the amount of birds I see at work now. And all of them look huge! Most of the mature gobblers I've seen got ropes man! Should be a good season I hope. Lot of nice birds out there.

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[Outdoor814]

My uncle sent me this picture of a Tom mating a hen in his backyard today. Has anyone else seen this activity before this early in the year? Do you think it will have any effects on behaviour during season?

Might have hens sitting on nest early.




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[Outdoor814]

Pulled the truck over for a bathroom break this morning and heard 3 fire off after some crow calls.

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[csoult]

Saw a flock yesterday on a cut corn field. There was some serious strutting going on.

[xpauliber]

I've had 6 long-beards coming in all winter to my feeder and it really gave me the opportunity to study their behavior and see when mating behavior started to show up.

Here they are in December:



In the past, we had started locating gobblers around Easter and I always knew they were gobbling by then but I didn't know how long before that they may have been sounding off. Here is a picture out my kitchen window on January 21st and I was SHOCKED to see two strutters. The one on the left didn't even eat, he just stood there and strutted his stuff like a boss.



What's strange though is that only those two were strutting and they only did it for a day or so. After that, they went back to a feeding pattern. Like they knew that mating season was coming and they just couldn't help themselves or something?

The group split up about 3 weeks ago and I still have a group of 2 coming in and a different group of 3 coming in. Additionally, my son and I just saw a group of 4 strutters with a group of about 10 hens up the road from my house. Here's a picture my wife took just last week of one in the group of two:



The interesting things that I've noticed since watching these birds for the last 3 months is that the colors of their heads have really changed and become much more vibrant recently. They also seemed to have smaller feathers much higher up their necks in the winter months which makes sense. Also, their beards seem to have changed noticeably and appear more full & pronounced than when they were in January & February. Maybe it's just in my head but they look different to me this time of year.

PA's hunting season doesn't start until the end of April every year and now I know that we catch the middle & tail end of the mating season for sure. Gobblers will have been courting hens for at least 6 weeks before we can get out and chase them.

And here's a pic thrown in for good measure.

[Outdoor814]

That's awesome. I'm getting really excited and I still have almost a month to Waite

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