How to Use Tail Feathers on Male Turkeys to Age Them

It can be useful to use tail feathers as a way to age your turkeys, but it is not always possible to use this method. Most experts agree that using turkey tail feathers to tell the age tale is really only possible if you are comparing one year old turkeys (also known as jakes) from mature birds. Here is how you can go about telling a jake from a mature turkey. The tail feathers of a jake are fanned out. In general, the middle sets of primary tail feathers will tend to be two to four inches longer than the rest of the turkey’s tail feathers. This will create a visible bump in the middle of the tail feathers. This is one of the easiest ways to note the age of a turkey

Other Signs of Jake Tail Feathers

There are other visible signs of jake tail feathers. In general, jakes have longer tail feathers. This is mostly due to the fact that they start to molt during the late summer, and only replace the middle primary tail feathers after this. In the second year of a young gobbler, the tail feathers begin to molt and shape into the standard adult pattern. The standard pattern tends towards molting from the outside in. This creates a full, even fan on the adult gobbler. Thus, once a turkey has reached its second year, it will have a full, even fan for the rest of its life. Of course, there are occasions where a turkey will lose one or more of its tail feathers. In most cases, the turkey will grow another tail feather in its spot. Thus, it is possible to find an older turkey with an uneven feather as part of its tail.
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Prepare for Optimal Turkey Hunting Circumstances

Before you prepare to take aim, take the time to set up the right kinds of circumstances for success. Spend the day before you go hunting scouting out the location. Late afternoon is a good time to go turkey scouting. What exactly are you looking for? Look for signs of turkey activity, including, most importantly, turkey sounds. You will want to scout at least until nightfall. When it is dark, turkeys will fly up into the trees to roost for the night. They do this in the evening, close to dark. If you think you may have missed seeing the turkeys going to roost, but you suspect that they are up there in those darkened boughs, you can elicit a response by hooting like an owl or crowing like a bird. This is a good way to get a response from nearby turkeys. However, if you do not hear anything, do not despair. This does not mean that there are no turkeys up in the trees—they may be simply fast asleep or not in your immediate area of the woods. However, if you do hear a response, this means that you have successfully set up your hunting area for the next day. If you are able to make it a practice to note where the turkeys are roosting, you are much more likely to experience a fruitful hunting season the next day.
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There are a few materials available that might help a hunter pattern his gun. For example, many of the better hunting and sports stores offer turkey targets. If a commercially produced target is not preferred, a hunter may draw roughly the size of a turkey’s head on a paper and pin this paper to the usual target used to train.

To properly pattern a gun, targets need to be set up about every ten yards starting at twenty. This means 20 yards from the shooter, 30, 40 and then five yards distance for any targets after the 40 yards one. When shooting at the targets, try out different types and even different brands of ammunition, since most shotguns and rifles have different accuracy levels with different loads. If the hunter is lucky he has one of the few shotguns that is very accurate and there will not be much pattern work necessary. After setting up the targets, the hunter needs to aim at the turkey head. By shooting the head, he will learn several things about the gun (given of course that the shooter is a good shooter). First of all the hunter will learn from his shot pattern, where he has to aim at with the bead of the shotgun to be able to center his shooting pattern on the turkeys head. It will show if the gun is dead on, or maybe a tad bid high or low. As mentioned before, the hunter should try out different loads, so that he can learn which load gives him the best, most accurate pattern.
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Different Kinds of Hunting Licenses – Which One Do You Need?

There are many different kinds of hunting licenses. Which kind will you need for turkey hunting? It depends on what kind of turkey hunting you would like to do. If you are planning on only doing a little springtime turkey hunting in order to take advantage of the gobbler activity that is common during the spring season, you will usually only need to get a temporary permit from your local game, fish and wildlife department. However, if you are serious about doing some long-term, year-round wild turkey hunting or other kinds of wild game hunting, you will often have to pay more for a full license. Here are some guidelines for getting a long-term hunting license. The ins and outs of getting a license will always depend on your local and state laws, so these are merely guidelines for what you can expect from your local game, fish and wildlife department.

Getting a Recreational License and Permit

In some areas, you can get a so-called recreational license that entitles you to do all kinds of hunting in a specified area. In some cases, you can procure these recreational licenses and permits from the local county tax collector office, or subagents, including local sporting goods stores and other retailers that are known to sell fishing or hunting equipment and which are licensed to sell these recreational licenses and permits. The price of procuring a permit, license or issuance fees will be subject to change depending on the local legislative session, which maintains the fee schedule. Some areas allow the convenience of online recreational license sales, and you can buy directly from the regional department over the Internet. (more…)

Finding the perfect turkey hunting spot is not easy and even when it is found, things might still not work the perfectly. A hunter might not be able to tag and bag that turkey. First of all, to find the perfect hunting spot, it is necessary to scout the area considered for hunting. Often it is possible to spot turkeys in the area and if there were turkeys at night when area was staked out, it is most likely they will be there the next morning. Many male turkeys sleep in trees and if a hunter can place himself close to one of the trees that a turkey was spotted the night before, it might be a perfect spot. Even if a great spot close to a resting turkey was found, the hunter might still be out of reach or not be able to see the turkey the next day. This could be due to differences in daytime versus nighttime vision. What the hunter thought at night was the perfect spot, might not be the next morning. The perfect spot does not necessarily exist. It is more the existence of a good hunter who knows where to settle down, but who is also prepared to move to a different position in a moments notice. A good turkey hunter can set up his gear and move with as little noise and finds cover quickly.

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Basics of Wild Turkey Consumption

Getting to know the principles of turkey habitat management involves getting to know what the wild turkey eats. The wild turkey is classified as an omnivore with an annual diet that consists of 90 percent plant food, and 10 percent animal protein. Most wild turkey populations also consume fruit, seeds, mast, greens and other agricultural crops. These are the principal types of plants that wild turkeys consume. Acorns alone are known to make up roughly one third of the wild turkey diet. There are many soft mast producing shrubs that also make up a good percentage of their diet include the dogwood, the wild grape, black gum, hackberry, cherry and other related plant species. During winter and early spring, grasses and seeds are an important source of nutrients for many wild turkey populations. During the summer, insects make up a good deal of the summer diet for young turkey poults.

What Makes Up the Best of Turkey Habitat?

For optimal wild turkey habitat management, the population should have a mixture of open lands and forested lands. These work in combination to provide the best kind of turkey habitat. Roughly 10 to 50 percent of the land should be open land. Why is open land so important for optimal turkey habitat management? The distribution and size of open areas is important because they help to create a diversity of land and sustenance. (more…)

One of the first skills that a bow hunter needs is actually the same as for any other hunter, patience. Patience is necessary in hunting. Hunters need patience to wait for game to come by, and patience after calling the bird. Even if half an hour or more passes from when the hunter first heard the gobblers call, the gobbler might still be on the way towards the calling. Getting up and checking might scare the bird away.

If a hunter is waiting in a spot, there are two major signs for when patience is actually essential. When a gobbler has flown in and answers his calls, coming slowly closer and when there are no barriers between the hunter and the bird. Any movement could scare the bird away. (more…)

When a hunter is able to pack everything necessary for a trip, he might not find himself in a situation that can cause trouble. For many hunters, part of the fun of a turkey hunting trip is the packing and gathering of the gear. Often times, when packing, the hunter also needs to make decisions as to what gear he wants to take. This is especially if the hunter wants to fly to the hunting destination. He really needs to only take what is essential for the hunt.

When planning to hunt turkey, it is best to first choose the subspecies he or she wants to hunt, which automatically means a hunt in a specific region in the United States. This also gives the hunter clues as to what kind of gear he will need. If the hunter is not sure what is necessary for the hunt, he can always ask a local sporting goods store, hunting outfitters or hunting guides to help him with this task.

A good list for hunting gear to take along on the trip can be found in many better hunting guides, online or with experienced hunters. If it is in the hunter’s budget, he might also plan in a guide for his hunting trip, since he is going to be walking and hunting in unfamiliar territory. After deciding on the region, the hunter should pack for weather and terrain. It is very important that he packs efficiently and follows the airport and airline rules. Firearms cannot just be transported, but must be packed and shipped accordingly to all laws and regulations. (more…)

A grand slam in turkey hunting means that the hunter has to shoot four different turkeys, each from one of the four major subspecies in the United States. The four major subspecies are Rio Grande, Osceola, Merriam’s and Eastern. For a grand slam, the turkeys need to be hunted in spring and need to be fully grown toms that were called in and shot with either a shotgun or a bow. Even bigger than a grand slam is the scoring of a North American grand slam, where a Gould’s turkey is added to the list mentioned above.

Hunting is a passion, but some of the hunters out there have a lot of spare time and money, some do not. For the ones with enough time and money, a grand slam can be achieved in one spring, but for most hunters, that is not very realistic and the approach to scoring a grand slam is by taking good old time. To be able to make sure that a hunter catches the right subspecies, he first of all needs to know the differences between the subspecies of turkeys. There are subtle differences in coloration as well as a few other marks. (more…)

When turkey hunting with a shotgun, it is always important to aim for the neck or the head. Hitting the body or feathery part of the turkey might not kill to bird, but leave it wounded instead of dead. The turkey’s head and neck are very small targets compared to the deer and a good aim and a good choke are essential. There are many good scopes that might help bag that turkey, but one thing that is important before going on a turkey hunt is to pattern the gun in advance. Pattern means to do some target shooting on targets the size of a turkey head and neck. Using different ranges for the target to shoot at and different ammunition will help the hunter learn which ammunition gives him the best overall aim and accuracy. It will also show him exactly how he has to aim to get his shot into the center of the target when the gun pulls a little low or high instead of dead center. Patterning the gun is like pumping up tires for a long bike ride or making sure everything necessary for a trip is packed. (more…)