Tennessee experienced another crazy spring and summer of weather last year, and weather does play a role in turkey survival rates. From his unofficial reports from the field, Anderson said it looks like there may have been an extended nesting season with many young broods being seen late, quite possibly because of the weather.

Not only were the spring hunts a major success, last fall’s seasons across much of the state were stable and comparable to the previous fall hunts. Anderson said hunters are harvesting fewer than 2,000 birds in the fall out of an estimated population exceeding 300,000 turkeys.

The agency plans to look at any potential impacts of the fall harvest in the near future, but he doesn’t expect to see much of an influence. The fall archery and quota hunts are doing what they were designed to do -- give Tennessee hunters an opportunity to get in the field. For now, at least, the harvest levels are too low to serve as population control or management tools.

Looking at the overall population, Anderson said from what he can tell the state’s population is thriving. There may be fluctuations within counties, but it’s difficult for the agency to recognize small shifts in local populations. Hunters shouldn’t expect any regulation changes in the four-bird statewide limit in 2007.

The good news is Anderson feels all of our counties have great potential for a quality hunt. What hunters need in any case, is someone with local knowledge to help them find the birds. He said turkeys are out there and the population is growing, we just need good access to huntable lands to go after them.

For hunters with limited access to private lands, Anderson said the public hunting opportunity is another viable option. He suggests that hunters look for a WMA that has actively been planting native grass habitats. The agency has directed WMAs to replace fescue and other non-native plants with plants that are native to Tennessee. Anderson noted that as these habitats are established on our WMAs, we should see turkeys and many other wildlife species respond positively. These native habitats have great cover potential and most importantly, they produce a great amount of insects for our birds.

THE TOP TENNESSEE TURKEY COUNTIES
Not only did we set a new turkey harvest record in 2006, a couple of counties reached new milestones of their own. Dickson County in Region II was the reigning leader in statewide hunt totals in 2005. That title has been relinquished to Greene County in Region IV with the highest turkey harvest among the state’s 95 counties.

Greene County hunters led the way across Tennessee with 1,106 turkeys tagged last spring. Dickson County was second with 1,014 turkeys killed. Dickson County hunters led the state in 2005 with a harvest of 982 birds. The significant milestones were the harvests of over 1,000 turkeys for the first time for both Dickson County and Greene County hunters.

Greene County was fifth statewide in 2005 with 829 turkeys harvested. The move from fifth to first was obviously directly related to a one-year harvest increase of nearly 300 birds. If you’ll refer to the accompanying table of statewide turkey harvests, you’ll see one other significant change in 2006. The Top 10 counties statewide remain unchanged from last year with just one exception. In the Top 10, Hardeman County was replaced by Rutherford County.