The spring turkey hunt has arrived
A half hour before sunrise the Wisconsin Spring Turkey Season opened. If you’re a turkey hunter, you’re excited. If you’re not a turkey hunter, I encourage you to give it a try. The spring hunt will run until May 30th.
The hunt is divided into six hunting periods that run from Wednesday through Tuesday. Hunters applied for a tag in a time period of their choice and the zone of their choice back in December.
If a hunter is willing to accept a tag other than in the first or second time periods, they’ll draw a tag every year for the management zone of their choice. “Left over tags,” as the DNR calls them are available for sale in every management zone for the last three time periods and often even on the third time period.
There are currently seven turkey hunting management zones in Wisconsin, encompassing the entire state. This all means opportunity. The pressure is spread out by the state dividing the tags available for the harvest desired in each of the seven management zones over the six time periods.
On public land, several hunters often see the promised land in the same spot based upon their scouting, so they bump into each other from time to time. Wisconsin private landowners often eagerly allow hunters to hunt for turkey on their land. Many want hunters to hunt them and most turkey live on private land. This hunt provides tremendous opportunities for hunters. I know hunters that will hunt five time periods and actually have purchased more than one “leftover tag” in the same time period.
One such friend has been hunting turkeys in other states for a few weeks now. Some of those states allow a hunter to harvest two birds a season. He hopes to harvest four turkeys over five weeks in Wisconsin. “That’s the difference between states with over-the-counter hunting and a more managed hunt like ours,” he told me. He feels we get more opportunities.
Every tom harvested is a trophy. That’s not true with deer hunting in Wisconsin. Most hunters go the season without even seeing a buck, much less a trophy buck. Some will never see a true wall-hanger type buck from their stand. Unless you have the time to get to your hunting area and put in the scouting, that’s the reality of Wisconsin deer hunting. Not so with turkey hunting and there are more deer in the state than turkeys.
By the time you read this, several turkeys will have been harvested right around our area. If you’re a hunter you really do owe it to yourself to hunt spring turkey once or twice in your life. It’s not expensive to start turkey hunting. Most people reading this have a shotgun, camo clothes, and calls are inexpensive.
You can still get a tag and license for a time period in your back yard and hunt yet this spring. Watch a couple YouTube videos or have a friend show you the ropes, and you’ll experience first-hand the excitement of turkey hunting. There can be some dry times, but when your luck changes it becomes a heart pounding, adrenaline filled hunt. Turkey makes excellent table fare.
The majority of the people hunting turkeys scramble for the first two time periods. But some years the best conditions for hunting end up being the third or the fourth periods. In some places, by the time you get to the fifth period, the birds haven’t been hunted for a couple weeks and they’re quite cooperative. I’ve killed several turkeys in the last two periods.
Like with all activities there are safety concerns. I have never understood someone that thinks they are sneaking up on a hen yelp expecting to shoot a tom. Assume it’s a hunter yelping, assume you are shooting at their decoy and they are behind it in the line of fire, and assume that movement or patch of color you see is a hunter. If you didn’t see the whole bird walk a good ten steps and do a lot of bird stuff, don’t take a shot. Hunters mistaken for game incidents are simply hunters not controlling their emotions.
Thankfully hunting incidents during turkey season in Wisconsin are rare. They are rare across the country as well. Which is why hunting is statistically safer than golf.
Good luck to all the turkey hunters this year and please remember Safe Hunting is No Accident!
Through a
Decoy’s
E
ye
