Hunts
| Scouting Spring Turkey on Agricultural Land in Missouri, Kansas and Iowa agricultural or crop land habitat consists of row crop adjoining river, creek bottoms, timbered draws, tree lines and large and small timber plots. The majority of non-resident turkey hunters relate prime turkey habitat to large timber. Large timber is unquestionably prime habitat for turkey. We have several large timbered ranches leased for those that prefer the big timber. Since the bulk of MAHA leased land is involved in productive agriculture, we would like to pass on a few scouting tips gathered over the years relating turkey behavior to crop land. Compared to heavily timbered regions where mouth locator calls are a primary source to locate gobbling birds, the birds on cropland habitat are visible by sight and easy to follow from a distance with or without binoculars. One of the main advantages of open range turkey scouting is birds that are gobbling can be scouted just as easily as birds not gobbling.
Putting a bird to roost by sight rather than sound gives the hunter a better understanding of where to set up in the morning, but like turkeys anywhere they can slip out the back side on any given day, but the deep ditches and draws are good cover for the hunter to cut off or sneak up on a turkey that slipped him on his first approach. The patterns of cropland spring turkeys change with weather and the agricultural practices of the farmer. Short green fields are prime feeding and strutting areas, but once they are plowed and planted the birds typically move to higher ground or the nearest green field around. We recommend scouting the day before your hunt to assure the conditions have not changed to your disadvantage. Changing reservations the day before the hunt is permissible and understood by our staff. After the first week of the season a lot of the cropland turkeys move to isolated fields that are not visible from the road. Keeping a good distance from the birds and scouting from a ½ to ¼ of a mile with an aerial photo in hand is a good tip for scouting late season cropland turkeys. More details about our spring turkey season scouting. |
