State schedules six-day shotgun hunting season on turkeys

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Ever since wild turkeys were reintroduced in Maine 30 years ago, state wildlife biologists and hunters have looked forward to the hunting opportunities that would eventually be created.

That effort, which began with the transport of 41 birds from Vermont to southern Maine, has been an immense success, and spring turkey hunters are no longer required to enter a lottery to gain a coveted permit.

This fall, yet another milestone has been reached: The state will open up select Wildlife Management Districts to a six-day shotgun hunting season on turkeys.

The state has previously staged fall archery turkey seasons.

“We had designs on a fall hunt [with shotguns] down the road,” said Brad Allen, a Department of Inland Fisheries & Wildlife biologist who serves as leader of the bird study group. “Well, we’ve met [those goals and can go forward].”

Allen said that in certain parts of the state, landowners and farmers have complained that turkeys have become overpopulated. Those concerns helped spur a petition drive, and the DIF&W responded.

This fall’s shotgun season – which also coincides with archery season in the same zone – is from Oct. 13-19.

The hunt will be open in Wildlife Management Districts 15, 16, 17, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24 and 25. WMDs 20 through 25 cover the coastline and inland communities from Maine’s southern tip to Penobscot Bay. WMDs 15 through 17 stretch from the Maine-New Hampshire border to Hermon, Bradford and Sangerville.

“Fall hunting is a tradition for turkey hunting,” Allen said. “Certainly not in Maine – we have no fall turkey hunting tradition here – but in the south there is one. It’s a good hunt.”

Allen said the DIF&W will closely monitor the season, and tinker with the system as needed.

“We’re going to have that six-day gun hunt only in the areas where the turkey populations are the densest, and annually we’ll be looking at those figures to make sure that it’s appropriate that a district is open or it’s not,” Allen said.

Hunters during the fall shotgun season will be allowed to shoot one turkey of either sex, which sets it apart from the spring shotgun hunt.

And because of the

“One interesting thing about the fall hunt is, you’re not going for these big longbeards,” Allen said, referring to the bearded males which are targeted in the spring. “In the spring, we shoot the males. The males, they’re polygamists, they breed the females, there are a lot of them around, a lot of surplus animals, and you can take ’em out.”

In the fall, the interaction of a flock is entirely different, which will lead to a very different kind of hunt, Allen said.

During the spring breeding season, hunters emulate female turkey calls in hopes of drawing a large male to them.

In the fall, the birds have separated into two distinct kinds of groups, Allen said.

The hens group up with other females and their young, while those males who are older than a year old spend time with other males.

Just picture a bunch of guys sitting around during the fall, watching football games on TV.

“[The males] are in bachelor groups. They’re just hanging out,” Allen said.

Hanging out, yes.

But waiting for a call? Not quite.

“In the fall, turkeys are in very large groups,” Allen said. “They’re very social, they’re very gregarious. The MO for a fall turkey hunt is to find a group of turkeys, hens and all their young – there might be 10 hens there, there might be 30 young – and to scatter them. Literally break them up.”

Allen said in some southern states, hunters use dogs for that purpose. He doubts there are many “turkey dogs” in Maine, but said they are allowed during the fall hunt.

“What you do is you sit down and you make an assembly call, a come-back call, that emulates the female turkey calling her brood back,” Allen said. They want to get together because they’re a social bunch.”

That vocalization, called a “kee kee run,” tells the other birds to regroup, and allows the hunters to pick a turkey to shoot.

Allen explained that many of the birds that are shot during the fall season will be adult females, because they’ll be the largest birds in their flocks.

The males in those flocks will be young-of-the-year males, and will weigh only seven or eight pounds, if that, Allen said.

“I think inherently [hunters will] want to shoot the largest of the birds. It’s probably going to be a big, adult hen. So we’ve got to be careful that we don’t shoot too many of these, because they’re what it’s all about,” Allen said.

Allen said keeping a close eye on matters and considering the long-term health of the flock was a key point of emphasis for the DIF&W.

“Your fall hunt has to be fairly conservative and fairly well monitored. The bottom line is, you just don’t want to shoot too many hens,” Allen said.

John Holyoke can be reached at jholyoke@bangordailynews.net or by calling 990-8214 or 1-800-310-8600.