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Pheasant/Turkey numbers

Kansasdeerslayer

Kansasdeerslayer

PMA Member
I know, this is a whitetail site, but I was interested in you alls opinion. I was at the family farm in western IA last weekend on a pheasant hunt and the number of birds we saw was terrible. The numbers have seemed to be steadily declining over the last ten years. Ten years ago you would be covered in roosters. We also had very few turkeys at that time. Now we have more turkeys than we could ever want. My uncle believes that there is a direct correlation to the increase of turks and a decrease in pheasants. Have any of you guys seen the same thing? Are there any studies that have shown that turkeys have a negative effect on pheasant numbers? I personally can't do a whole lot as an NR to control the turkey herd. Its too expensive and your chopped up seasons stink IMO. I've tried to get some cousins interested in turkey hunting, with no luck so far. All they seem to care about is those big horns running around up there.
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I also have heard comments about turkeys having a negative impact on pheasants, and am curious to see what others say. In my area I believe that poor pheasant numbers have more to do with habitat (or lack thereof) than turkeys.
 
I have read that turkey will destroy pheasant eggs and coons & yotes are another big problem.
 
I am willing (free of charge) to approach your family with a "turkey reduction plan" and then implement it myself.

I am always available (during season that is..) spring and fall.
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Pheasant numbers are about habitat and the timing of the hay harvests. Not to mention weather. With more CRP coming out all across the state, we will have darker days ahead. The good days of pheasant hunting are waaaaay behind us, I am afraid. That is, unless something happens with the Farm Bill. There will still be really good bird hunting in localized areas with great habitat....but overall, numbers are going to be hurt.
 
I don't see the correlation. Here in NW Iowa pheasant and turkey numbers are both excellent. While on deer stand once this fall I watched 200+ pheasants fly out of a CRP field within a short distance of where large numbers of turkeys roost. While I have seen years when our pheasant numbers were higher, I've also seen them much lower. In my opinion, winter and spring weather is the big determining factor for us.

NWBuck
 
The turkey were here first and the pheasants were the immigrants (an introduced species). I've never heard about the two populations affecting each other negatively, but it's an interesting concept to think about.
 
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Pheasant numbers are about habitat and the timing of the hay harvests. Not to mention weather. With more CRP coming out all across the state, we will have darker days ahead. The good days of pheasant hunting are waaaaay behind us, I am afraid. That is, unless something happens with the Farm Bill. There will still be really good bird hunting in localized areas with great habitat....but overall, numbers are going to be hurt.

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That pretty much sums it up
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Down here it's always the "turkeys eat the quail eggs"
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Turkeys are opputunistic and will eat just about anything they come across...but coons, skunks and possums are the main cause of nest mortality...not turkeys.

It's all about HABITAT and we don't have it anymore...where we do, we have birds...plain and simple.

Pheasants need undisturbed nesting habitat along side crop fields which used to be full of hi protien weed seeds.

Now in most cases we either have thousands of acres of CRP left in worthless brome and with no crops nearby...or

thousands of acres of very clean crops
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I have turkeys coming out my ears but right down the road is a farm which is planted to switchgrass/crop/switchgrass/crop (you get the idea) the fields of each are large enough to provide nesting cover (for those that seem to think switchgrass is terrible nesting cover
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) winter cover even during the worst winter weather and a food source via the crop fields.

The crop fields are full of turkeys, yotes, coons and skunks...hey...I live here I know!

Yet these fields always have plenty of pheasants and quail I might add....

perfect habitat...but it's rare and as it goes...so do the birds
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Couldn't agree dbltree. I'm the president of our local PF chapter and I've heard all the reasons why the population is down. Sure turkeys, yote, coons, red tailed hawks all have an impact but habitat is the number one element that is missing. Farmers in my area are planting from ditch to ditch, trees are coming down, fence rows are gone....it makes me sick. The upcoming Farm Bill will be important.

If you're interested in learning more about habitat and how to improve your land I'd recommend you attend Pheasant Fest next weekend. I'll post another message with more details.
 
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If you're interested in learning more about habitat and how to improve your land I'd recommend you attend Pheasant Fest next weekend.

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Stop by the Landowner Habitat Help Desk for help planning better habitat!
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National Pheasant Fest 2007
 
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Down here it's always the "turkeys eat the quail eggs"

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Just insert pheasant where quail is and you will get my uncle's response. I didn't know if that theory held any water though.

The one problem for me to think about is that the habitat is good on our farm and it hasn't really changed in the last 10 years of declining pheasant numbers.
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Something is obviously causing it, but the uncle just wants to blame the turks.
 
...if the ground has been in a program for that many years it is possible that it has become "stale"...pheasants like a little disturbance to allow "weeds" to grow...my relatives ground that we bird hunt has been in CRP for more than 10 years and its productivity for pheasants has decreased as it is a monoculture of smooth brome...we still find pheasants in it but not nearly as many as we did when it was newly established and had some other weeds it...
 
I have to agree they are takin out all the fence rows with all of the shrubs. seems like everyone around me is takin out every fence row, ditch, or draw to get that extra acre with all the rising prices of crops. alot of people are puttin their crp ground into corn now.
 
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The one problem for me to think about is that the habitat is good on our farm and it hasn't really changed in the last 10 years of declining pheasant numbers.
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This statement is incredibly common among landowners and I have always been able to prove this statement wrong on every property I have been on. I can guarantee the habitat has changed on your family farm ... if you do nothing to habitat it will change, you have to maintain a very aggressive habitat management program to prevent habitat from changing from year to year. The statement above is like saying the grass doesn't grow each year and the trees along the field edges have all stopped growing as well.

It has already been stated by others but one of the biggest factors with pheasant and quail populations today is loss of brood rearing habitat ... ANNUAL WEEDS ... something most farmers hate but quail and pheasant absolutely must have to survive. Unless you have an active prescribed fire program on the farm, if you look closely you will see that the grass has become thicker and the percentage of bare ground has decreased. Pheasant and quail chicks are very small when they first hatch and they have to find insects soon after they hatch. As they grow they need food rich in calcium and protein that weed seeds do not provide but insects do. Annual weeds provide excellent habitat with a canopy hiding them from predators, bare ground underneath to make traveling more realistic, and flowers that will attract insects. This combination is critical for young birds of most upland species. Turkey polts have a serious advantage over quail and pheasants that makes them much more successful. There size when they hatch enables them to move quicker and negotiate the thick mat of sod grass that is common in CRP today and find habitat that is more suitable for brood rearing ... quail and pheasants chicks often die trying to find this habitat. In good brood rearing habitat you should be able to drop a golf ball to the ground and it will hit bare dirt 5 out of 10 drops. Less than 50% bare ground and you will not sustain good pheasant or quail populations.

Another important habitat type for quail and pheasant that is dissappearing is brushy winter cover. Most farm fields have lost that successional, stairstepped, edge of brushy cover leading into mature timber and now have an abrupt edge of tall trees ... or worse yet a bulldozed out fenceline bordered by the neighbors adjacent field. A good rule of thumb is to start your edge over if it is taller than you. If it is over you head it is or will soon become useless to pheasant and quail and it is time to edgefeather. This brushy mess along the edge will give pheasant and quail a place of refuge from winter weather and predators. Turkeys benefit from this brushy edge too but can survive without it during the winter months as they roost in the trees at night, there larger body size enables them to survive colder nights in the relative safety of the trees while pheasants and quail are forced to huddle on the ground and take their chances.

Turkey, pheasant and quail habitat overlap and they will often use the same habitat but there is no significant impact that turkeys have on pheasants or quail. As others mentioned, the problem is pheasant and quail habitat is dissappearing and being replaced by habitat that turkeys can survive in but pheasant and quail can not ... I'd blame the noticeable decline in pheasants on your farm's cougar population which of course the DNR dropped out of black helicopters at night before I would accuse your growing turkey population ...
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Many good posts have already been made concerning the precise habitat needs of quail and pheasants. I totally agree and will add a couple of points.

1. My 90 acres of CRP is the wasteland of brome mentioned earlier. I did a burn 2 years ago. The plan was to burn about 1 acre to start with, I ended up with about 15 acres torched.
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Now I didn't mind that more acres got burned, just that I wasn't able to maintain control and that was a concern for me, not to mention my neighbors! At any rate, what grew back was a mixture of the brome but also several other weedy plants and so forth. Guess where I almost always see the quail and pheasants on my farm... right where the formerly burned acres are, esecially in the Spring.

2. I think the lack of plant diversity and overall negative wildlife habitat impact brought to bear by the "seas of brome" in so many CRP fields has been recognized by the NRCS and so forth. My new 10 year contract requires what is called "mid-contract management". I am obligated, I would have been happy to be allowed, to affect the CRP acres by either spraying with Roundup to kill off brome and let other plants grow back or by double-disking to create the same effect. At any rate, having just walked through certain sections of my place yesterday I can say that the brome is also worthless as a wintering cover and I can't wait to kill it all and let nature start producing some seeds and stalks.
 
The landowner where I hunt informed me he can clear woods for about 2-2500 per acre but has to spend $3500 per acre to buy. His plan is to clear fencelines and timber if it is tillable land. Unfortunate but he has to make a living.
 
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2. I think the lack of plant diversity and overall negative wildlife habitat impact brought to bear by the "seas of brome" in so many CRP fields has been recognized by the NRCS and so forth. My new 10 year contract requires what is called "mid-contract management". I am obligated, I would have been happy to be allowed, to affect the CRP acres by either spraying with Roundup to kill off brome and let other plants grow back or by double-disking to create the same effect.

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I'll be out discing the centers of some brome CRP fields this spring, too.

With the freshly disturbed soil, is there some seed a person could broadcast to increase the productivity? Maybe a light seeding of oat, rye or clover? Something cheap so when the foxtail chokes it out, a person doesn't cry.
 
"I'll be out discing the centers of some brome CRP fields this spring, too."

Try discing along the field edges and you will have better success if your goal is to improve bird habitat. Connecting habitat types is more effective ... leaving a thick stand of sod between the timber edge and the brood rearing habitat I assume you are trying to create will only act as a barrier.




"With the freshly disturbed soil, is there some seed a person could broadcast to increase the productivity? Maybe a light seeding of oat, rye or clover? Something cheap so when the foxtail chokes it out, a person doesn't cry."

German millet is cheap, easy to grow in freshly disced or burned ground, and provides a good food source and habitat through the winter. It should be broadcast after May.

A better option though is to plant nothing after you disc and let the foxtail, ragweed, and other annual weeds come up. It's usually hard to beat the "weeds" that mother nature grows for pheasants and quail.
 
Thanks QDM and everybody else for all the great responses. I'm going to email a link of this thread to my uncle. Hopefully it will encourage him to take some steps to improve the habitat for the birds or contact PF for some help/advice.
 
I better get the video camera out before I ask my dad if I can run a disk through his brome buffer strips to encourage weed growth. The look on his face would be priceless. He's a farmer, not a hunter.
 
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I better get the video camera out before I ask my dad if I can run a disk through his brome buffer strips to encourage weed growth. The look on his face would be priceless. He's a farmer, not a hunter.

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Remember it just has to be a light disking...just enough to disturb the soil to encourage weed growth...which certainly goes against the grain for most farmers
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