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WILD TURKEY FORECAST -- Jim Matthews-ONS -- 19mar03
Public land prospects fair at best, but private land looks promising
Turkey hunting prospects on public land for the March 29 spring season opener look poor to fair throughout Southern California, but the picture on private land -- especially in San Diego County and the Central Coast -- is brighter than it has ever been, according to reports from guides, biologists, and hunters scouting for this season.
Overall, there continues to be a major expansion of turkey numbers in California, in spite of the ban on relocations since 1999, according to Scott Gardner, the Department of Fish and Game's statewide coordinator in Sacramento.
"The population has grown quite a lot in recent years," said Gardner, but he noted that most of the birds are in the lower elevation oak-digger pine habitat, and that is mostly private throughout the state. Hunters with access to private land, or willing to pay for that access, will undoubtedly have the best success this year.
In Southern California, San Diego County will have the best opportunities, especially on private ground. John Massie, a former DFG biologist, said that the season "looks very good, even better than last year and last year was good."
Public land hunters on the Cleveland National Forest will have some decent opportunities in the Eagle Peak, Love Valley and Palomar Mountain region, but hunters need to be sure they know the public-private land boundaries. Wardens in this area spend a lot of time writing trespassing citations during turkey season.
The Lake Sutherland hunt, which saw nine turkeys taken last year, had around 200 applications for the 27 slots, and it should be as good this year as last.
There's also a new membership club that has over 10,000 acres of ranch land in the region available for hunters. Called My Country Club, the group has limited annual memberships that include deer and turkey hunting, according to Gary White. Hunters should call (760) 742-2482 for more information.
The San Bernardino Mountains do not look promising, according to DFG biologist Jim Davis.
"We had a pretty bleak year as far as reproduction went last year, and we have a diminished and widely scattered population of turkeys," said Davis. He said the Willow Fire three years ago burned a lot of the good habitat and birds were pushed into the Cleghorn and Holcomb Valley areas, but Davis did not have a single report of a bird taken last fall and only a couple last spring. He said the best area would probably be the Santa Ana River drainage.
Further north, Don Geivet said the Tejon Ranch turkey population was growing.
"It looks like its going to be a pretty good season. We had a good hatch last year and there are just a lot of holdover birds. We had so much bad weather last year that we didn't kill many and we just have a lot of older birds," said Geivet.
The Tejon has a few spots still available for guided or non-guided hunting, but permits were almost sold out. Hunters can get more information by calling Geivet at (661) 663-4208.
Further up the coast, there was generally good reproduction from Santa Barbara north, in spite of a dry spring last year. Brady Daniels at Cal-Quest Outfitters in Santa Barbara said this week that his birds were all still in their winter flocks and that he'd seen groups of 60 to 100-plus birds all grouped up.
"The weather has made the season a little late for us, but I think the numbers are pretty good. We had good recruitment from last season and we lost very few birds to predators. Our poult counts last year and our juvenile counts this spring didn't show a lot of difference, so we didn't lose a lot of birds.," said Daniels.
Daniels was mostly booked up for this spring, but said he might have a slot of two open up later in the season. For more information, hunters can call Daniels at (805) 560-6582 or send him an e-mail at calquest@cox.net.
The spring turkey season is open from March 29 through May 4. The limit is one bearded gobbler per day and three per spring season. Hunting is allowed from 1/2-hour before sunrise to 3 p.m. each day. For more information, hunters should consult the Department of Fish and Game regulations available at all license agents.
Public land prospects fair at best, but private land looks promising
Turkey hunting prospects on public land for the March 29 spring season opener look poor to fair throughout Southern California, but the picture on private land -- especially in San Diego County and the Central Coast -- is brighter than it has ever been, according to reports from guides, biologists, and hunters scouting for this season.
Overall, there continues to be a major expansion of turkey numbers in California, in spite of the ban on relocations since 1999, according to Scott Gardner, the Department of Fish and Game's statewide coordinator in Sacramento.
"The population has grown quite a lot in recent years," said Gardner, but he noted that most of the birds are in the lower elevation oak-digger pine habitat, and that is mostly private throughout the state. Hunters with access to private land, or willing to pay for that access, will undoubtedly have the best success this year.
In Southern California, San Diego County will have the best opportunities, especially on private ground. John Massie, a former DFG biologist, said that the season "looks very good, even better than last year and last year was good."
Public land hunters on the Cleveland National Forest will have some decent opportunities in the Eagle Peak, Love Valley and Palomar Mountain region, but hunters need to be sure they know the public-private land boundaries. Wardens in this area spend a lot of time writing trespassing citations during turkey season.
The Lake Sutherland hunt, which saw nine turkeys taken last year, had around 200 applications for the 27 slots, and it should be as good this year as last.
There's also a new membership club that has over 10,000 acres of ranch land in the region available for hunters. Called My Country Club, the group has limited annual memberships that include deer and turkey hunting, according to Gary White. Hunters should call (760) 742-2482 for more information.
The San Bernardino Mountains do not look promising, according to DFG biologist Jim Davis.
"We had a pretty bleak year as far as reproduction went last year, and we have a diminished and widely scattered population of turkeys," said Davis. He said the Willow Fire three years ago burned a lot of the good habitat and birds were pushed into the Cleghorn and Holcomb Valley areas, but Davis did not have a single report of a bird taken last fall and only a couple last spring. He said the best area would probably be the Santa Ana River drainage.
Further north, Don Geivet said the Tejon Ranch turkey population was growing.
"It looks like its going to be a pretty good season. We had a good hatch last year and there are just a lot of holdover birds. We had so much bad weather last year that we didn't kill many and we just have a lot of older birds," said Geivet.
The Tejon has a few spots still available for guided or non-guided hunting, but permits were almost sold out. Hunters can get more information by calling Geivet at (661) 663-4208.
Further up the coast, there was generally good reproduction from Santa Barbara north, in spite of a dry spring last year. Brady Daniels at Cal-Quest Outfitters in Santa Barbara said this week that his birds were all still in their winter flocks and that he'd seen groups of 60 to 100-plus birds all grouped up.
"The weather has made the season a little late for us, but I think the numbers are pretty good. We had good recruitment from last season and we lost very few birds to predators. Our poult counts last year and our juvenile counts this spring didn't show a lot of difference, so we didn't lose a lot of birds.," said Daniels.
Daniels was mostly booked up for this spring, but said he might have a slot of two open up later in the season. For more information, hunters can call Daniels at (805) 560-6582 or send him an e-mail at calquest@cox.net.
The spring turkey season is open from March 29 through May 4. The limit is one bearded gobbler per day and three per spring season. Hunting is allowed from 1/2-hour before sunrise to 3 p.m. each day. For more information, hunters should consult the Department of Fish and Game regulations available at all license agents.
