Huge decline for us on our club in S Alabama. It seems to have started when the timber companies started spraying herbicide in our thinned pines and absolutely killed all the underbrush. It has become a barren wasteland of nothing green but pine trees and they are very open leaving the turkeys vulnerable to predators, both by land and air. They are finally clear cutting some of it now so hopefully we get some good nesting areas in the next few years.

I’m not condemning anyone because I have done both but the more I think about it and the more I find myself agreeing with chamberlain’s theories......... There is no doubt the decline started here about the time decoys became legal and fanning and gobbler decoys became all the rage.
I don’t think the problem is so much the number of turkeys getting killed as which ones are getting killed. The dominant turkeys that do the majority of the breeding should be extremely difficult to kill early season because they have the hens and it’s hard to call them. I think this has always protected the species in Alabama where we have a long season and liberal limits. Those birds are expendable now, but they certainly are not on March 15 or even March 20. Problem is that the turkey that should be hard to kill turns into the stupidest thing in the woods when you show him a fan because that’s his place and his hens.
I may be dead wrong. Just one man’s opinion that’s spend the last 25 years or so trying to learn all he can about wild turkeys. I will say I’m glad that the state has outlawed fanning and I certainly hope that gobbler decoys are next.

I’m not condemning anyone because I have done both but the more I think about it and the more I find myself agreeing with chamberlain’s theories......... There is no doubt the decline started here about the time decoys became legal and fanning and gobbler decoys became all the rage.
I don’t think the problem is so much the number of turkeys getting killed as which ones are getting killed. The dominant turkeys that do the majority of the breeding should be extremely difficult to kill early season because they have the hens and it’s hard to call them. I think this has always protected the species in Alabama where we have a long season and liberal limits. Those birds are expendable now, but they certainly are not on March 15 or even March 20. Problem is that the turkey that should be hard to kill turns into the stupidest thing in the woods when you show him a fan because that’s his place and his hens.
I may be dead wrong. Just one man’s opinion that’s spend the last 25 years or so trying to learn all he can about wild turkeys. I will say I’m glad that the state has outlawed fanning and I certainly hope that gobbler decoys are next.

[quote=BrentM]

What percentage of kills do you think fanning or decoys accounts for in a place like skyline? I’m talking in regards to birds that would not have been killed anyways.

I’d be happy if decoys were outlawed again. Areas that have a lot of open ground, I think decoys make a lot of difference in hunter success. But, I don’t think you can blame them on these huge wooded tracts.