The more I’ve thought it out I think I may be onto something with the high and low variable areas of the map being either poult limited or nesting limited……Its just a theory and you know how theories go buuuuuuut……..

Look at it this way……Let’s say we completely eliminated nest predation from the equation….At some point every population would still reach a population limit…….But that limit would all be controlled through poult and adult turkey predation…..Virtually every egg would be hatching but the end turkey population would be determined by the hawks, owls, coyotes, bobcats, etc and wherever their density cuts it off……And as long as their pressure is swinging with the annual rodent variability…. then we’ll also see that same level of variability in the end turkey populations. So with no nest predation everybody would see the higher variability in this scenario.

Alright so now lets say we want to try to change that high variability in an area to make it low variability……Can you do that if the swingy poult predators are still controlling the end game?? What does it have to mean if we see very low variability??.....It would have to mean that poult predators are not the main controlling factor to population growth… It's being controlled by something that’s more constant….

Something like for instance in southwest Alabama….the amount of constant nesting habitat available year to year and the amount of constant pressure from corn eating coons that likely arent fluctuating due to constant food availability……Again population levels always have to stop somewhere but now it’s nesting limited…..That’s not to mean that there isnt good nesting present but rather nesting is what is defining the population cap…It’s not saying that nest predation isn’t having any variability either…..It’s saying that’s it’s at a distinctly different level than the rodent predators and that difference is able to be seen through the numbers……..

So if an area is putting out fairly constant nesting numbers each year and the end variability stays low then we have the flipside of the original scenario where “brooding” was the controlling factor ……Sure there is still always going to be some poult mortality on the back end after nesting but it would have to be minimal for the end variability to stay low…..After the more “constant” nesting has taken place the only way to change it to “high variability” would be to apply a lot of pressure from the swinging rodent predators. If the final variability comes out still fairly constant then that would mean they didn’t have a major impact after nesting.

That’s a lot I know but if it’s true then that really gives you an edge on determining what’s happening in different areas. When you look at which areas are which on the map it makes a lot of sense......In theory.