[Bristol-Birds] 83 Wild Turkey in Rootby Branch Flock on 25 Feb.
- From: "Wallace Coffey" <jwcoffey@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "Bristol-birds" <bristol-birds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 25 Feb 2010 19:09:17 -0500
About half the Rooty Branch flock is shown in this photo.
Rooty Branch
Sullivan Co., TN
25 Feb 2010
My Rooty Branch Wild Turkey flock count, this afternoon, came
to 83 birds. That is the largest flock I've seen in Sullivan. I am
sure there are some larger ones but I haven't seen one.
I don't know what the flock size was at its peak this past fall and
winter but this is a big flock and it may have been near a hundred
birds, if we knew what the winter loss to weather and/or
predators and disease may have been. A flock of 100-125 is
about as large as you see in this region.
Since the Wild Turkey flock in Sullivan County appears (by harvest)
to be the largest in the Northeast Tennessee counties, I've kept
a vigil to better understanding these wonderful, big, birds.
The region has a very young flock which only began to
be well introduced and established in the late 1970's into the 1980s.
During calendar year 2009. the harvest in Sullivan was 347 birds.
This is amazingly low as turkey hunting totals go. The other NET
counties were Washington 307, Carter 224, Johnson 201 and
Unicoi 148.
I think Dave Worley and others saw about a 100 or more in one
Russell County flock a few years ago.
Let's go birding . . .
Wallace Coffey
Bristol, TN
Other related posts:
