Wild Turkeys in the Santa Ritas??

[Outdoor Writer]

This is from the latest AGFD Hunting Newsletter. -TONY

 

 

 

Gould’s turkeys thrive, allowing further range and distribution

By Doug Burt, public information officer, Arizona Game and Fish Department

The Arizona Game and Fish Department and the National Wild Turkey Federation, along with sportsmen and private citizens, successfully captured and relocated 50 Gould’s wild turkeys from the Huachuca Mountains in early March. The captured birds were relocated to the Santa Rita and Catalina Mountains to help supplement existing populations and continue to expand the range of this unique but once eradicated wild turkey subspecies. The Gould’s turkey is common in Mexico, but only Arizona and New Mexico support populations in the United States.

 

Six mountain ranges throughout southeastern Arizona now support populations of the Gould’s turkey: the Chiricahua, Pinaleno, Galiuro, Santa Rita, Catalina, and Huachuca Mountains. All of these mountain ranges are part of the Sky Islands. This 70,000-square-mile region extends from southeastern Arizona, southwestern New Mexico and the northwestern part of Mexico. This region encompasses one of the most diverse ecosystems in North America.

 

The Gould’s reintroduction project began as a joint international effort with Mexico, where the first populations of Gould’s subspecies came from to restore Arizona’s historic populations during the 1980s, 1990s and early 2000s.

 

Today, Gould’s populations in the Huachucas are significant and capable of sustaining further range expansion from our own populations. This translocation marks the fourth time that in-state populations have been used to continue the repopulation effort, indicating that the reintroduced Gould’s turkeys to southern Arizona are healthy and adapting well.

 

Translocation programs are designed to increase diversity of wildlife populations throughout the state and beyond. Turkeys nationwide have expanded from a historic low of less than 100,000 to over 7.4 million birds today. Programs are possible by funding from license sales, concerned sportsmen groups, special auction tags and other concerned conservationists.

[AZP&Y]

Yes, these pictures were taken in the Santa Ritas- last july.

 

They are doing very well and the birds are doing so great they opened hunting to unit 35A and I'm sure other units will follow...

 

I've spotted turkeys in the Huachuacas, Santa Ritas and Santa Catalinas!

 

AzP&Y

[Snapshot]

What elevation are you guys typically seeing these birds at? Is it down in the PJ or above the Ponderosa level? Just curious!

[Kilimanjaro]

I've seen Goulds in the Santa Ritas a few times...also seen them in the Huachucas, the Chiricahuas and down in the Canelo hills..

[AZP&Y]

What elevation are you guys typically seeing these birds at? Is it down in the PJ or above the Ponderosa level? Just curious!

 

below even the P & J all 3 times... but again it was a warmer time of year when I've spotted them. They have exploded in the Huachucas. I've seen groups of 20 birds at a time.

 

Azp&Y

[audsley]

You'll notice the foreground in the second picture above, apparently at a stock tank, shows a mesquite. However, it's my understanding that Goulds will tend to hang out in the oaks. (This being southern Az., think oaks rather than pinyon-juniper, although there are plenty of pinyon-juniper around here as well. But PJs tend to have low branches; turkeys don't like to roost in trees with branches too near the ground.)

 

Also, I believe Goulds will follow riparian areas out of the mountains and into lower elevation desert areas. A friend of mine shot one next to a palm tree at the foot of some mountains in Mexico.

[Snapshot]

My limited turkey hunting experience is up in unit 27 where PJ and ponderosa play a big part on habitat, I was curious as to what habitat they prefer most in the Santa Rita's, so when I look around maybe I can find some birds and get some pic's for the collection.

You are right about the oaks, There is alot more oaks than PJ in the Santa Ritas, at least on the North end of things, and once you get to the Ponderosa things are getting steep pretty quickly.

[COOSEFAN]

We've seen them between Sonoita and Patagonia last spring, I've also seen them in the Catalinas and Pinalinos.

 

I've seen them just before you get into Patagonia on the south-east side of the road in the farm fields. For a while last year you could always see a bunch of birds out there every evening. Also have seen them several times up in the Canelo Hills further East.

[KGAINES]

We have seen them over the years near Parker Canyon lake, this last year during the early Coues rifle hunt we seen at least twenty in a flock.

[bmf1321]

Wow. Thanks for all the info. I never would have thought there were birds around here.

[SunDevil]

saw 2 last spring off from redington road in unit 33.

[parothead]

Saw a hen Saturday in the Pecans groves east of Old Nogales Rd At at Continential Rd!!! Wish I had a camera with me.

 

Travis

[coueshunter84]

Seen 2 hens and actually heard one gobble 2 times in the Cochise Stronghold, over the weekend. And last year there was a flock in St. David for a couple of weeks. They appear to be migrating all over the place. LOL>.. Shouldnt be to much longer and the number of tags will grow to where they are easier to draw.

[billrquimby]

I covered for the Tucson Citizen the first release of Gould's turkeys into Arizona in the 1980s. It was a near-disaster. The agricultural authorities were concerned about the possibility of introducing diseases, so they held about a dozen birds captured in Mexico in quarantine for weeks in a building at Douglas. Several died, and some got out of their cages in the warehouse and presented a bunch of problems before they were caught.

 

Came the big day, I drove down to Fort Huachuca and met with the fort's two wildlife biologists and three or four Arizona Game and Fish Department guys, and we drove up into upper Garden Canyon and released the five or six birds that had survived the quarantine. I photographed them as they came out of their boxes.

 

Merrium's turkeys were introduced to the fort and elsewhere across southern Arizona in the 1920s and 1930s and a good number still remained in the Huachucas when the first Gould's were released. I suppose the turkeys there today have both Merrium's and Gould's in their genes.

 

The same would hold true of those in the Santa Catalinas, where I hunted turkeys in the 1950s and 1960s. The Merrium's variety ranged from the top of the mountain to the mesquites along the San Pedro River on the east, and to the ocotillos in what we used to call the Burney Mines country on the north. I didn't know much about turkey hunting then and shot only two birds on that mountain -- one was in Rose Canyon while they were building the dam for the lake; the other was on Rose Peak where I shot a mountain lion many years later. I had friends who liked to hunt along what now is called the Aspen Trail above the Mount Lemmon ski run, and they shot several birds there. There were no spring seasons then, so we hunted turkeys by walking and glassing, and shot them with rifles when we found them.

 

We used to see turkeys in the eastern foothills of the Galliuros near the Sunset Ranch while deer hunting. There were long fingers of oaks that stretched out into the flats, and we often came upon small flocks while jump-shooting whitetails in them. The turkeys were gone from the Galliuros and the valley by the early 1960s, and by 1970 mule deer (which were rare when we first hunted there) had replaced the whitetails.

 

Although I never saw or hunted turkeys there, it was my understanding that there were Merrium's turkeys in the Chiricahuas and on Mount Graham and in upper Josephine Canyon in the Santa Ritas until at least the mid-1970s.

 

Game and Fish also released a few Rio Grande turkeys near Pena Blanca Lake in the early 1980s, but nothing came of it.

 

Bill Quimby

[kbutton]

That is really ironic that this is coming up, yesterday a Hen hanging around the building at work, here are some pic's. they were released in Gardner Canyon and have been blow out of there with all the winds we have had.