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CHARITON – The old saying that records were meant to be broken could not be truer for the 2000 Iowa spring turkey season. There were a record number of permits issued – nearly 60,000, a record number of hunters taking the field – 47,334, and a record number of turkeys harvested – 21,850.
"We have a tremendous turkey resource," said Dale Garner, forest wildlife biologist at the DNR’s Chariton research station. "You can’t go wrong with a statewide hunter success rate of 44 percent. That’s great."
Garner estimated about 9,000 hunters with permits did not get into the field for one reason or another.
There were 12,000 more spring turkey hunters in 2000 than in 1999, and Garner attributes the increase to a variety of factors, including the flock size and people seeing a lot of turkeys while hunting other game. Iowa has a strong turkey population statewide.
"We’ve had fairly decent hatches over the past several years and expect to have another good one this year," he said.
He also credits the National Wild Turkey Federation’s efforts in promoting spring turkey hunting and the availability of turkey hunting videos and other outdoor products to improve success rates.
The DNR sends a survey card to 10 percent of hunters and uses the information to estimate the turkey harvest.
Uploaded: 9/6/2000
Uploaded: 9/6/2000