June 8, 2020 Update

2020 Spring Turkey Overview

The 2020 Spring Turkey Season will be remembered by the COVID 19 pandemic. Before the pandemic Kansas lowered the limit from 2 toms to 1, which eliminated the famous “Kansas double” where you could harvest 2 birds in one day. As of April 10th Kansas terminated the sale of non-resident spring turkey tags, which stopped those from hunting Kansas that did not purchase a tag prior to April 10. Since Missouri remained open and tags are sold over the counter, all non-residents had the option to hunt Missouri and the limit is 2.

This year members traveled from 18 different states, which was down from 23 in 2019.  Missouri residents were the top state with 106 hunters, Kansas was second with 24 and Arkansas was third with 17.

The total number of spring turkey hunters was up from 191 in 2019 to 207 during the 2020 season. Turkey numbers were down a little in some areas but stable in others. The beauty of MAHA is the option of having 79 counties to choose from, but you must scout and locate the birds. The success ratio jumped from 1.4 toms per member to 1.5.  207 members harvested 310 toms, which is a lot of up-close action!

Below are two first year junior members that were able to get in on the action.

Once again, most of our spring turkey hunters are casual and utilize spring turkey season to scout and become familiar with the map and reservation system. The average member only hunted 3 to 5 days, but we always have a group of die-hard spring turkey hunters that take filling tags very seriously.

The 2020 MAHA spring turkey Tough Man contest went as follows:

166 hunters hunted one state, 35 hunted 2 states and 6 hunted all 3 states. The most days hunted without filling a tag was 11 days and the longest it took to fill one tag was 14 days. The most days hunted by a member was 24 and he harvested 2 toms. Once again, all three were local hunters who had the time and just enjoyed getting out. The quickest a member filled 4 tags was 4 days and the fastest a member filled 5 tags was 7 days. The heaviest bird was 26 lbs., the longest spur was 1 9/16”, longest beard was 11” and most beards was 3.

heath t-cr

Out of the 6 members that hunted all 3 states four harvested 5 mature toms, which we call the “MAHA Slam”. The other two harvested 4 toms each.

We have a new one to add to the MAHA books this year. We had 3 father son (junior) member teams harvest 8 toms total between father and son Congratulations guys, that is some fantastic memories and a freezer full of turkeys!

 

 

We would like to thank everyone that responded to our email requesting harvest numbers to calculate a total of birds harvested during the 2020 season. This feedback is helpful when it is time to renew leases. Success photos and stories are most gratifying. Keep them coming.

We have had a couple rocky months to deal with lately. MAHA is doing well, the small towns are getting back on their feet and we will all get through it.

 

Enjoy the summer and stay safe! Jon, Susie, and Jon Jr.

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