Some will say that spring has arrived when they see the first American robin.
Others may say it’s when they slap the first mosquito or pull a crawling wood tick off a pant leg. For some, the first blooming dandelion or the fragrance of fresh lilacs are their signs of spring.
For me, it is the first tom turkey gobble heard or maybe the first strutting tom seen.
Remarkably, there was a time that the spring woods in Minnesota was silent of booming gobbles. Wild turkey populations were gone in Minnesota from 1880 through the early 1970s. Their return hinged on one influential trade and the hard work of many individuals and organizations.
Was the greatest trade in Minnesota history when the Twins got Joe Nathan from the Giants?
Was it the Vikings acquiring Jared Allen from the Chiefs?
Was it the Wild getting Devan Dubnyk and riding his hot goaltending into the playoffs?
Those might be good trades in the realm of sports, but the greatest trade in Minnesota history involved game birds.
The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources sent 85 live-trapped ruffed grouse to the Missouri Department of Conservation in exchange for 29 live-trapped Eastern subspecies wild turkeys, which were released in Houston County in 1971 and again in 1973.
Missouri wanted to reintroduce ruffed grouse into the Ozarks while Minnesota wanted to re-establish wild turkeys where habitat was most favorable in the state’s southeastern corner.
Missouri’s ruffed grouse are presently a species of special concern; hunting was discontinued in 2011 and the Ozarks population is still endeavoring at recovery with introductions of trapped grouse from Wisconsin.
Based on the two birds’ divergent results over the past 50 years, it appears Minnesota got the better end of the deal.
Wild turkeys had been extirpated since 1880 in Minnesota. Pen-raised wild turkeys from Maryland, Pennsylvania and Texas were released in Minnesota the 1920s, but failed to survive.
In 1957, pen-reared Pennsylvania birds were again attempted at Whitewater Wildlife Management Area, but the result was another failure.
Between 1964 and 1968, Merriam’s subspecies wild turkey trapped in Nebraska, South Dakota and Arkansas were attempted. Unfortunately, the smaller bodied Merriam’s failed to survive. The live-caught, Eastern subspecies Missouri wild turkeys flourished, far beyond expectations of wildlife officials who knew the history of failed attempts.
The Missouri transplants did so well that in 1978, Minnesota held its first turkey hunting season and 10,740 hunters applied for the 420 available permits and bagged 94 birds.
By contrast, last spring’s 2022 turkey season saw just under 70,000 hunters buy licenses and kill more than 12,000 birds.
Eventually, more Eastern subspecies turkeys were acquired from Illinois, Wisconsin and four other states. The wild turkey has recovered to their pre-settlement range and even expanded in Minnesota, an unquestionable conservation success story with the bird found in around three quarters of the state.
Minnesota has slowly liberalized turkey hunting opportunities since that first hunt, dropping the tag lottery drawings except for specific wildlife management areas. Minnesota also has allowed turkey hunters to choose to use unfilled tags in the last two time periods of the spring hunt.
A great deal of work was undertaken by the Minnesota DNR and the National Wild Turkey Federation to shepherd the wild turkey’s recovery success story in Minnesota.
DNR wildlife employees began trapping wild turkeys in the southeast by 1976 and moving them elsewhere to start new populations, baiting sites with corn and capturing the birds in rocket-fired nets. Turkeys were moved to the several locations in the years that passed.
The NWTF was a huge partner, sponsor and conservation leader, helping fund the work and later lobbying for a turkey stamp which would become the dedicated funds for wild turkey management around the state.
The coordinated trap-and-transplant efforts continued through 2009. In 33 years, more than 5,000 turkeys were transferred to new sites.
To recognize the great success of Minnesota’s turkey recovery now reaching a 50-year milestone and to honor the NWTF’s 50-year anniversary, NWTF Minnesota will be hosting a celebration of the restoration of wild turkey in Minnesota.
It will be held — where else? — but in the Qild Turkey capital of Minnesota, in Caledonia on Saturday, July 22. There will be a plaque dedication, highlighting the conservation partnership of NWTF and DNR, at Caledonia’s North Park at 2 p.m.
Guests include Ron Schara, who was the first state chapter president for NWTF and is a longtime outdoor media celebrity, Linden Anderson, also a former state chapter NWTF president and three decade turkey trapper; Jason Burckhalter, co-CEO of the NWTF; Tom Glines, event emcee and NWTF Director of Development for the Midwest and 29-year NWTF veteran; Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz; and DNR Commissioner Sarah Strommen.
Wildlife professionals who helped with the turkey trapping will lead a presentation of how the birds were trapped and share some anecdotes of their good and bad days collecting birds, while a video is shown on loop to tell the turkey translocation story.
There will be activities for kids through the NWTF Jakes program, the entire collection of Minnesota turkey stamps will be on display, a 50th anniversary gun raffle is scheduled for the evening, along with live entertainment, and cake and refreshments will be served at the community center, along with the chance to tell turkey stories.
Sitting in the woods this spring while enjoying turkey hunts with friends and family will be a highlight for many Minnesotans. Countless others will not hunt but enjoy seeing and hearing the spring mating dance spectacle.
Thanks to the work of those who cared to return wild turkey to the landscape, we all get the chance to see and hear thundering gobbles and delicate dances play out in woodlots, field edges, ravines and bluffs across the state.
I can’t imagine a spring without them.
Scott Mackenthun has been writing about hunting and fishing since 2005. Email him at scott.mackenthun@gmail.com.