TURKEYS IN THE TIMBER

By Scott Haugen

As soon as I found turkeys lurking in the timber a couple seasons ago, I set eight trail cameras on that 1-mile-wide, nearly 3-mile-long ridge. I’d taken many turkeys from it over the years, but that spring marked the fewest toms I’d seen leading up to the season opener. That changed when I headed into the timber.

Not only did I reposition all my trail cameras inside the timber, I also spent hours scouting it. Due to thick cover, however, trail cameras proved more beneficial compared to what I saw, or failed to see, in person.

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I run trail cams on video mode in order to capture sounds on the periphery of what’s in the frame and to study bird behavior – things you

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can’t decipher from a still image. I use StealthCam’s DS4K Ultimate cameras; their video quality is tops, as is their ability to work in a range of year-round conditions.

What surprised me the most was the number of predators I caught on camera leading up to the season. One video clip captured three mature coyotes chasing turkeys, while another snippet caught four predator species on the same trail in one night.