Seen a hen with 11 this morning crossing a gravel road. Heard 5 gobblers on roost (private land). The poults looked to be 1-2 weeks. Others have reported seeing a couple of hens with poults in other areas this week at Quantico. Have not heard of any yet at AP Hill.


Earl

Striker owes you a VT hat for the poults sighting.

Mine hangs proudly at Sampson's Bay.

in the edge of an uncut hayfield today i drove in to my fishing spot, and a handful of very small poults ran across the road and then the hen crossed too. some of the poults ducked back in the three foot high hay. I stopped the truck . Got out and walked away to let them regroup and then came back to get the truck later. These poults were not more than a few days old and l do not think they could have been fliers yet. FWIW have heard birds gobbling along the local rivers about everyday lve fished, including several birds this week.

Sure, now they are gobbling good!

Just heard a report of a poult sighting the first week of the season this year. I have never heard of anything that early, and have no idea whether it's fact or not.

put a post on here a decade ago about pre season scouting in Tenn in mid march and seeing a hen with poults a few weeks old …….thats when l formed my opinion that they breed year round, just heavier in March to May

Seen 4 more hens this week with poults. 4-9 in each group that I could tell (privet land). They all looked 1-3 weeks old.


Earl

Saw 4 gobblers 2 hens and 6 poults with one of the 2 hens.
Chesapeake.

Have not seen any other sightings since June 10. Other folks are seeing very little. Also no fawn sightings yet.


Earl

Greyghost know this l am sure , but fwiw, Biologists say it takes something greater than 3 poults per hen to survive in order to maintain the then current population. Friend here has some wild birds in edges of his yard regular and says one hen brings four poults with her everyday now. One gobbler along one of my fishing rivers still gobbles a regular ridge route midday every day. Spect we lost some poults in some areas here last week when up to 80 mph and heavy rain took a big toll on trees, barns, and roof s in some areas. Some folks without power for six days . Biologists do all kinds of poult hen ratios to estimate breeding success. They measure the percentage of hens with poults and a per cent age less than 50% is considered poor nesting success; the ratio of poults/hens is observed , and if the hens with poults is less than 3.0 it is considered poor to fair poult survival..I am paraphrasing a short course on the the biology here ….but you get the idea maybe.

I am afraid the hatch does not look good in N Fauquier. I have not seen a single poult. We have had several hard storms with lots of rain and flooding and high winds to boot. Most of the creeks and rivers have been out of the banks a couple of times and I know of several nests that are surely in the bay by now. After a tremendous hatch last year I was hoping for at least a good hatch this year. Last week I heard gobbling several mornings, surely its too late for re-nesting. The strange thing is I have seen very few birds in the last few weeks. Hay is being cut everywhere now so I am going to do some scouting to see if I can spot some brood hens with poults. On a side note I have not seen any fawns either but have heard of a few.

I don't know about it being to late for re-nesting I watched a big gobbler breed a hen in Western Loudoun County last Week from the road. I was amazed to see that this late. I also seen a single hen with 6 to 7 poult's in Clarke County yesterday they were very small though.

Just not seeing the poults anymore. Lots of hens without any.


Earl

Saw 3 hens out back thurs eve at least 2 had some poults and i suspect all did. couldnt count but great to see.

I have not seen a single poult in my little corner of Frederick County. Anybody see any grouse chicks ?