Improve Your Spring Turkey Hunting Odds
The Diet of Wild Turkeys: What Do They Eat?
Understanding the food sources that wild turkeys rely on throughout the year can be beneficial for both hunters and wildlife managers. In the spring, turkeys may be more focused on breeding behavior, but they still need to eat to survive. Knowing what types of foods they are seeking out can help hunters identify areas where turkeys are likely to be feeding, which can increase their chances of a successful hunt.
During the spring, turkeys will often feed on a variety of foods, including insects, berries, and seeds. As the weather warms up and the vegetation starts to grow, turkeys will often shift their focus to new plant growth, which can provide them with the necessary nutrients they need to thrive. In the summer months, turkeys may also feed on fruits and other types of vegetation that are abundant in the area.
In the fall, turkeys may start to shift their focus to more energy-dense foods, such as nuts and acorns, as they prepare for the colder winter months. Understanding these seasonal shifts in turkey feeding behavior can help hunters identify the best areas to focus their scouting efforts, as well as help wildlife managers evaluate the productivity of different habitats and determine what types of management practices may be needed to support healthy turkey populations.
What Types of Food Do Wild Turkeys Eat?
Wild turkeys are true omnivores. This means they’ll eat just about anything they can find, including grasses, invertebrates, forbs, seeds, tubers, nuts, and fruits, along with the occasional small mammal, reptile, or amphibian. Wild turkeys living in farm country will also seek out waste grain, chaff, and other agricultural leftovers. A hen searches for bugs during the summertime in Florida. While plants make up the majority of a wild turkey’s annual diet, invertebrates—especially grubs and insects—are critical sources of protein for the birds. That means wild turkeys do eat pill bugs, grasshoppers, beetles, snails, caterpillars, and ticks.
Turkeys forage for these food sources throughout the day by scratching and pecking at the ground. The food is stored in the bird’s crop (an enlarged chamber in the esophagus) before it is swallowed and digested. Inspect a Turkey’s Crop All five subspecies of wild turkeys in North America eat this diet. The specific contents of their diet varies significantly by region, however, and the best way to understand what turkeys are eating in your area is to inspect the crop of a harvested bird.
Variations in the Diets of Different Turkey Subspecies Across Regions
As a seasoned hunter, I know that wild turkeys can be found in every U.S. state outside of Alaska, and their wide-ranging diet is a big reason why. While many hunters may picture hardwood forests in the East as quintessential turkey country, these birds also thrive in swamps, mountains, plains, and deserts. Here’s a general breakdown of each subspecies and the major foods they tend to focus on
Eastern Turkeys
As the largest and most abundant subspecies of wild turkey found in the U.S., Eastern turkeys inhabit every state east of the Mississippi River. They prefer hard mast such as acorns and beechnuts, along with seeds from native grasses and the flowers of herbaceous plants. Insects are also a valuable part of their diet, and Midwest Eastern turkeys have a particular fondness for waste grains and other agricultural food sources like soybeans, corn, and wheat. A study in Wisconsin showed that 54% of the birds’ crops contained waste grain, compared to 27% wild plants.
Rio Grande Turkeys
Rios are native to the semi-arid southern Great Plains states like Oklahoma, Kansas, Colorado, and Texas. They depend heavily on oaks, pecans, and other mast trees, as well as insects and a variety of grasses. Hydration is extremely important to Rios, especially in arid states, so they also eat succulent plants like prickly pears to get the water they need.
Merriam’s Turkeys
Merriam’s turkeys are residents of the mountains and high plains in the Western U.S. They prefer nuts from hardwood trees, but will also eat cones and seedlings from ponderosa pines and other coniferous trees. In the spring, they enjoy tender grass shoots and buds, and may even feed exclusively on grasshoppers at certain times of the year. They’ll also scavenge feedlots for leftover alfalfa, barley, and other waste grains.
Osceola Turkeys
These colorful turkeys can only be found in Florida, where they thrive in swamps and open pastures. Birds in the swamp eat more frogs, salamanders, and other small amphibians, while dryland birds focus on grubs and acorns. Favorite foods also include berries, wild grapes, ferns, and other plants.
Gould’s Turkeys
The rarest of the five wild turkey subspecies, Gould’s turkeys can only be found in the mountains of Arizona and New Mexico, as well as in Mexico. Their diet is similar to Rio Grande turkeys and includes various species of grasses and cactus, with the occasional lizard thrown in. They also key in on piñon nuts and berries from scraggly juniper trees.
Understanding How Wild Turkeys' Diets Vary with the Seasons
As a hunter, I know that the food wild turkeys eat varies not only based on regional availability but also on the time of year. Turkeys change their dietary habits according to the seasons, and I have observed this pattern over my 30-plus years of studying these game birds. During fall and winter, turkeys focus on survival and eating, and they rely on high-energy, high-protein hard mast, such as acorns, to get through the colder months. I have found that timber stands near farmlands or feedlots are excellent places to look for them during this time.
In the spring, turkeys shift to different habitats as they breed. They need open, grassy areas to see each other and strut their stuff, but these areas also provide plenty of food. They feed on fresh shoots, grasses, and other green forage cropping up in fields, as well as insects that become more abundant as the weather warms up. Female turkeys also need safe, shrubby areas with dense cover for nesting during this time. Summer is a plentiful time for turkeys, with a wide variety of edible plants available, including blackberries, fresh buds, and flower bulbs. Insects are also abundant during this season, and they play a critical role in a turkey's diet, especially for poults, which require a steady diet of bugs for healthy growth during their first few months of life.
Adult turkeys also molt during the summertime, and insects provide them with the protein they need to grow new feathers. As a hunter, I have noticed that wild turkeys follow this cycle every year, changing their habits and diets according to the seasons. Understanding these patterns is crucial for hunting them successfully and sustainably.
Spring is the Time for Turkey Hunters to Focus on Food
If you're after spring turkeys and also pursuing deer during the rut, you can approach your search for wild game similarly. While the toms may be more focused on mating than eating, the hens are fueling up for nesting season. By finding their food sources, you can locate the hens and ultimately the toms. During spring, turkeys are drawn to fresh green vegetation and showy wildflowers that attract insects. These insects provide both protein and vegetation, making it a two-for-one meal deal for the birds. As a hunter, it's essential to pay attention to anything that's attracting insects, which in turn attracts the turkeys.
As the vegetation becomes more abundant and rank, the turkeys will move on to new sources. According to Chamberlain, gobblers strut for only a short time before they have to stop and eat, and they often do so in the afternoon. Therefore, hunters should be on the lookout for these breaks when turkeys gorge on food sources. If you're looking for specific food sources to target in the spring, fresh green vegetation and flowers are the way to go. Chamberlain also suggests paying attention to the link between insects and showy flowers, which often attract turkeys looking for a good meal.
Turkeys Can Benefit from Strategically Planted Food Plots
It's common to associate food plots with deer. However, food plots can also be beneficial for wild turkeys, especially during fall and winter when food is scarce. By planting crops like oats, clover, soybeans, and corn, hunters can attract both deer and turkeys and establish predictable movement patterns.
To make the food plot more attractive to turkeys, hunters can also plant native wildflowers and bunch grasses for cover. Chufa, marketed as Turkey Gold by the National Wild Turkey Federation, is another popular crop that produces a small tuber similar to a peanut and is specifically planted for wild turkeys.
When choosing a location for turkey-specific food plots, focus on the edges of hardwood forests where turkeys can find good roosting trees and retreat to cover. Access to water is also an important consideration.
But even without a food plot, hunters can still find food sources for wild turkeys by observing their eating habits. By paying attention to what turkeys eat in their habitat, hunters can better plan their hunting strategy and increase their chances of success.