Officials from the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife reported the number of turkeys harvested this season is down 2% from the number of harvests in 2024. They added that license sales also suffered a drop of 4%.
Turkey and grouse coordinator, Zak Danks, said the decrease in harvests and license sales reflect the severe weather in the Commonwealth leading up to the opening days of turkey season and isn’t related to any changes in the turkey population.
“Keep in mind that, the week before turkey season, my mind really wasn’t on turkey season. It was on helping friends that had suffered flood damage, three different sets of friends, clean up from historic floods,” said Danks.
Danks said if the weather and hunting conditions were normal, there may have been an increase in the number of birds harvested. He added the number of turkeys hunted on the opening weekend of turkey season was only 1% lower than the five-year average.
“As you can see, there is some fluctuation year to year, but all things considered, it was a pretty good harvest,” said Danks. “We made the 30,000 threshold which is kind of an informal benchmark we look at.”
Danks added that recent data on the number of turkeys hatched this year indicates that the population of wild turkeys will increase. This, coupled with the recent wave of cicada hatchings, fares well for prospective turkey hunters leading into next year.