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Last Thursday, 20 Eastern turkeys from Maine were released into Angelina County in the Middle Neches Eastern Turkey Cooperative.

The birds were released by officials with the Texas Parks & Wildlife Department (TPWD), in partnership with the National Wild Turkey Federation (NWTF)..

This stocking part of what is called a “super stocking”.

These boxes contain wild turkeys shipped from Maine to Texas. They were at the TPWD field office in Lufkin to get a veterinary exam. (Photo by Chester Moore)

Raigan Heule and Chad Argabright fit a monitor onto a juvenile hen about to be released. Argabright is a grad student working on a project for LSU on turkey movements in East Texas. His study was featured in the March/April 2022 edition of Texas Fish & Game. An updated story will be coming in the March/April 2023 issue. (Photo by Chester Moore)

“TPWD started the super stocking effort in 2014 and we have released close to 1,000 birds since,” said TPWD Wild Turkey Program Coordinator Jason Hardin.

“Super stockings” are large, concentrated stockings with a minimum of 80 birds released in a location with a male/female ratio that allows for optimal population expansion.

Listen to an in-depth interview about TPWD’s turkey program with Jason Hardin and Chester Moore here.

Since Texas is 97-percent privately owned, landowner cooperation is key for such operations.

“Our Turkey Restoration Co-op, includes a group of seven landowners and consists of approximately 11,000 acres,” said Jay Todd of Core Supply LLC.

“We began our journey for restocking Eastern turkeys back in 2015, when we first put in our application with TPWD. We ended up not passing our habitat evaluation that year, and knew we had some work to do with regard to improving our habitat.”

Over the next four years, the group of landowners worked hard on enhancing habitat for Eastern turkeys and got a green light for stockings to begin in 2021.

Among the project partners, NWTF holds a unique position.

“NWTF holds an agreement with Delta Cargo. The Texas State Chapter of NWTF reimburses NWTF National office for the fees associated with shipping birds by air,” said NWTF biologist Annie Farrell.

“The Texas State Chapter also assists with funding for disease testing and reimbursing TPWD staff who travel out of state to collect and haul the birds (not this year though. All birds came in via air). NWTF also provides transport boxes to whichever states are trapping for Texas, free of cost.”