Turkey season video pops
On April 17 Drury Outdoors posted a video of three iridescent Rio Grande gobblers strutting in Texas, calling the scene 'pure MAGIC' and drawing nearly 6,000 views. (x.com) The clip highlights plumage and display behavior as the turkey season heats up. (x.com)
A Texas turkey clip from Drury Outdoors is landing in the middle of the state’s spring Rio Grande season, when gobblers are actively strutting and sounding off. (x.com) Drury Outdoors posted the video on April 17, showing three Rio Grande gobblers fanned out and displaying in a Texas field. The post called the scene “pure MAGIC” and had drawn nearly 6,000 views by April 18. (x.com) The birds in the clip are male wild turkeys, or gobblers, and Texas A&M AgriLife says gobblers attract hens by gobbling and strutting. Male Rio Grandes carry iridescent body feathers in copper, bronze, red, green and gold, which is the shimmer the video picks up. (wildlife.tamu.edu) Rio Grande turkeys are the main wild turkey subspecies in Texas, and Texas A&M says they have the state’s largest turkey population and widest range. The National Wild Turkey Federation says Rio Grandes are found in 15 U.S. states, with strong populations in Texas. (wildlife.tamu.edu) (nwtf.org) The timing lines up with Texas’s 2026 spring season calendar. Texas Parks and Wildlife said the South Zone regular season runs March 14 to April 26, and the North Zone runs March 28 to May 10. (scttx.com) Texas Parks and Wildlife said on February 27 that hunters should expect plenty of two- and three-year-old gobblers this spring after good production in 2023, 2024 and 2025. The agency also said gobblers were expected to spread out in search of hens. (scttx.com) State survey data show why turkey footage is showing up so often this spring. Texas Parks and Wildlife recorded 2.71 poults per hen in 2023, 2.66 in 2024 and 2.19 in 2025, all levels the agency lists as positive recruitment. (tpwd.texas.gov) Texas Parks and Wildlife says wild turkeys now inhabit 223 of the state’s 254 counties after a long recovery from overhunting and habitat loss. The agency says Texas now holds some of the country’s highest turkey densities. (tpwd.texas.gov) The same agency now requires mandatory harvest reporting within 24 hours for all wild turkeys in all counties, and hunters must carry an Upland Game Bird Endorsement. Those rules put more structure around a season that still revolves around the same spring ritual in the video: gobblers fanning, pacing and trying to draw hens in. (tpwd.texas.gov)
