fer blackberries, huckleberries, mulberries, 

 browntopmillet, bullgrass, cowpeas, pea- 

 nuts, grain sorghums, soybeans, and 

 wheat; seeds of bahiagrass, bullgrass, 

 carpetgrass, yellow-eyed-grass, and woolly 

 croton; and insects such as cicadas, 

 crickets, and grasshoppers. 



Planting Food for Wild Turkeys 



The food available to wild turkeys can 

 be increased by (1) planting grasses, grains, 

 and legumes and (2) managing woodland 

 to increase natural foods. 



Fields of clovers, winter grains, and 

 grasses^provide green grazing and nutri- 

 tious food in late fall, winter, and early 

 spring. The tender blades of these 

 plants are higher in protein than most 

 fruits, nuts, and buds of native trees 

 and shrubs. These fields also provide 

 good summer range where the turkeys 

 can forage for insects as well as grain 

 and weed seeds. 



The field you plant for wild turkey 

 food should be at least 1 acre. If you 

 have deer, the field must be larger (2 

 to 10 acres) in order to feed them also. 

 Some of the largest flocks of wild tur- 

 keys in the Southeast have been estab- 

 lished and maintained with high deer 

 populations where about 5 percent of 

 the total woodland area is kept in food 

 patches of winter greens. 



Clovers. Button, crimson, red, and 

 white clovers (including Ladino) are ex- 

 cellent turkey foods. Clovers can be 

 planted with grasses, oats, or wheat but 

 are more easily managed for turkeys 

 when grown alone. Perennial grasses 

 such as bluegrass, fescue, tall oatgrass, 

 and orchardgrass soon crowd out the 

 clovers in turkey fields. Deer will feed 

 in the same fields with wild turkey. 

 Since the deer prefer the clovers, the 

 grasses soon replace these more heavily 

 grazed legumes. 



Inoculate clover seed before planting 

 in a field where clover has never been 

 grown. Use the true clover inoculant 

 for crimson, red, and white and the 

 alfalfa-burclover inoculant for button 

 clover. In fields that have grown clover, 

 inoculation is seldom necessary but 

 phosphate usually is needed for continued 

 vigorous growth. 



Seed clovers in the fall by broad- 

 casting. Select the clover best adapted 

 to your soil. Button clover is seeded 

 at 20 pounds of scarified seed per acre, 

 white clover (and its varieties) at 2 to 

 4 pounds per acre, crimson clover at 20 

 pounds per acre, and red clover at 10 

 pounds per acre. 



Lime the soil wherever necessary to 

 establish and maintain a pH of 6.0 to 

 6.5 for crimson and white clover and 

 6.5 to 7.5 for button and red clover. 



Wild turkeys are at home in woodlands, and much of their food comes from trees. 



(Courtesy of Roger Latham) 



