The weather has been great for farmers, but wild turkeys have not

FILE PHOTO

It’s been a great year for farmers, according to Cache County Agricultural Agent Clark Israelsen. He says the season started with the reservoirs full and a lot of good snowpack. Then, he says, the growing season found the farmers with all the water they wanted or needed.

“I was talking…to some folks out in Newton at Newton Reservoir, which typically runs dry early in the year,” Israelsen says, “it’s still about 40% of capacity. They just had a good year.

“They have made some improvements on the system, their distribution has been improved. It’s been really good. I don’t know that we’ll ever have another year like that.”

Israelsen says the timing of the rain was really good. The weather has been good, the crops are pretty well harvested and most farmers are in pretty good shape for next year, he adds.

Things that aren’t great for crops, Israelsen says, are wild turkeys. They’re great for Thanksgiving dinner, but a turkey is far from his favorite animal. Wild turkeys cause a lot of damage on farms and Israelsen says they are very hard to get rid of.

“I’ve proposed that we increase the number of birds that can be hunted, or even extend the hunting season,” he continues. “Some of that has taken place. Also the Division (of Wildlife Resources) comes and traps some when they have troubles and move them to different locations in the state.

“They really haven’t been all that helpful because we may have 150 turkeys in the cow manger and they’ll trap half a dozen. That leaves most of them there.”

Israelsen says the wild turkeys are even causing problems with homeowners because of the messes they leave.

Free News Delivery by Email

Would you like to have the day's news stories delivered right to your inbox every evening? Enter your email below to start!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.