where are they?

I have a nice property not to far from the house that i pretty much have sole permission on. I see lots of good birds there all summer, fall, and winter. They are piled in there! But for the last three springs, its like they vanish. They almost always show back up in late may, early june. I was just wandering, how far do they typically go from what would be considered their "home range" I have no problem doing some road scouting, and trying to get permission. I just dont know how big of an area I should be checking.

Kinda weird around here. went to another property this afternoon to look around a bit. this place has had spring turkey on it for at least the last three years, as long as I've been hunting it. This is the second time I've been there in as many weeks and i gotta tell ya, if this was the first time I had ever been on this property and you were to tell me there are turkeys there, I'd call you a liar. No gobbling or yelping, no tracks, feathers, droppings, scratches.... Nothing.

Today was encouraging. the last couple years, I concentrated on the second property I mentioned. But with no sign of turkeys this year I decided rather than hunt today, I would scout a couple other places. I suppose I could have hunted a public area about a half hour south of here that I checked out a couple weeks ago. I spotted a few hens there but not sure about gobblers or roosting areas, I felt I should find some place closer to home.

My first stop was the property I mentioned at the beginning of this thread. I've hunted it at least once in each of the last 2 seasons and had no luck even though this place is loaded with birds any other time of the year. I hadn't gone into the woods 200 yards when I looked through the woods and spotted turkeys in the adjacent field. Turned out to be a couple hens, but as they were walking into the opposite treeline, I could here more hens to the north of me yelping and cutting. Didn't hear any gobblers, but at least I found some birds! The other spot is another public area about 10 minutes east. I intended to get out and put some shoe leather down, but there were other guys already hunting there. Rather than walk in on them I decided to come back later in the week after work.

So is it like the rut? you find the does, the bucks will show up? Or just because there are hens around, that doesn't mean the gobblers are there too?

This aint over, I'm gonna find a bird sooner or later.