The Wild Turkey’s Springtime Show: What 500 Years of Ozark Mornings Sound Like

I stepped onto the porch at first light this morning and heard him before I saw him — that unmistakable gobble rolling across the hollow like someone shaking a coffee can full of gravel. A tom turkey, somewhere down near the creek bottom, announcing himself to every hen within a half mile. He’s been at it since late March, but these mid-April mornings are when the show really peaks.

If you’ve never watched a wild turkey strut, you’re missing one of the most ridiculous and magnificent things the Ozarks have to offer. The tom puffs himself up until he looks twice his normal size, fans that tail into a perfect semicircle, and drags his wing tips along the ground while his head shifts through colors — pale blue to bright red to white — depending on his mood. The whole performance looks like something a committee designed by accident, and yet it’s worked for longer than humans have been on this continent.

A Small Victory Seventy Years in the Making

Here’s what most people don’t know: wild turkeys were nearly gone from Missouri by 1900. Overhunting and habitat loss had pushed them to the edge. The birds strutting across our 500 acres this week are descendants of a careful restoration effort that began in the 1950s, when the Missouri Department of Conservation started trapping and relocating wild birds from the few remaining flocks in the southern part of the state. Every gobble you hear is a small victory, about seventy years in the making.

The Language of Courtship

The timing of turkey courtship isn’t random. Toms start gobbling when daylight hours reach a certain length, and the hens are listening for more than volume. They’re evaluating the rhythm, the consistency, the confidence of that call. A young jake gobbling too fast or too erratic won’t hold a hen’s attention the way a mature tom will. It’s a conversation happening in a language we can hear but only partly understand.

Start a Turkey Field Journal

This week would be a good one to start a turkey field journal with your kids. Find a spot where you can sit quietly at dawn or dusk — the edge of a field, near a tree line, anywhere with open ground and woods nearby. Listen first. Count the gobbles. Note the time. Then watch for movement. Toms often strut in the same areas day after day, so once you find a spot, you can return to it. Have your kids sketch what they see: the fanned tail, the beard hanging from the chest, the way the hen ignores him entirely while he puts on his whole show. Compare the tom to the hen — the size difference, the color difference, the fact that she has all the power in this arrangement and seems completely unbothered by his display.

What Comes Next

The hens will start nesting soon, scraping out shallow depressions in leaf litter under low cover. Each one will lay about a dozen eggs over two weeks, then sit on them for nearly a month. By late May, if you’re lucky and quiet, you might spot a hen crossing a trail with a line of poults behind her, no bigger than your fist.

We’ve got turkeys moving through the preserve right now, and the mornings have been loud with them. If you’re nearby, Ha Ha Tonka State Park is hosting a Discover Nature event today that’s worth the drive. Or come out to our land sometime this spring and sit on the farmhouse porch with a cup of coffee. The show starts at sunrise, and the tickets are free.