SURVIVAL AND REPRODUCTION OF FEMALE EASTERN WILD TURKEYS IN THE PEMBINA VALLEY, MANITOBA

Abstract: Information on wild turkey (Meleagris gallopavo) vital rates can assist managers in understanding status and health of current populations, determining limiting factors, managing harvest, and planning future introductions. Such data have never been collected at the northern fringe of the species— North American range in Manitoba, Canada, despite presence of an established population dating back to introduction efforts starting in 1958. Therefore, using radiotelemetry, we sought to gather information on spring‐summer survival probability, cause‐specific mortality, and reproductive parameters of female eastern wild turkeys (M. g. silvestris; hereafter, turkeys) in the Pembina Valley region of southern Manitoba. We captured and radiotagged 43 turkeys and monitored them during spring‐summer of 2011 and 2012. We monitored turkeys 3 times per week, investigating all known mortality and reproductive activity. We used the Kaplan‐Meier product limit estimator to calculate survival rates, daily nest survival rates to estimate nesting success, and nest investigation data to estimate natality throughout our study. We estimated spring‐summer survival as 53% across the 269‐day study period, with mammalian predation accounting for 84% of mortality events. Reproduction was characterized by 82% nesting frequency, 28% cumulative nesting success, 45% hen success, clutch sizes averaging 11.3 eggs, 89% hatching success, and a natality rate of 2.1 females hatched/female alive at breeding. Despite differences in snow depths, late winter temperature, beginning of the frost‐free period, and May rainfall between study years, we did not detect annual differences in survival or nesting success. This study provides useful information on parameters necessary for modeling viability of turkey populations at their northern limit, where effects of weather, harvest, and predation remain poorly understood. Populations in Manitoba appear to be less responsive to environmental conditions than populations at more southern latitudes, exhibiting comparable vital rates despite being subjected to severe winter weather. This resiliency, combined with results of Kiss et al. (2015), suggests that turkeys can successfully inhabit other northern landscapes, particularly within those containing agricultural landscapes that provide winter food resources.

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