Not long after February’s winter storm, large cardboard boxes were popped open by giggling children who squealed as turkeys emerged and flapped their way to freedom, while biologists and parents smiled and watched with their own sense of delight.

 Working with the National Wild Turkey Federation and private landowners in an Eastern Wild Turkey Restoration Program, the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department is restocking wild turkeys in areas of the state where they’ve declined. Eastern wild turkeys arrived at the Cooper Wildlife Management Area in February after long flights from Maine and North Carolina. The turkeys got general health check-ups and a drink of electrolytes to help them recover from their trip, then they were released at their new East Texas home. 

TPWD staff wrapped up an eastern wild turkey stocking effort in Titus County, releasing 83 eastern wild turkeys originating from Maine, Missouri, North Carolina and West Virginia. TPWD staff has also released 48 eastern wild turkeys from Maine, Missouri and North Carolina toward an 80-bird goal in Franklin County. 

Since 2016, TPWD staff has released 671 Rio Grande wild turkeys at seven sites within the Trinity River watershed, south of DFW to just east of the Richland Chambers Reservoir. The Trinity River is the historic interchange between the two species. Nearly 200 Rio Grandes were released at four sites in Kaufman, Navarro and Freestone counties last winter.