It used to that be catching a glimpse of a wild turkey on Mike Nickels’ farm in Jefferson County was a rare event.

Not anymore.

“There are a lot of birds,” Nickels said. “They’re common. You don’t have to look too hard to see them.”

All the gobbling doesn’t surprise officials at the Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks, who say there are more turkeys around the state now than at any other time in the past century.

“They’re definitely on the increase,” said Mike Mitchener, the department’s section chief for wildlife. “The turkeys are doing very well at this point. It’s stable to increasing.”

Turkeys were found in early-day Kansas, but were nearly nonexistent by 1900 because they were gobbled up by hunters, Mitchener said. The state began trapping wild turkeys from other states and transplanting them throughout the state in the 1960s and 1970s, but Mitchener says the population has become especially healthy in the past decade.

“It’s taken a little time,” he said. “In the past six to eight years it pretty much exploded, and we met that critical mass.”

Turkeys are especially bountiful in eastern Kansas, which has more of the foliage and water the birds prefer for habitat. Mitchener said the state continued trapping eastern birds and transplanting them in western Kansas to spur populations there.

The turkey boom has been good news for hunters. Kansas sells about 30,000 turkey-hunting licenses each year. The spring season runs from mid-April to the end of May, and the fall season runs from the first of October to the end of December.

A hen turkey and her young look for food east of Lawrence. Officials at the Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks say there are more turkeys around the state now than at any other time in the past century.

Dave Billings, a Lawrence resident who has been hunting turkeys for 25 years, said it was easier now than ever to bring home the birds.

“It’s doing great,” he said. “There are a lot more every year.”

Billings said he’d hunted turkeys in Missouri but preferred going after them in Kansas because the terrain was a bit friendlier.

“Missouri has a lot more wooded areas,” he said. “It’s easier to hunt in Kansas because there are more wide-open spaces.”

The turkey resurgence should be a feather in the cap of Kansas Wildlife and Parks, Billings said.

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“It’s one of their great success stories,” he said. “They’ve done a great job.”

In addition to farming between McLouth and Oskaloosa, Nickels owns Old School Guide Service, an outfitting and tour service for hunters.

He said most of his clients enjoyed the challenge of luring turkeys with decoys and calls.

“I’ve heard it explained by an avid turkey-hunter that if he could get a deer to act like a turkey, it would be the ultimate hunt,” Nickels said.