Where'd my squirrels go?

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So after opening gifts and such yesterday morning I took off into the hills behind my inlaws home in LaFayette, GA looking for some squirrels to put on the dinner table.

No luck yesterday but I ran into a big flock of tukeys (8 or 9 big ones) grazing on the hill behind our house. When I went back out this morning to do some additional scouting I ran into what I assume is the same flock on the back side of the hill just at the edge of our property.

Anyway I've never seen the turkeys before (and dangit, Georgia doesn't have a winter gobbler season) and am wondering if the lack of squirrels (I didn't see a single one or even evidence of one where usually there are dozens running about) and the appearance of the turkeys is related.

I know some coyotoes have moved into the area, but haven't really seen evidence of them on our property. Its just sort of strange that the squirrels have totally disappeared. The turkeys seemed to look at our hilll as some sort of all you can eat smorgasboarg.

Any thoughts? Anyone in Northwest Georgia with any thoughts or pointers to where the squirrels are?
 
I've hunted in the same area for years , but one year there were NO squirrels !! It was a weird feeling not to see or hear even one squirrel. The answer is a preditor such as a coyote or maybe grey fox.Once the squirrels are gone the preditor moves on , leaving free eats of acorns etc for the turkeys.
 
Probably,

THat makes lots of sense. We know there are some coyotes around (a friend lost a dog to one earlier this year) and my wife saw a fox today. So that could explain a lot. While the coyote is a varmit I can take any time, Georiga consiers the fox a furbearing species and there are some different regulations on taking them. I ought to break out the DNR guide and gind out. WOuldn't mind getting her a fox fur for valentines

BTW, I've attached a picture of some of the turkeys.

At one point I was about 15 yards from them. THey had little fear of me.
 
It is hard to tell from the picture, but I have always had terrible luck hunting squirrels when they sky is overcast. I don't know what it is about the sun, but I have had many a day when I didn't see a single squirrel. In my expierence the reverse is true on a bright sunny day. I have to pass on some just because there were too many to shoot on a clear day. It looks like you were a regular hardwood forest so you should have seen some.

If you want to know for sure dump some bird feed or corn out in the woods. I wouldn't hunt over it like bait but it will let you know if there are any squirrels out there.
 
I kinda doubt the presence of turkey has anything to do with getting skunked on squirrels. The areas I hunt have both and I see squirrels on the same days I see turkey. Hawks are a different story; though I have seen a squirrel less than five feet from a perched hawk. Gave that bird a good talking to.

More likely the availability of food is the culprit. Squirrels are no different from other critters in that if you find food you will find squirrels. I looked for a Georgia state "Mast Report" but couldn't find one so I don't know the food situation in your area.

Sometimes good can be bad and bad can be good when it comes to available food. For example when your area has a really good mast year, critters will, in all likelihood, be dispersed over a large area as is the food. Makes finding them tough. But when your area has a bad mast year, the squirrels migrate to the few areas that did produce mast. This is good for the savvy hunter. All you have to do is scout for the few areas with mast and game of all types will be abundant.
 
We've had the same experience up here in Arkansas this year. Very early in the season, the squirrels were thick and it was no trouble to go out and get your limit. Now they're virtually gone. I have seen one or two here and there, but nothing like I was seeing. The old-timers around here seem to think it's because of the acorn crop we had this year. It was short-lived and what we did get was eaten up almost as quickly as it fell. Anyhow, my point is, they're semi-migrational (or at least that's what all the old-timers around here think), and I believe them. Not all of those squirrels could've been eaten by a predator. They move with their food, especially late in the season like this when pickin's are slim. Just my two cents.
 
Thanks for the responses.

They move with their food, especially late in the season like this when pickin's are slim.

More likely the availability of food is the culprit. Squirrels are no different from other critters in that if you find food you will find squirrels. I looked for a Georgia state "Mast Report" but couldn't find one so I don't know the food situation in your area.
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I don't think food is a culprit as there seem to be as many uneaten nuts on the ground as there are leaves. Plus, there are simply no nests in the trees. All signs of squirrel life are gone on our property and th eneighbors property. I went back out this morning and scouted out about a 10 acre wooded plot and saw one old squirrel nest in a tree. Its just bizare.


It is hard to tell from the picture, but I have always had terrible luck hunting squirrels when they sky is overcast.
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Actually, I think that the color of the sky probably had more to do with the angle the picture was taken than anything else. It was a pretty bright day that day. This morning was bright as wel, though its a bit overcast now.
 
Same thing here in western KY. In the summer and early fall, we were overrun with the things. For the first time, they totally cleaned my pear and apple trees :fire: . Starting about late October, they left after cleaning up the acorn crop.

One thing I noticed this year is that we also didn't have any hickory nuts. No hickory tree anywhere around me (and I'm around a lot of them) had any nuts on them.

What it seems they did was to move to wooded areas around corn fields where there is still some food available.
 
Ok, I'm a city boy. Don't hunt and never expect to; but I have absolutely no problem with it (I'm not some bubble head that thinks the meat magically appears in the grocery store.) but I do like to cook.

So I have to ask:
looking for some squirrels to put on the dinner table.
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- how does one prepare squirrel? The ones we have around here are dinky little things and for the life of me they don't look like they'd amount to much after skinning and gutting. Stew?
 
i only saw 4 today, they were spooked something serious. i've never seen a squirrel climb into a tree and not move for over an hour, that's insane. since all the snow has fallen they've been eating hedge apples, ALOT of hedge apples. although, i did get to see a squirrel riding a big hedge apple as it rolled down a snow covered hill. :p
 
One thing I noticed this year is that we also didn't have any hickory nuts. No hickory tree anywhere around me (and I'm around a lot of them) had any nuts on them.
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We've got lots of nuts on the ground . . . chestnutts, walnuts, acorns, hickory nuts. Its just awfully strange. We saw a bunch today, but they were all within the Chickimauga Battlefield Park (and there aint no hunting allowed there).

Oh well, tomorrows another day!
 
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