SALT LAKE CITY, Utah, Feb. 4, 2026 (Gephardt Daily) — A batch of designated “nuisance” turkeys were released to their new home where state wildlife officials hope they’ll behave themselves.
“Big thanks to the students from Utah State University Eastern who helped us release turkeys on our Gordon Creek Wildlife Management Area (WMA)” the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources said online upon the release of four troublemakers near Price, in Carbon County.
“Each winter, we trap nuisance turkeys and relocate them to help establish new populations or to boost existing populations in other parts of the state,” the DWR said. “These turkeys will now call Gordon Creek home and will be a great addition to the turkeys already there.”
The DWR regularly responds to complaints of wild turkeys moving into residential areas. The agency notes that while not predators, they may grow to 25 pounds and four feet in length and can be aggressive. They will destroy landscaping, knock down bird feeders, scratch up paint jobs on cars, and they love fruit trees.
Social birds, they tend to congregate in numbers, which can make for a mess with their droppings. In 2018 a large infestation of wild turkeys afflicted Mendon in Cache County, population 1,300, when several hundred raided backyards.
The DWR needed multiple years of regular relocations to solve the problem. The last of the wayward Mendon gangs were among about 500 nuisance turkeys from around the state released in 2023 in the Hardware WMA (formerly Hardware Ranch) in Blacksmith Fork Canyon, east of Hyrum in Cache County.
Wild turkeys can fly, unlike their domestic cousins bred for size, but only in short bursts, typically to roost in trees or escape predators.
