Bill Cochran is a Roanoke Times outdoors columnist.

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• Drum fishing on Virginia’s Coast comes in two colors
• Elk advocate finally gets his day
• Turkeys are plentiful, so why are hunting regulations so tight fisted?
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You have to wonder what is happening to Virginia’s turkey population. The annual fall kill has been plummeting. Preliminary figures show that during the recent season hunters reported killing a scant 5,656 turkeys.

That was a 14-percent decline from the previous year, which was a 14-percent decline from the year before that, which was a 32-percent decline from the year before that. The record kill of 16,861 in 1990 was nearly three times more than the 2004 take. You have to go back more than 15 years to find a lower number than the one posted by hunters the past season.

Deer also were down. The early count for the 2004-05 season was 220,538, which is a six-percent drop from the record take of 235,037 that occurred the previous season. Unlike turkeys, the deer decline was expected, even hoped for. Another record kill would have had biologists skittish, thinking that the herd was getting out of hand.

Matt Knox, the Department of Game and Inland Fisheries’ deer biologist, would like to see less emphasis by hunters on bucks. Even with a somewhat wacky rut, plus more doe days and additional doe tags available the past season, hunters still killed way more bucks than does. Some 105,933 antlered deer were reported killed. You can add another 20,240 male fawns. The total doe kill was 94,365.

The time is approaching that hunters may be forced to kill a doe in order to earn the right to kill a buck in some areas of the state. That could be discussed publicly as early as March.

Last season, for the first time, hunters were given the opportunity to report their deer kills by phone as opposed to stopping by a traditional check station. Some 96,000 kills were called in. There is no way to know whether the new system skewed the total figures, up or down or not at all. The high deer kill suggests good compliance. What is certain, the new check system proved to be popular.

The bear kill was 1,130, a 25-percent drop from the previous record season, but still the second highest ever. There was little surprise about the decline. The previous season’s gigantic kill came when most of the eastern part of the state was opened to bear hunting for the first time in modern history. Add to that, the bear-archery season was expended and a four-day muzzleloading bear season was established in the east.

Likely the easy kills in the East are a thing of the past. The eastern kill was 213, down sharply from the 443 of the previous season when bear hunting was a novelty in the region. Success of archers also declined the past season, dropping to 205 following a kill of 446 the previous season.

Wildlife officials blame much of the decline in the fall turkey kill to a string of poor hatches, brought about by adverse weather during the recruitment season.

The kill is supposed to be going up rather than down. In 1995, DGIF officials promised that the fall and spring kills would advance significantly during a 10-year period if hunters gave up some of their fall hunting dates to save hens. That’s not happening as the time frame reaches its conclusion. In fact, the fall kill was increasing more rapidly under the previous regulations.

Where were all of these birds when the turkey season was open? Dr. Ron Webster snapped this flock in Catawba Valley.

Until last fall, few people were saying that turkeys are scarce. It has been common to view flocks in fields along roads. They just haven’t been showing up at game checking stations.

But my fall/winter hunting experiences this time indicated that turkeys were scarce, at least where I hunted. I not only didn’t see any in my favorite hunting area, but I also didn’t see scratchings or droppings. Even our turkey dog couldn’t flush a flock.

But, then, a friend sent me a recent picture of a big flock in the snow in the very region that I hunt. Where were they during the season? Who can figure turkeys?