When Europeans arrived in what is now New York, wild turkeys were found state‐wide. By the mid‐1800s, turkeys had been eliminated from the state due to habitat loss and unregulated hunting. In the 1950s, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation began an active restoration effort funded by grants from the Federal Aid in Wildlife Restoration Program.

This summary economic analysis presents the benefits to the public from the restoration of wild turkey populations statewide, based on the costs of the restoration effort and subsequent expenditures by the public who hunt wild turkey, from 1985 through 2020. We also examined the value (in meals) of this wild food source to households.