# turkey quest from the western U.P.



## Rooster Cogburn (Nov 5, 2007)

My home is near the Porcupine Mountains close to the south shore of Lake Superior. Turkeys have been showing up around here the past 2 or 3 years...and today I saw 2 hens with 6 little ones about the size of a ruffed grouse. Aren't the young ones a little too small for this time of year? Winter is rough enough on critters like turkeys and it seems like those little turkeys have the odds against them.


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## multibeard (Mar 3, 2002)

Small poults at this time of year is a result of a hens renesting efforts. She probably lost her first nest to predation and ended up with a late hatch.

I know the chances of these poults might look slim. At least there are poults that might make it which is better than none being hatched at all.


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## Linda G. (Mar 28, 2002)

I had heard that there was birds in Iron County, but any further north or west, wow...but I believe it. They're tough, but not that tough, without steady winter feed in that country they won't make it. Period.


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## old graybeard (Jan 19, 2006)

Linda G. said:


> I had heard that there was birds in Iron County, but any further north or west, wow...but I believe it. They're tough, but not that tough, without steady winter feed in that country they won't make it. Period.


I think the hen with polts has already proven you wrong. I have seen quite a few birds in the Bruce Crossing area as well as that entire general area. I'm sure they have a tough time but their numbers prove that they can make it period.


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## Linda G. (Mar 28, 2002)

You happen to know for an absolute fact that nobody's feeding these birds, right?

Sure, just like nobody's feeding the deer up there. 

Wild turkeys cannot survive in several feet of snow and cold for more than 4-6 weeks. Period. Ask any wildlife biologist.

Maybe you haven't had any snow up there in the last 10 years or so...LOL


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## Bow Hunter Brandon (Jan 15, 2003)

They have been in my part of the western UP for the last 5 years now and we are seeing larger flocks and more flocks each year around Bergland, Marenisco, and Wakefield. There is even a small flock living within the Porcupine Mountains Park now. Some birds might be getting feed along with the deer in the winter but many area's they are in dont have any year round residents to do the feeding.


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## Wizard3686 (Aug 30, 2005)

We have a a good number of turkeys in the baraga county area and i have heard of some up in houghton county also. 

Where i have seen these birds there is no way anyone is feeding them because of the fact they were miles and miles away from any houses or camps


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## kumma (Jul 12, 2002)

I was shocked last year when I saw upwards of 20 birds in the woods behind my place in Bruces. A local friend of mine said the turkeys disappeared when the family farms did. Saying that feeding thru the winter was the only reason they stayed. I would guess some feeding going on.


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## multibeard (Mar 3, 2002)

Are you guys in the UP seeing these turkeys in the middle of the winter out in these remote areas?

Turkeys will move a long ways to find a place with feed unless they are caught by a real heavy snow before they get a chance to migrate.


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## Rooster Cogburn (Nov 5, 2007)

Multibeard,

I saw 2 turkey's just north of Watersmeet in early February about 3 years ago. Also found evidence of some making it through the winter here at my place just before spring break-up this past spring. I'm close to the Porcupine Mountains.


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## Bearboy (Feb 4, 2009)

There are a few in Houghton and even Keweenaw counties.....I have seen them...


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## Linda G. (Mar 28, 2002)

I live in Antrim County, which with portions of Charlevoix, Otsego and Kalkaska County, is the snowbelt of the lower peninsula and gets just as much snow as many parts of the western UP, with the exception of Keweenaw County, which annually beats everybody. 

I have participated and maintained dozens of winter wild turkey feeders in those years since 1987. And the fact is, if you have more than a foot or so of snow on the ground for more than six weeks with temperatures below 20 degrees above zero, without a constant source of nutritious chow of some kind, not pine tree branches, any wild turkeys in those conditions are dead. 

There are lots of hunters around who couldn't find any birds this spring to testify to that, as with the ban on deer feeding in the LP many people were afraid to feed anything at all, even though it was still very legal to feed wild turkeys. 

So I find it very hard to believe that any birds in the western UP made it through the winter completely on their own. Someone around there, and I'm sure there's more than you know, fed those birds (probably while they were feeding the deer).

As Multibeard said, where you see wild turkeys in the spring, summer, or fall can be a LOOONNNG way, sometimes as much as several miles, from where they spent the winter. I usually look within a two mile radius to find out who was feeding, but it can be three, four, or even five miles away. Wild turkeys in northern Michigan DO migrate in the fall and spring. Hens will leave summer breeding and nesting areas in the fall to find mast with their poults, then head for wintering areas sometime between mid-October and mid-December, depending upon the weather. Toms, like whitetail bucks, usually take their time, but are in the wintering areas by mid-January or so. 

The toms don't stay long, as soon as there is any kind of break in the weather, sometimes as early as mid-February, they'll head out for spring breeding territories. A lot of them probably never make it. 

The jakes are usually next, heading out about mid-March to the first of May, again, depending on the weather. 

Hens and almost grown jennies are last, but usually by the first of May they can be found in the areas they'll spend the summer in.

And that's true just about everywhere you find a wild turkey, even the other four American subspecies. There will be variations, but that's a pattern they all follow, even where winters are very mild. 

And winters anywhere are still very hard on the birds, even if they are fed. As much as a third of a flock can be lost due to one cause or another in the winter, predation being much of the problem.

I'm glad to hear there's birds in those portions of the UP. That's great. But they're there because of the people who help them, period, not because Mother Nature allows them to survive there. They can't. Just as they can't survive here without help.


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## FireDoc66 (Oct 9, 2005)

> But they're there because of the people who help them, period, not because Mother Nature allows them to survive there. They can't. Just as they can't survive here without help.


And once again proving the point that they SHOULDN'T be there then. :coolgleam


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## Linda G. (Mar 28, 2002)

on whether you like turkeys or not. 

And that comes from a guy from southern Michigan, who probably does his hunting in southern Michigan, right?

Given the habitat of much of the western UP, people probably shouldn't be feeding deer, with that reasoning, either. Because deer have to be fed to survive in any kind of numbers in that country, too. 

But, hey, that's ok when it comes to deer, right, just not when it comes to turkeys...

Ya, right. :coolgleam


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## Bow Hunter Brandon (Jan 15, 2003)

multibeard said:


> Are you guys in the UP seeing these turkeys in the middle of the winter out in these remote areas?
> 
> Turkeys will move a long ways to find a place with feed unless they are caught by a real heavy snow before they get a chance to migrate.


multibeard,
Like most of us I see most of them in the spring and fall and I am not sure how far they will move before winter sets in. The one larger group I have been seeing for three years now is located 10 miles from the nearest homes. There is one camp near it but its not open in the winter to do any feeding. If they migrated 10 miles they could have been feed and then migrated 10 miles back each spring.

The only turkeys I have seen in the winter were about two miles up a small stream valley on snow shoes. I was surprised to find them to be honest with you. It was late march and the snow was getting soft. The stream bed is lined with Hemlock and that breaks out into spruce and maple that was recently cut. they had been scratching through the snow to feed. Lots of grouse were in that area as well and they had been feeding in the same area. I saw them several times and the tracks never left that valley. Nearest corn feeder was at my parents property two miles away. They never showed up at that one though. I doubt they would travel two miles in the snow.

I did see another group in the winter as well but it was November and they were feeding under a choke cherry tree in the front yard of the rental house we were living at. :lol:


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## FireDoc66 (Oct 9, 2005)

Ahh Linda, 

ASSume, ASSUme, ASSUme. 

At least you left bowhunters out of this one. Carry on.


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## Linda G. (Mar 28, 2002)

I've seen wild turkeys feed on watercress in trout streams in the dead of winter before, yes, while standing right in that ice cold water, but only because they were starving. 

Those birds you saw could have already been moving to their spring locations, too.

FireDoc...I'm not assuming anything, except that you live somewhere in southern Michigan, which is what is on your avatar. Usually people who live in southern Michigan don't tend to do all their hunting in the western UP...it's quite a truck. I'm also assuming you probably don't get up to the western UP in the dead of winter, right? Don't base the ability of a wild turkey to survive in that neck of the woods against what you see in southern Michigan, there's a ton more food in southern Michigan all winter long, even without all the farms.


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## spoikey (Jan 18, 2005)

Wonder why there are more turkeys in the north than in the south!


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## old graybeard (Jan 19, 2006)

Linda G. said:


> You happen to know for an absolute fact that nobody's feeding these birds, right?
> 
> Sure, just like nobody's feeding the deer up there.
> 
> ...


Sorry I forgot that you are the wise and all knowing wizard:lol:


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## Linda G. (Mar 28, 2002)

There aren't. About 150,000+ in southern Michigan, maybe 50,000 in northern Michigan, and that includes the UP. I think that after last winter, when a lot of people were afraid to feed, there's a lot fewer than 50,000 in the north. That's the DNR's numbers, and since they don't actually count the birds anymore, there's probably a lot fewer than that.


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