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Wild turkeys attracted to feeders in Ida, Mich.
By Steve Pollick
Imagine looking out the breakfast-nook window at your bird feeders one morning and seeing 11 wild turkeys, one of them perched atop a feeder pecking at seed.
Dick Boers, of Ida, Mich., is seeing such a sight almost daily this winter. "It’s been an interesting experience," said Boers, who retired in 1995 as Toledo commissioner of parks and forestry.
The flock wends its way through the neighboring woodlots into Boers’ five acres, and on into the feeding station. "They feed and then march off to the woods." He has shot a series of photographs to prove to friends he is not kidding.
"With the snow on the ground you can see them coming for quite some distance," said Boers, who remains active in arts, gardening, and forestry circles in the area. "When the sun is shining, their colors are just gorgeous."
Most wild-turkey hunters could not agree more. In fact, more often than not hunters who have bagged a gobbler will marvel at the iridescent feather patterns. Turkeys are hardly just big black birds.
Wild turkeys have been reintroduced to Monroe County, with the first stocking five winters ago near Ida by the Monroe County chapter, National Wild Turkey Federation, and Michigan Department of Natural Resources. By 1998 turkeys already had re-established themselves in Lenawee and Hillsdale counties to the west.
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