Surprise Visitors

[196thDLR]

My wife has been telling me of some strange birds coming to the area where we have our bird feeders. It is not at all strange for Grouse to come to this area. She has been telling me of these birds for a week. I finally saw them yesterday during the Vikings offensive woes of the third quarter. QUAIL!!! NORTHERN BOBWHITE QUAIL! They are wild birds, very wary. I am thinking that someome bought chicks, or one of those incubators with the eggs in them, since they are well north of their typical range. I'll try to keep them alive. They are fun to watch.

[mcary]

I saw a Northern Bobwhite in July of '05 in Duluth. I asked around and everyone seemed to think that it was an escapee from dog trainers. The one I saw was also very wary. It would be interesting if they could re-establish a population up here. If I remember correctly Northern Bobwhite used to be found well into Minnesota.

[Steve Foss]

Escapes are my guess, too. With the warming winters, it's sure possible they could become established, especially if they can find a good food source.

We had a couple wild turkeys up outside Ely here the first two winters I was here. Escapes, they were, and they made it through at least one winter.

[bwtrout]

I've seen them between Duluth and Aurora on hwy 4 twice. Once there were 5 or 6 on the side of the road and in that same area I saw a covey of 10 to 15 flying. Both times I had to do a double take.

[bwtrout]

I saw and heard Turkeys a number of times around Brule and Iron River this year. I'm thinking I might need to change my Turkey hunting closer to home.