Do you believe him? STORY

Sure.
I was bow hunting for deer back around “77” about 45 miles north of Grand Rapids MN sitting over a very old grassy logging trail.
I saw a a critter come down that trail, under me, then go beyond and gone. It was absolutely a Wolverine. No one not even DNR would believe me and it was long before any type of any easy to use camera.

I know what I saw, I figure every now and again one gets to wandering, sort of like mountain lions in Minnesota, moose in Iowa etc.

Osky

For some reason I can't pull it up but do.I believe there are wolverines in Michigan?No

We saw one from my Parents house one winter. 100% sure that is what it was. It came out, stood in the road and then ran straight away from us for 50 yards. All 3 of us saw it and the diamond on the back was unmistakable. About 5 years prior we followed tracks in the snow that I am certain was wolverine. I believe they cruise through once in a while from Canada.
There was a wolverine rumored to be in the Thumb of MI many years ago too.

There was one in the thumb area,how it got there is pretty dubious

I'm sure some pass thru from Canada.For some reason animals don't recognize borders

To pass thru from canada would require a lengthy swim. I would maybe believe a zoo or private pen escapee. It is common for people to mistake badgers for wolverine

Nothing freezes?

20 years ago a biologist got a picture of a wolverine in lower MI, seems like an odd place, Mn stories are totally believable.

Wolves get to/from Isle Royale on the ice pack.

The thumb area of Michigan is urbanized in some parts,and heavily agricultural in others,with at least one large state game area that I know of.That wolverine appeared out of nowhere in that area and died there.It never left the state game area where it was found.There was always something fishy about it.

It could happen

A old timer trapper friend saw one 40 some years ago on the south shore of Lake of the Woods,about 15 years ago another trapper friend showed me a track picture what he thought was a gulo it was a week later they had it on trail cam.A year ago in Sept I saw one out south in the big woods.Don't know about MI,but it wouldn't surprise me if once in a great while one comes through as stated above.

I would believe it. The Mn dnr also said we didn't have mountain lions in MN. either at one time.

Does MI have a sign up that says "Wolverine do not enter" at the boarder? They shot one in ND down around Bismarck. Why couldn't one be in MI?

Look at a map, easy to see how critters could go back and forth to Isle Royal. 200 miles south, the lakes seldom freeze solid and shipping channels are maintained, it would be easier to believe a wolverine was released than actually traveled on its own to end up in such a odd place.

Bismarck North Dakota is much more realistic than the thumb area of Michigan.If you don't know the thumb area you have no idea how astronomical the odds are for this.On the other hand people claim they see mountain lions and Big foot in southern Michigan too.

Mountain Lions have traveled into southern Michigan before. I’ve seen trail cam photos from Ithaca, and that’s not all that different from the Thumb.

Is it unlikely a Wolverine would end up in the Thumb? Yeah. Is it impossible? Not at all.

Wolverine can show up about anywhere, they are great travelers.
Wolverine have even been showing up in California, in Washington they seem to be expanding nearly everywhere, even out on the ocean beaches.

They are probably getting chased out by some of the "cougars" in the retirement communities.

The one in the Thumb was discovered west of Ubly and by coyote hunters. It eventually made its way to Minden State Game area where it eventually died quite a few years later. John Ford was a local teacher who spent a ton of his time keeping track of it and he found it dead. DNA results indicate it came from Ontario. That winter Lake Huron totally froze across as it has in other winters. A few years ago a Lynx was live trapped by Ruth after it had started killing farm geese. That Lynx was taken back to Canada (illegal immigrant!!!). There aren’t bobcats in this area of Michigan. Only about 60 miles across from Harbor Beach to Canada! And, freighters aren’t running in deep winter, the Soo Locks close sometime around the new year too.

So there's lynx and wolverines directly across from Harbor Beach?

And yes,the DNA results said it was from Ontario.But one of theories that our DNR floated was it hitched a ride on a garbage truck.I have no idea how this would have been possible,it sounded ridiculous to.me,but that theory was still around in the press releases after it was found dead.As I said at the beginning of this post,where it came from and how is dubious

LOL A wolverine hitched a ride on a garbage truck!
It reminds me of when I caught a wolverine in Ohio on my coon line.
The GW speculated it might have caught a ride on a freight train , as I caught it in a part of a gravel pit.
There was a lime stone supplier there.
Found out a local had a permit for exotics , and it escaped from him.
When I took it back to him, alive , we talked and he said it came out of Minnesota , across the Canadian border.
He told me he could drive across the border there and get them in Canada, if he needed another one.
Cogar is another one that got away from him, they tracked it into Pennsylvania last I heard.
So it's quite possible there's a wolverine in Michigan.

GO BLUE!

So Ontario is shipping their trash to the US now? How does a garbage truck get through customs? Like you, I would have shot holes in that theory right away.

They gentleman said he has never saw a fisher.

I'd wager it was a fisher.

Possible, but as soon as I got close to the one I caught, there was no doubt what it was.

I find it hard to picture a wolverine hitching a ride on any truck.

I can believe in a wolverine getting stuck in a garbage truck.
Check out these wolverines coming out of shipping containers filled with garbage.

Once you see that 'V' you know!

Exactly! There is no mistaking them! I chased the one I saw and the odor was fairly distinct too.

Wait a minute then! I think I know her as well! Chanel #9, oh what a night……

Osky

Many of the "sportsmen" on the hunting forums and social media groups in MI that spend time in the UP don't know what a marten, fisher are nor the difference between a coyote and a wolf. Heck, every few years someone shoots an elk in the northern lower mistaking it for a deer.

I know trappers and houndsmen who have seen marten and fisher in the lower peninsula.

I'd bet he saw a fisher, badger or a coon and figured wolverine.

The number of people in the woods and trail cameras out is insane. A critter like a wolverine to get to the middle of the lower peninsula without being seen, trapped, hit, shot... Not sure I'm buying it.

Proving that wolverines or lynx are in the northern Great Lakes could really impact land trapping for thousands of trappers. As stated above large animals don't need to swim at all to get to MI, WI, there is plenty of ice for several months each year, plus walking the shoreline. I don't see a couple hundred miles an issue for an adult wolverine.

Bryce

^^^^^This

We actually have rare sightings here in Utah as well. My son took pictures of this one they trapped in Randolf. They relocated it up in the Uinta Mountains.

Nice

Lynx absolutely turn up in Michigan about once every 10-15 years. There have been a couple trapped in the eastern U.P. in the last 20-25 years. The one trapped in the Thumb was videoed a few miles south a couple weeks before it was trapped. That cat was held briefly in captivity (to make sure it wasn't injured), then it was released in the eastern U.P. by DNR employees. It's release was videoed. The last lynx reported in the lower peninsula before the Thumb incident were 3 trapped in Crawford County the year my mother was born.....1917. Crawford is the next county north of my home in Roscommon Co. As for wolverine, well, if a guy told me in '04 that he saw one in the Thumb while coyote hunting I would have thought he was a goofy as most of those folks that tell me they saw wolverines several times since. ........yet the one in the Thumb was very well documented. John Ford, by the way, did not find the carcass of that animal, it was found by a couple hiking along a drainage ditch near where Mr. Ford had gotten some trailcam photos of the beast in the past. I used to hunt with a houndsman and his hunting partner that ran, and shot, the very last recorded lynx legally taken in the state in, I believe, the late 1950's. It was shot in the area north of St. Ignace near the Mackinaw/Chippewa county line. Two of the biggest Bobcats I ever mounted were ,coincidently, shot by the same two houndsmen in the same season, about 40 years after that last lynx was taken. The lynx shooter has since passed away.
edit.....I read some time ago, but have no memory where, that at the time of the Thumb wolverine, the Ontario MNR had confirmed a wild wolverine on Manitoulin Island in northern lake Huron.....only a short way from Drummond Is., michigan. It doesn't seem like much of a stretch to believe a wolverine could travel along the east side of Georgian bay and enter the Thumb by simply crossing the St. Claire river!