was surpassed that year only by dove hunters. The quail population in Texas has fallen drastically since then but it began many years before that when land fragmentation, agricultural practices, timber management and other habitat-related changes began to occur. In Georgia, Mississippi and South Carolina where quail hunting had become more of a cultural activity than a recreational activity, reports indicate quail numbers have dropped an astonishing 90 percent since the 1960s. In Texas, fewer than 30,000 hunters went after quail in 2011, an 80 percent decline over the previous 20 years according to Texas Parks and Wildlife Department estimates. Also, a 70 percent decline of the state’s quail population was estimated for that same two-decade period. Simply put, the drop of quail numbers equals a drop in the number of quail hunters. Only the purists will kennel, feed and take care of bird dogs year-round, much less buy and train pups from year to year if the areas they are privileged to hunt have few
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or no birds. Quail, being ground-nesting birds, require a varied grassland to meet their needs, not only for nesting but also for raising their broods and using their habitat as escape cover from predators. The bobwhite quail once had that, but in recent years land fragmentation by land owners selling their properties off in small tracts or changing once-suitable quail habitat into plowed fields void of native vegetation have caused quail to vanish. The reason: the small islands the quail have been left with are too small to provide a self-sustaining population of quail. Although the picture for the bobwhite quail has been a gloomy one for several years, the bird is not gone. The severe droughts of 2009 and 2011 resulted in little reproduction not only of quail, but also turkey and other ground-nesting birds. However, adequate rains in the spring of 2012 and more recent rains this year have spurred good reproduction in South Texas, the Edwards Plateau, Hill County and some portions of the Rolling Plains. The rains not only help provide adequate
moisture for quail eggs to hatch, but also help produce lots of insects for the chicks to eat once they are out of their nests. Although wildlife experts report 1,500 to 3,000 acres of contiguous or adjoining acres of good habitat is needed to provide a quail population all it needs to sustain 700 or more birds, finding such an area is becoming increasingly difficult. In recent years, some landowners have become sensitive to the quail’s decline and have taken measures to manage their lands to help meet the quail’s needs by providing larger areas of native grasses and other habitat. It is on those lands where you will find the most quail today. Changing land use practices in one direction for such things as agricultural and livestock production, timber management and urban expansion has been the major cause for the quail’s decline, but changing land practices in the opposite direction is our best hope for rebounding quail populations.
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