Quail??

[nchunter1989]

Anyone on here familiar with quail habitat? LO is a bird hunter, just started talking about establishing some coveys on the property.

From what I've seen, quail habitat is alot of early successional (but not too thick) along with grasses & forbes. Slightly different from deer/turkey.

 

[swat1018]

I have done lots of edge feathering, and it's is bringing the quail back in my area. I also planted sorghum, they love to run in that. I can usually get a covey or two out of my sorghum strips.

 

[Native Hunter]

They love fence rows between grass and weed fields too. If it has some scattered big cedars, that makes it better. Lots of quail on my place, and they also spend quite a bit of time in the food plots.

 

[KDdid]

Man, I'm hoping to get some quail living here as my fields grow up. My plan is to divide the NWSG I've planted in windbreaks of shrubs/trees, with firebreaks on either side.


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[yoderjac]

Anyone on here familiar with quail habitat? LO is a bird hunter, just started talking about establishing some coveys on the property.

From what I've seen, quail habitat is alot of early successional (but not too thick) along with grasses & forbes. Slightly different from deer/turkey.

Actually they can overlap pretty well. Quail need brooding ground very much like turkey poults. No fescue or grasses that lay down. Good vertical cover with bare ground underneath. A young clear-cut , planted with pines and sprayed with herbicide (like arsenal) can make good habitat for quail as well as bedding and fawning cover for deer. Quail also do well with shrubs for roosting and such. Crabapple and other shrub trees can give quail what they need as well as providing soft mast for deer and turkey. We have a pipeline bisecting our farm. Can't plant any trees on it because of roots interfering with the pipes and if we don't manage it, the pipeline company bushhogs it flat. We use it for food plots but tried to separate it into sections with visual blocks. We used bicolor lespedeza to divide it. (Anytime I mention Bicolor, I like to caveat it with the fact that in some areas under some conditions it can be invasive). The game department biologist convinced the pipeline company the roots are too shallow to interfere with pipes. Deer use the food plots more during the day because of the visual blocks. They cross the pipeline uses these blocks. They provide great vertical cover to protect young turkey poults from avian predators. It also produces millions of tiny seeds that Quail love. In the winter when snow is on the ground and other seeds are less available, quail will fly into the bushes banging them enough to make seed fall on top of the snow. Another kind of habitat I'd like to have is savannah. These are widely spaced large pines that are sparse with shorter NSWG and shrubs interspersed.

I like the idea of long-term planned timber management in management units that provide a variety of successional habitat in proximity.

We are primarily managing for Deer and Turkey, but we also consider Quail and small game.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[buckdeer1]

I have several sandhill plum patches and they really use these in winter and feed on the plums in summer.The big thing with quail I think is edges and areas thin enough understory for them to travel.This is one of the reasons to lightly disc NWSG because it thins the under storey and creates weed growth

 

[Bill]

No quail when I bought my farm. Killed the junk cow grass and planted native grass. Leave soy beans standing. Edge feathered, hinge cut for deer and even let a few spots in fields grow rag weed like crazy. If I don't hear a bob white with coffee and at lunch in the summer now it's odd. And the quality of deer has improved 10 fold.

Good habitat is good habitat for lots of critters.

 

[j-bird]

I just made a post about seeing quail on my place today and how they are not that common here due to habitat loss. I have seen coveys before but today made me feel real good because these where female birds with several chicks each......that's a real good sign. I saw them between my NWSG/weeds buffers and my soybean fields. In some places deer habitat and quail habitat can/does overlap.

 

[nchunter1989]

Thanks for the info guys. The property is actually very close to a popular quail hunting preserve in southeast NC, so we get a bird or two occasionally. But I think they stock versus actually raising the majority of their birds.


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[yoderjac]

I think stocking quail is like feeding predators...

 

[buckdeer1]

here in kansas they say that soybeans cause issues with quail,I don't think I have ever seen any around my bean fields but you plant milo and that where they will be

 

[Catscratch]

I think stocking quail is like feeding predators...

Hawks! They say a huge percentage of stocked quail are eaten by hawks on the first day. I think it's an acceptable loss to those who follow a stocking program though.

 

[Catscratch]

here in kansas they say that soybeans cause issues with quail,I don't think I have ever seen any around my bean fields but you plant milo and that where they will be

Interesting. My only go-to spot is to walk the bean field, we always find a covey along it's edge. Otherwise you might have to walk miles of pasture to find a covey. We don't have any milo...

 

[j-bird]

I'm going from memory here so bear with me. If I recall properly quail like small hard seeds and need open ground to move around with some overhead cover to find from predators. This is why many folks plant bunch type native grasses and allow natural weeds to grow for them. I read somewhere that quail habitat is difficult because quail won't travel more than like 300 yards without suitable roosting habitat. This also affects their ability to survive the winters as you ave to have food available within that distance to them. I'm sure planting of milo and sorghum are good for them as well. I'm sure there are other organizations that would have better habitat info on them as well. I thought I read someplace where bicolor lepedeza was planted in the south for them - again due to the hard see and the cover the plant provides.

 

[Turkey Creek]

For here where quail used to be quite numerous.... early succession plant growth + milo + no severe winters = quail. We have seen nice increases in quail the last couple of years. I attribute it to Roundup resistant weeds!

 

[ksgobbler]

I’ve got two coveys on my place up from none when we bought it.