Bobwhite Bounce In The Heartland
FUR-FISH-GAME|November 2016

The return of native bobwhite quail from Kansas south through Oklahoma to Texas is one of the true conservation success stories of the new millennium.

Tom Keer
Bobwhite Bounce In The Heartland

How strong has the comeback been? Quail Forever surveys populations in early fall after the broods survive summer, and September 2012, at the height of the worst drought and accompanying heat wave in decades, volunteers ran their dogs in 39 separate square-mile transects scattered across western Oklahoma. The dogs’ reactions indicated they detected quail a measly eight times.

No doubt that had to be discouraging, yet the Quail Forever chapters, the state wildlife agency and private landowners just kept burning, discing, planting and irrigating, and when the return of spring rain finally pulled it all together, a similar survey last September recorded 80 detections in the same area, a 10-fold increase in just three years.

Last December, I traveled from my East Coast home to the heart of Oklahoma to hunt those wild quail on public land with Jared Wiklund of Quail Unlimited, friends James Dietsch and Dwayne Elmore. First thing I noted about the 15,000 acre WMA we hunted was how it differed from where I previously had chased quail in the Southeast. There were no stands of loblolly pine, longleaf or slash, no big fields of soft Johnson and love grass. It was all rolling hills cut by creek bottoms, a mix of sagebrush, tumbleweed, prickly pear and oak. Vast fields did extend off these areas, and they were filled with native quail candy: big and little bluestem, ragweed, and switch grass.

Pairing a big running dog with a closer-working dog is ideal for this type of cover and terrain, and we cut loose a pair of English pointers and two shorthairs. The pointers ran the edges while the shorthairs cast side-to-side. The boys brought plenty of fresh water for the dogs, and they earned every drop.

This story is from the November 2016 edition of FUR-FISH-GAME.

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This story is from the November 2016 edition of FUR-FISH-GAME.

Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.