Who else misses them? I was just reminded of it from reading a little article about a guy's dad that could get his limit on the way to work in the early 40's. They were everywhere when I was a kid in the south and now, they are nowhere.

I miss those days and hearing them in the spring.

We have a few... not many.

Doing what I can to help with their habitat (had a professional write a RX for our property and 3 adjoining).

But as he put it... EVERYTHING kills quail.

Heard some whistling at the farm today

A few here in NE Kansas. Not today, but Saturday and Sunday there was one at the end of the driveway right about 1 o'clock.

Not the least bit bothered by me being outside either.

Quite a few whistling all day around here.

Pheasants around too, more than just a few years ago.

The last time I flushed a small covey of quail, I never even raised my shotgun. I just stood and smiled as they flew away. I sure do miss the days of plentiful quail.

Fire ants are deadly on quail eggs. If they are raised in coops here the legs of the coops have to be put in water buckets or pots to keep the ants from getting in.

Yep

We’ve got s few back here. One in front yard week before last. Heard two coveys behind house. In back pasture

Clay Newcomb on his podcast talks of “never trust a ground nesting bird, they’ll just break your heart”

Says his grandpa was a big time quail hunter and he’s into turkeys and watching the turkey populations fall now like his grandpa watched the quail fall.

We got em here in SW GA. But I live in plantation country so it’s a given. To hunt truly wild birds is an experience I’ll never forget. The amount the owners spend on habitat and management, on a per bird basis, is classified. You wouldn’t believe it anyway. We have, among others, Robert Woodruff’s Ichuway Plantatiion (Coca Cola’s founder), Nilo (Olin Winchester) Plantation, Nonami (Ted Turner) Plantation. Mr Woodruff had his accountant figure his annual cost per bird harvested just for kicks. It blew him away. His accountant asked him what he was going to do now that he knew how much each bird cost. He told him he wasn’t changing a thing…keep hunting.

Nothing wrong with buying a few and helping them along.

Plenty sold online.

https://www.tractorsupply.com/tsc/product/hoovers-hatchery-bobwhite-quail-30-baby-chicks

True story. Happens pretty fast too I guess.

When my Grandad was a kid there were so many quail they shot them with 22s in the cotton rows. When my dad and his brothers were coming up they could walk a 2 mile circuit out in the hills and bust 2 dozen coveys. I haven’t seen more than 8 in a covey in over a decade. I’ve never killed a 10 bird limit of wild quail in this area in my life.

When dad was coming up the wildlife dept was working to reestablish turkeys. And by the time he was in his 20s they had huntable populations. By the time I was old enough to chase them we could kill 2 gobblers every spring. Now they’re slipping away fast and we’re down to a 1 bird limit, shorter spring season, and they took our rifle season away in the fall. I get to feeling sorry for the ones we have left and missing the days of flocks numbering over 100 in the winter, I haven’t even hunted them in 2 years hoping to leave what I can for seed.

We still have lots of turkeys in this country.

Yeah, turkeys are falling hard as well. I recall not just 10 years ago seeing 100+ flocks in the winter. They are still around and seem to be doing a little better the past 2 years, but nowhere near what they were 10 years ago.

I remember quail hunting as a kid in Nebraska. I loved kicking up the occasional 20 plus coveys and watching them land a block or so away, only to have my german shorthair pointer....point out single birds and get some shots on them. They were always better than pheasant to eat and more fun to hunt.

In the '50s they were common in northern and western Ohio, not as much as in the deep south but pretty common regardless. Now they're extinct here. And we don't have fire ants.

Same here, Bob. Probably more Turkey than quail.

We had tons of both blue or “scaled” quail and Bob whites here on the Ranch when I was a kid.

Haven’t seen a blue in years. Occasionally see a bob white.

The quail population start to decline here when we became inundated with wild hogs.

Well we don't have any wild hogs here either. But we have foxes and coyotes.

And a plethora of bobcats and hawks and raccoons and skunks and bulldozed hedgerows and weed free corn fields and a desert of fescue (here) and and….

Yep. But probably the modern practice of fence to fence crop planting and the destruction of “hedge rows” or the weedy areas for cover and food, have done more damage to quail populations than anything else. And as for as predators, the birds of prey, like hawks, probably kill more quail than other predators.

Hogs and fire ants are hell on nests, eggs, and chicks.

Feel lucky to still get a few a year. Don’t even bother hunting them locally though.



My driveway a few years back. Haven’t even heard them whistle around the house the last few years though.

I haven’t hunted any in years either, eye worms, and throat worms is what has caused big kill off here in western Ok. I have heard a lot of Bobs calling this spring and summer. The coveys had twenty birds at the end of winter, usually about 6, Turkeys are trying to come back too, 5 years ago you couldn’t hardly Deer hunt because of hundreds of turkeys rushing to feeders when they went off, don’t know if it’s hogs or worms that has almost wiped out both , hogs have moved back to the Canadian river, and numbers are up.

My grandfather was an avid Bob White hunter. He lived in the Oklahoma panhandle, Beaver and Boise City. Always had at least one bird dog and hunted with a Browning Sweet Sixteen. I still have his shotgun. The gold is wore off thevtrigger and there is a dent in the rib. I have no idea if there are still Bob Whites in that area.

Part of that may be blamed on Hollywood going so hard against the wearing of fur. Raccoon, opossum, mink, coyotes, fox, and all manner of varmints run wild, procreate, and eat up everything they find.

Still have some down here but not near like back in the 70s early 80s, fire ants, and hogs.

We hunt Quail a lot here. and we are covered up with Turkey's Rio7

Miss hearing them. Heard them almost every evening when I was a child.

GreggH

Quail are like Hamburgers everything eats them. Rio7

Truth, really good with biscuits and gravy.

Don't get me started on birds of prey. They need controlled the same as 4 legged predators.

Used to have a bounty on them for a reason.


And people with their fugging cats.

Barn cats too. No use for a cat on the place.

Even hard to even see a rabbit around here. I have several on my place but the brush is thick as schitt. Neighbors cats do best when they stay on their side of the road.

For many years my uncle’s family had some land in Tillman County Oklahoma that was northwest of Grandfield. He ran cows on that land, but otherwise he pretty much left it alone. Back in the late 60’s to about 1978 I hunted quail with him a bunch out there. That place had really good numbers of bobwhites back in those days. He had some good dogs and I always had a blast hunting with them.

But over the years, the quail went the way of the hornytoads (which also used to be in abundance out there).

When the boy was little we’d buy bobwhite chicks and raise them. They’d last a year or two then the predators got them. Neat call, though.

We have a few coveys on our lease south of San Antonio. We don’t hunt ‘em since not too many, and they have enough enemies without me shooting em!

Don’t get me wrong, I love to quail hunt but don’t want to not have ‘em around to hear and see.

Saturday. He hung around for probably 20 minutes.

I miss the strong population of quail that we had in the 80s. I miss the good ol bits that hunted them too. Many were WWII veterans. They would argue about dogs, guns, etc. I loved listening to the bird hunting stories.

Wild or stray house cats are quail killers.

We used to have 2 to 3 coveys and now we are down to 2 quail. Cannot convince the home owners that the stray house cat they have are killing the quail.

I used to have coyotes out back and the home owners do not want them around and shoot them (in city limits). The coyotes were helping keep the cat, jack rabbit and cottontail population down. With out the coyotes the 3 are running amuck.

My Dad was a beagle man when I was a kid. I can remember rabbit hunting and jumping coveys of quail and trying kill them. I knew I’d have bird dog when I got older.

As soon as I could I started buying good blooded English Pointers(I know they dropped using the English but they will always be English pointers to me).

Sometimes we’d go days and never bump a covey. Then I quit buying replacement puppies when my dogs got older. Then my last two bird dogs died about six weeks apart. I told my wife I was done hunting something that was like hunting Bigfoot.

That lasted five or six years. I said I was tired of not having anything to do in the winter. So I done it. I bought another English pointer puppy. That puppy is now about a year old and I have a five week old puppy on the way in a couple more weeks.

The few quail that remain I’ll chase with my 28 gauges. I just can’t give it up though I know I should.

Had 3 English Pointers and truly loved to quail hunt. It was my passion. Over the years you had to travel further and further to find birds. Eventually the numbers scaled down so drastically that it wasn't worth the effort. I even bought a "Johnny House" to capture quail, but rattlers would find their way inside of it. Even tried stocking areas with pen raised quail. Pen raised birds don't do well in the wild, and they're slowwww fliers. (Hardly fun to shoot).
I understand, Argentina still has quality coveys and many years ago many of my friends traveled to the Baja Peninsula with excellent success. Sad to lose them. They were great sport and outstanding table fare.

The last time I hunted quail locally a friend saved me from stepping on a rattler. I heard a "LOOK OUT" and he shoved me sideways. Naturally I had on boots and even though he was smaller in size doesn't mean he wouldn't or couldn't have struck higher. I would have definitely stepped on him. (The good old days) I'll never forget the start one receives when a covey bust in front of you.

House cat is dead meat here, shoot on sight, we have a lot of Quail, some years more some years less, depends on how much rain we get, we manage about 20,000 acres just for Quail hunting, food, water, cover, predator control, are very important to wild Quail. Rio7

Shoot the cats when no one is looking, then assist the owners in the search. That’s one of my favorite things to do.

I have hunted bobs my whole life, took Dr. And Lawyers hunting as a kid, walked the snott out of them and there high dollar pointers, the old guy’s that have hunted bobs are dying off, you sure don’t see young guys out there longer than a day , maybe two, we used to hunt them for weeks. I believe nothing more fun than watching dogs, and busting coveys of bob’s with a 1100.🤠

Nesting cover is our limiting factor in SW GA. We have all the food they can eat. Son and I have worked extremely hard trapping out nest predators for a few years and it has made a difference. Got plenty of pics of turkey hens with 10-12 poults each! No yotes, foxes, coons or possums ruining their day. Piggies shot on sight too of course.

Haven’t had any quail in a long long time .
Last I had was a disaster .
25-30 years ago
Not sure I got the name of the restaurant right , but I believe it was Jerry Clowers off I-40 in Tennessee. Dropped in there figuring it would be my kind of food .
Ah hah ! Quail on the menu .
Picturing a plump little tasty bird .
Setting there and waitress brings out this pancake looking critter , something a 18 wheeler ran over on the interstate .
I explained I had ordered quail .
Waitress smiled and says that’s your quail .
I told her didn’t look like no damned quail I had ever seen .
She knew she had herself a true hick and smiled and asked expecting a plump bird ?
Yeah , I ain’t seen no quail like this .
She explained it was shrink wrapped for shipping .
Ok , commenced to trying to eat this shoe soul , and that was how tough it was .
Veggies sucked too .
Beer was cold 😀

Ww have a few small coveys on our lease. You don’t see then very often but e still hear them off and on.

Used to be a lot of them noeth of 60 back in the 70's and 80's. Not so much anymore..

You're in a great place! Enjoy them.

#1 getting hunters loaded up for a evening Quail hunt.

#2 back up buggy with spare dogs

#3 out riders

#4 Pointer at work

We run 3 gun trucks each with 10 dogs, 2 out riders with each truck, driver and dog handler, we average 10 coveys per hunt, each truck goes out morning and evening, we hunt Quail from Oct1 to Feb 28, Quail hunting is a big part of what we do. Rio7

We used to have three coveys in our yard. I haven’t seen or heard a quail in more than 20 years on our place . Habitat is better now than it was then. Don’t know what it is but they are gone. Might be fire ants, hogs, and other predators. But there would be some. There are just none. We have clearcuts galore. We have a little bit more than 1000 acres we don’t even bush hog anymore. It’s all pine trees, thickets, and hardwoods. Much of it is stereotypical southeastern Bob White habitat. And not one damned bird on it anywhere.

I'm sure I'm not the only one who has been running the woods at night and bumped into a covey of quail. Being startled is an understatement.

There was a time when I could hear quail whistling in every direction here on my farm. There were always several coveys using here, but I have not seen or heard a quail in the past 5-6 years. They are still around in parts of the area, and I know a couple of guys who have dogs and hunt them with a decent degree of success. I have no idea why they disappeared from my place, as I didn't hunt them. I'm guessing it was the predators.

I would rather quail hunt than deer hunt. Ever year is different on population. And most die out even if you don’t hunt them.
Feral cats, road runners, hogs all are hard on ground nesting birds. But habitat destruction is their worst enemy.
Hasbeen

There were plenty of quail here in southern Indiana when I was a kid.
The blizzard of 78 hit them hard but they rebounded pretty well in my area in the 80’s.
They started disappearing in the 90’s and for years I never saw any even when rabbit hunting. No fire ants or hogs here.
As of the last five years I’ve seen coveys where I haven’t seen any in 15 years or better.
I now know where five coveys are so things are looking better.
If the winter gets bad me and the boys will put cracked corn out where a couple of the coveys hang out.
There’s a lot of factors contributing to their decline. Destruction of cover is a big one and predators also but man is their biggest enemy around here.

An uncle in south central KY has worked for years trying to get coveys going on several farms with very little success. He has some land close to my home town in CREP and it still won’t hold birds. I’m thinking predators are his problem on that farm. He has tried call back boxes planting birds. Nothing seems to work for him.

From 2007-2019 we owned about 57 acres in some game and ag rich country. About 35 acres were timber. I kept most of the open area on the front side of the property brushy. I’d cut it back to keep the saplings down. There were a couple of covey in the area and every year I’d see them with their young around August. We didn’t hunt them and I’d kill cats that is saw loitering.

In 17 we timbered the timbered the 35 acres and tue property began to hold more game. I did my best to maintain habitat. It seems like you need native birds to spread to be really successful. That and predator management.

Live traps are your friend. Check em about 4 in the morning and if ol puss is in there a pellet gun to the brain then puss in a trash bag.

Help put up missing signs and look a little for the lost kitty.

Where in S, TX are you Rio?

No Mule pulled wagon? Got to experience that a couple times in Georgia....I would have been happy just to have sat up there and watched.

Some guy on You tube videos some impressive hunts in Oklahoma...

Supposed soil conservation programs involving deep ditch drainage ditches + modern "clean harvest" farming + commercial pine planting has caused a tremendous loss of habitat - in addition natural open long-leaf pinelands have been replaced with over-crowded, improved-seedling loblolly pine stands which not only has hurt quail, but also the gopher tortoise and eastern diamondback rattlesnakes. I realize that most don't care about the turtles and snakes but we've screwed around with the natural order of things so much, that much of these things will never come back.

I knew where all the coveys hung out. Now, none to be found. The coyote and feral cats are our biggest nemesis. Union county iowa. I hear there are a few there.
kwg

Rio,

What’s it cost to go on a hunt like that? I probably can’t afford it but I’d like to try it.

I was told they tried to kill the predators for years and it was a failure. The key to success was to remove the habitat the predators needed to survive. The trees went down and the Hawks had no place to sit, the Owls lost a home...And the living became harder for the egg eaters. The Quail then started to thrive. That and they had supplemental feeding. The Quail could come out of the cover, quickly fill their crop and get back in.

Farming wild Quail is expensive.

My daddy was a quail hunter, and always had a good bird dog. I remember as a kid him coming home with birds, and I would watch him dress them. He would always check their crop to see what they were feeding on. Back in that time frame, and 1950's and 60's, it was weed seeds, lespedeza, and buckberries. The farms of that time period weren't farmed fencerow to fencerow like they are today. There were always fields that were grown up, and let to lay fallow for the year, giving quail feed and places to roost. The predator population was also kept in control because a lot more people hunted them back then.

Today, there are very few places around here where quail have the habitat needed in order to survive, and nobody hunts the predators that much. I believe that hawks catch more quail than any other predator, and since they have been protected, the quail have suffered.

Quail were my first wing shooting experience and I loved it. 50, 55 years ago. I guess there are many reasons for their disappearance such as clean farming, predators chemicals etc. Sure do miss them.

I don't think a lot of people appreciate and know how those plantations are so quail focused.

I hunted quail in Alabama last January and had a blast , Hawks seemed to be a real problem .

Zero-Turn lawn mowers and acreage of manicured lawn on what was once farmed or brush lands is devastating Quail populations.

Predators have at them because they've lost the habitat that had provided them cover.

Once suitable habitat is restored they recover rather quickly.

https://quailforever.org/Habitat/Why-Habitat.aspx

If they were abundant again like in the old days....think the farmers would be all that enthusiastic to letting you hunt like in the old days? The old days are gone...and most farmers are not a hunters friend, as in the old days. Deer, Elk, Quail, Pheasants Rabbits, farming practices, etc, etc.....Todays farmers mostly play the same tune.

And don't go there with the hunter doesn't respect the farmers land....There are less hunters today and the eduction of them is significantly better...

Look into the total cost of farm subsidies and agricultural exemptions and you will realize government is often their best friend...

+1 on Habitat

Amazing obvious conclusion...that is like saying man can't live without water...

Addition...Even more obvious..You want Quail, then you best buy the land and make the habitat. The days of someones else doing it for you are the long gone old days.

Quail are easily one of my favorite birds to hunt. Lots of action, beautiful birds, and can be a challenge to hit. It’s always fun to see the dog go cross eyed when that first covey lites out.😃

Have good populations out here.

Yet people spend thousands of dollars and endless hours of labor destroying the Quails habitat, right down to weedeated fence lines.

Don't wanna leave them birds a square inch of cover.

Easy to place the blame of lack of birds on everything else while you sit back sipping coffee looking across your manicured 2 acre plot.

akasparky, Very true on the fence lines, burning helps the habitat more than most people believe, there are many native seeds that don't germinate until burned, burning promotes healthy cover and gets the woody trash up of the ground. Rio7

I burn every Spring, shoot or run over every feral cat I can find, the dogs stay penned unless in my company
The Forest ends at the edge if my deck.
Wildlife of all forms are abundant.

Cooper’s hawks are back in numbers and they aren’t helping any. The Cornell Lab of Ornithology lists the bobwhite nationwide as “near threatened” which means they are worried too. 90% declines across much of its range.

Habitat requirements are a bit more complex than one might think, dense cover for nesting, less dense cover but with overhead coverage for rearing broods, the birds travelling up to 500 yards for this.

They’re also finding quail are more mobile than thought, birds dispersing from where they were hatched.

Hatchery-raised birds are clueless.

The only place in the US where quail are holding up in numbers is in South Texas.

25 years ago Chaparral WMA had good numbers of quail but now it just sucks. They still do lots of burning and habitat management but there's more going on. I definitely see more predators than I did back then.

There’s a 15 square mile roadless tract out west of town that’s essentially unchanged from what it was 100 years ago. No farming, no spraying, too rocky to cut hay, just cattle grazing like they have for the last 100 years. 40 years ago there were thousands of quail out in the hills, now there isn’t. Habitat is a big part of the the picture for any species, but something else is going on with the quail in addition to the habitat issue.

Much like the Whooping Crane, they taste good..

DO NOT buy pen raised birds and release them into the wild.
Only God knows what diseases and pests you're releasing on wild populations.

If you are honest about wanting to help your local population, put up watering stations, install feeding stations and establish cover.

Weather permitting, I've seen quail raise two broods across a summer. If it gets too hot, too quickly, hen quail will abandon their nests.
Excessive heat, like we're experiencing in southern Oklahoma, will also kill quail.
There is a covey* that hangs around the house. Haven't seen them in quite some time now.

Damnable fire ants are really tough on the quail populations.

* - you DO NOT shoot the house covey!

Birdie,

You are so right about Coopers! Having my office looking out on to the backyard with creek and
the bird feeders was a revelation about the carnage those little bastards do to the local bird populations. I’ve seen them take everything from Chickadees to mallards and a green heron. On the farm, I knew they were Hell on the young pheasants and quail and they never got a pass. Here in the ‘burbs, selective culling is more challenging…

That's very naive..

Where I've released 100s, in Florida a permits required and the chick's have to come from certified hatcheries.
Permits are easily obtained.

Success ration is dismal, probably under 5%.
It's more about having birds to shoot.

One thing that I've taken note of over the years is as soon as the chick's are of age to release into flight pens wild Quail start showing up in the immediate area.

I don't know if it's sight or scent that attracts them but they show.

Even with less than 5% survival it's more than if we weren't releasing.

Quail Release Permits
.

It so happened that a couple of quail flew across the road in front of me this morning, the first I have seen in a couple of years. I began bird hunting in the mid '60s with my Dad and hunted them until the mid '90s when around here the numbers fell off abruptly to the point where it wasn't worth the effort to hunt them; even if I had been able to find some, I couldn't in good conscience shoot any with the population down so much. I was between dogs at that time and couldn't see that there was enough of a population to train a pup on, much less hunt for.

Like some others have said, it was my passion. I made some fairly serious life decisions on the assumption that there'd always be birds and I'd always be a bird hunter. There has been an empty spot in my life for the last 25 plus years since I last hunted them. Most disappointing was the fact that I never got the chance to take my sons quail hunting. Had hoped/assumed that there would be a fourth generation quail hunter in our family, but it was not to be.

About a hundred years ago, my grandfather once shot 75 wild quail one day in the Piedmont of NC. Hard to believe how much things have changed.

We have found pen raised Quail to very poor hunting compared to wild birds, we have never imported birds here, but have hunted pen raised in Georgia and Florida, there is so much to producing Wild Quail it's hard to explain, but it all comes down to Food,Water,Cover, Predator Control,and large land area, and don't over harvest birds. on good rain years we get 3-4 hatch's on average years we get 2-3 hatch's on the very dry years we get 1 1/2 hatch's. we try to match our hunting to the # of Quail the Ranch produces. Rio7

Out west we have a decent population of Gambels quail, and some larger mountain quail. Mountain quail hunting is almost as fun as hunting chukar.

We have very few around here. I remember watching a couple feed around my feet while setup on turkeys one morning several years back. My 10yo finally got see some wild ones for the first time while deer hunting. Doubt his kids will ever see one. We used to always knock out a few while rabbit hunting also.

I had a great uncle that lived to hunt bobwhites in the Piedmont of NC He carried me a couple of times and it was nothing to run 6-8 coveys around town hauling his pointer and setter in the back of a station wagon. He once took me down to our family homeplace way out in the sticks and we could hunt and cross property lines at will all day long. On one memorable day I cut my finger to the bone peeling an apple with a Buck 110 and had some of that stuff to kill germs only meant for dogs put on my thumb that was like liquid fire, had a cold quail sandwich with white bread and mustard I'll never forget and honest to goodness after chasin' all these woods runnin' birds all day we walked into a covey in the open I guessed to be five times a normal sized covey of 8 birds. This was the end of quail hunting around here ca. 1976 It seems like a dream now as I don't remember the last bird I've seen or heard.

Outside my MAN Cave. Rio7

Had a covey of about 12 birds under a deer feeder last year on opening day.Saw them again Thanksgiving weekend and they were down to 8 birds.By the end of deer season only 3 remained.Everything in Texas eats quail.

I have purposely left the fencerows alone on my farms, even though it results in smaller fields that are hard to farm with today's large equipment, and reduced crop yields. They have been as they are now for my lifetime, 72 years, and the quail still disappeared. I agree that habitat is a large part of it, but there is more going on than just that. The turkeys here are not reproducing, as I've yet to see any young ones, and I've seen a bunch of hens.

How about those chemicals used for no-till farming? Ever since no-till became popular, I've seen fewer rabbits and zero quail in areas that used to have a heckuva lot of both.

Quail Porn, This morning out side my fence, lot'a screwing go'in on.

You would think that must have an impact. But, as someone pointed out to me, the chemicals used in the '50s and '60s were a lot more toxic than the ones used now, and there were plenty of birds back then. I used to hear that no till was actually going to be better for wildlife. I agree with JamesJr that habitat may be part of it, but there's something else going on.

I sure miss them. I get away to western Ky at least once a year to hunt them with a friend.

They are a rare sight here in the eastern part of the state anymore. This past spring however I heard this little gentleman whistling and my wife was able to get some really good shots of him. Made my week seeing him.

Like I said, it’s not habitat. Ninety years ago in my part of the world there was a house every forty acres and everything was planted in cotton and corn. Quail were about the only game besides rabbits and squirrels that were around back then. Sixty years ago the cotton and corn was gone but there were pastures everywhere and lots of quail. Forty to fifty years ago, clearcuts became the vogue and quail, like everything else, EXPLODED. You couldn’t walk fifty yards in some places without kicking up a covey or two.

Today, fewer cattle operations. More grown up fields. Still lots of clearcuts and pine plantations in various stages. Lots of unmowed road ditches and NO row crops of any kind. Aaaaand I haven’t even heard a quail in probably at least 15 years. It might be twenty, but I know it’s been fifteen.

Ky221, Great pictures, your wife is skilled photographer, i need to get a better camera mine sucks very little zoom. Rio7

Don't know that I've ever heard/seen one in my life in SWVA.

Have turkey galore.

I heard a grouse drumming a couple of weeks back.
I stopped in my tracks and had to process what I was hearing, first grouse I had heard in about 10 years.

We still have a few but not like when I was a kid
The 120 acres across the road had 10 covies with 15-20 each

Live on the west coast now, but I've not heard one in 20 years during my visits to Va or WVa.

Buddys father in law.....we hunted a thicket behind his house. Early morning, sun been up 15 mins.

KABOOM!

Bout dropped my bow out of the stand.

Texted my bud WTF?

Reply was " ol boy proly shot a cat, keeps shotgun by kitchen window ".

Yup, he got one.

Wild quail been there 40 plus yrs. Off limits.

Said if you see a cat or coon and dont pop it, dont come back.

10 yrs ago, getting ready to cross fence going back to Jeep......grass strip on one side, yard and house on other.....

Covey of at least 2 dozen blew up in front of me.

Scared the chit outta me LOL

Hunted my buds fam farm 2 counties over and had 6 bebop under my ladder stand, single file. Pheasant there too, hear them and turkeys at first light.

Pheasant and quail off limits.

Never see a cat. Just sayin. Folks up there protect.the birds.

Used to dove hunt northen F&W area and always heard quail in crp field next to sunflowers.
Last time up......didnt hear any 😔

I was watching 6-8 quail march single-file down my dirt road, Injun style. A mourning
dove flew down at the back of the line and marched awhile. It would fly ahead
some to a low-hanging limb. When they passed by, take it's place at the rear of the line again and repeat.
IDK sometimes.

We still have quail and decent numbers but nothing like 20 plus years ago. Hear and see them every day but this is still prime habitat here. Turkey hens clucking to their broods in the brush all around the place too. I love it here in the Red River valley. Long stretches of turf here just like God made it…

Coming back from checking water this morning, damn near ran over a pair with little chicks about the size of a small mouse, there's Quail every where here, a lot of young birds, we are on our second hatch now. Rio7

Wish I shared your troubles.

Looks like a good year for both Blues and Bobs outside of Zapata. Babies everywhere - we are even running a couple hunts this coming season. For whatever reason we have not had much of a turkey population but I did see a few this year - won't hunt those.

Hawks and Falcons seem to be the biggest quail predator for us but I'm sure the coyotes, bobcats, and hogs do their damage as well.

Ran across these two in the road on the way back from the back pasture a moment ago!
😁

That's great Bob.

It's been hot and dry here, and i have been running the water on the pastures, the Quail love these water sprinklers. Rio7