Managing for quail?

[Kayser]

Looking for suggestions from any quail fanatics on how to improve what I would call "nearly depleted hay ground" to hold a few coveys of quail.

We're looking to improve some mixed hay pasture/timber land in the Union Breaks geographical region. There's a few quail running around the area in the spring, but we've only seen 1 on the property itself. We mostly hunt deer there right now, but we'd love to see more quail and rabbits on the place. Photos below are the 100+/- acre parcel map outlined in red, and a photo of the north pasture. Pastures get mowed/hayed once a year, typically June.

Creek runs east-west through the center, hills sloping up to north and southwest. We have a couple thicker brush patches in the north pasture, and are looking at which trees to drop to feather the edges. Pastures are mostly little bluestem, maybe a bit of clover, and god only know what else (photo below). The SW pasture is patchy/barren on a hillside. SE pastures are kinda flat, mixed material. Minimal fescue.

Questions:

1. What seed could we overseed/broadcast spread in February during a freeze/thaw cycle that would germinate and improve the habitat? Can't be a problem for hay production.

    1.a Grass, legume, forbs/wildflowers/other broadleafs? Hoping for something native.

2. What food plots could we plant that would benefit both deer & quail?

3. Any suggestions for planting strips broomcorn/sorghum (visual cover + food)? Want to break up the visibility of the place from the road, provide some visual cover for walking to deer stands, and add a bit of winter food for wildlife.

4. Suggestions for a biologist or other pro that might have some better suggestions? MDC, Quail Unlimited, etc?

 

 

 

[ness]

This looks like a pretty good resource

https://quailforever.org/Conservation/Habitat-Education/Resources.aspx

[fishinwrench]

Plant them, then give them a reason to want to stay.     It's that simple.  No need for a team of accredited biologists.   

I love hunting over a good pointer, but nothing will cause quail to evacuate an area quicker than a few encounters with a hound.  No matter how cush their environment is.....SAFETY is #1 

If they don't feel safe.....they are GONE.

[tjm]

MDC has at least  two good  quail men- https://mdc.mo.gov/magazines/conservationist/2019-08/new-approach-quail

[tjm]

13 minutes ago, fishinwrench said:

Plant them, then give them a reason to want to stay.

What's a good source of wild stock? or do you say that tame quail will adapt? We seem to have lost all the quail in this area 20 years or so ago, and the habitat is basically the same as when I had two coveys every year.

[fishinwrench]

23 minutes ago, tjm said:

What's a good source of wild stock? or do you say that tame quail will adapt? We seem to have lost all the quail in this area 20 years or so ago, and the habitat is basically the same as when I had two coveys every year.

I'm not sure how "good of a source" it is.....but Bird Dog Crazy kennels in Ivy Bend is owned by a customer of mine.  They raise bobwhites and Coturns (sp?)

https://www.facebook.com/birddogcrazykennels?mibextid=ZbWKwL

[Kayser]

19 minutes ago, ness said:

This looks like a pretty good resource

https://quailforever.org/Conservation/Habitat-Education/Resources.aspx

It really is, if you have no restrictions on what you're doing with the land. Unfortunately, we need to mostly keep this as semi-productive hay pasture, mowing once a year. I don't think burning is an option, due to proximity of houses to the fields. We're trying to delay mowing the hay until after the early breeding season (mid-June), so the warm-season grasses can get large enough to be decent hay and the quail have time to hatch and escape farm equipment.

I'm trying to put together a plan of edge-feathering that would provide enough cover areas with brushy undergrowth to maintain habitat through that mowed period. I'd also like to leave unmowed borders along the brush patches in the pasture, plus maybe let the waterways grow up every couple of years. BUT- I think the area could highly benefit from some nitrogen-fixing plants added to the mix, some taller native bunch-grasses, and just a little better diversity overall.

I know this is possible, because the best quail populations ever were in the 1950s- so there's a way to have both hay and quail. I'm currently trying to figure out the best, cheapest, and easiest way to meet that goal.

33 minutes ago, fishinwrench said:

Plant them, then give them a reason to want to stay.     It's that simple.  No need for a team of accredited biologists.   

I love hunting over a good pointer, but nothing will cause quail to evacuate an area quicker than a few encounters with a hound.  

From what I've learned, tame quail just feed hawks and coyotes. There are wild quail in the area, and I'd like to encourage them to colonize this property and give them the right ingredients to establish a few coveys.

[Dutch]

I used to have a neighbor who’s 200 acres joined one of our farms.  He had one covey and we shared one.  I would hunt them a couple of times each year.  One day we were talking about the quail and he said that there used to be 10 coveys on just his farm.  He wondered what had changed.  We talked about how the land had been used and the fences.  

He said it had been a dairy farm.  He had fields of Lespedeza, milo, corn and alfalfa.  His fence rows were grown up.  Now it had been changed to beef production with clean barbed wire fence rows and fescue pastures. He went from a lot of food and cover to no food and one brushy draw.

 

[Kayser]

24 minutes ago, Dutch said:

I used to have a neighbor who’s 200 acres joined one of our farms.  He had one covey and we shared one.  I would hunt them a couple of times each year.  One day we were talking about the quail and he said that there used to be 10 coveys on just his farm.  He wondered what had changed.  We talked about how the land had been used and the fences.  

He said it had been a dairy farm.  He had fields of Lespedeza, milo, corn and alfalfa.  His fence rows were grown up.  Now it had been changed to beef production with clean barbed wire fence rows and fescue pastures. He went from a lot of food and cover to no food and one brushy draw.

 

Sounds about right- everything changing over to stay profitable. Fescue and no food or cover.

[tjm]

 Fescue prohibits birds by forming turf. Birds need bare dirt. And fescue wet with heavy dew means the birds are swimming with the chicks drowning.