Stocking Quail
 

I would like to stock my BO land with quail,chukar,or Phesant (which ever would be the most hardy)

I seem to have plenty of whitetails and turkeys so i have plenty of cover and food source (land has more cover and forest than open areas and plenty of water)


any subjestions on the best way to accomplish a enduring poplulation?? ...do i buy mature birds and release them..buy chicks and release them ..buy chicks and raise how long? and release them..any experiences and subjestions would be highly appreciated

Re: Stocking Quail
 

i would cage the bird , an eat them if needed , if you turn them out you may never see them again , oh by the way i try that , they well go every were

Re: Stocking Quail
 

Pheasants don't do all that well in the wild (at least in the north east), I would stock mature quail or grouse. You're BO land will have to provide the desired habitat, or like Mick said.....bye-bye birdie.

The levels of predation on gamebirds is very high as well, the amount of work you'll have to put into this most likely will not provide much reward. We stock pheasant on our club property, but we look at it as a put and take situation only. Very few ever make the winter, and we've yet to see any reproduction.

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These birds like grain and field edges that are shaggy. without cover and food that they prefer its nice gesture but unlikely to become habitat for the long term.

Missouri Deptartment of conservation has a web sight with good info on quial habitat.

E-A

Re: Stocking Quail
 

Wild turkeys grow like weeds in WI.

Re: Stocking Quail
 

I have good food and cover for them so that isnt a issue

I did see a group of wild turkey (aprox 30) this week ...and a old timer (quick to provide a opinion) said male turkeys will kill quail...any truth to that? that could explain the lack of quail in ideal conditions

CampBass...if i cant establish a population i may have to start a release and take program

Thx for the Tip EA i will take a look at the MDOC site

Re: Stocking Quail
 

There is a reason you are finding yourself in a position of having to stock your BO property with quail. For whatever reason (predation, lack of cover, lack of food source) you property is not real conducive to supporting quail. Whitetails will live anywhere so their presence means diddly for successful quail grounds. As far as turkeys eating quail, I don't have any idea, but I suspect that to be false.

Long story short, don't waste your efforts in stocking your land with aq dependable quail population unless you what to do it as nothing more then a hobby. Odds are your efforts (and valuable $$) will be fruitless.

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Never heard of gobblers killing quail. Though fox, opossum, raccoon, feral cat, coyotes, bobcat, armadillos, hawks, feral hogs, etc all can have a tremendously detrimental effect on quail population, whether by feeding on the birds themselves or destroying nests. Biggest killer of quail in the South is, believe it or not, fire-ants.

If you're gonna release mature birds, make sure you get flight conditioned adults. Best if you acclimate them first for a short period of time also. Some pen-raised birds suffer in the short term, as they have never been forced to forage and have nested and raised broods from the safety of pens. Many, if not most have also never nested themselves, as breeders remove eggs and incubate them separate to increase surivability and keep hens laying from spring all the way through fall.

Cover and food are not a problem on my place, and I've been releasing quail for years (I raise and sell them also) and have yet to acheive a self sustaining population.

Best of luck to you.

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Just to preface what I said in the previous post, I know you said you have plenty of cover and food, but is it the right cover and the right food. What works well for turkeys and deer, not so much for quail.

I'd be more worried about the coons,possums and coyotes raiding nests then toms kill quail.

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Thx for the feedback...how would you specificly "acclimate" birds before release?

my main goal is to have game birds so maybe ...raise...acclimate...release...hunt...then if some survive and habitate then all the better....

and im sure i have...hawk, coon, ferel cats, bobcat, possum, fox, cyotes, squirls, rabbits, snakes,....etc......lol....no fire ants or dillos yet

to all concerned thank you but please be assured i have the optimal cover and forage mature and in place (this was determined after researching Mo Dept of Conservation information)

I do truely appreciate all thoughts and insights into this Thank you

Re: Stocking Quail
 

Depends on where you'd be getting the birds and how they've been raised. Also, when you'll be releasing. Some breeders use indoor coops and lights/heat sources to keep the birds in optimum conditions for laying/etc, and they may not be "hardened" to your particular climate. Open air pen them for a week or two, and wean them off artificial climate control (i.e. heat for the first few nights, then only if you think you might have a spring freeze, then not at all). Feed them similar foods to what they'd have to forage for, etc. A relatively high roofed, long pen can help them develop their ability to fly and escape predators also.

That's what we do. In addition to selling quail, we use them to train bird dogs, and hunt them here on the place. Usually host a big hunt towards the end of fall to thin down the number of birds we feed over the winter.

Raising quail is a fun hobby, and we definitely enjoy putting them in the freezer also. Also, it really would only take one season to scale up bird production to a point where they could be a sizeable portion of our meat stock.

We've been doing this for several years, and my old man did it since I was a kid. Any questions you might have about raising, incubating, brooding, etc, I'd be happy to help.

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Here in S.E. Mich....25 years ago....I could limit out on Pheasant just walking the fields with a friend for a few hours.....today....we go out with 3 championship dogs and hunt all day and might only put up 2 birds.....

I don;t really know the reason....and Pheasants Forever trying to stock birds for the past 20 years does not seem to help???

No idea.

Around here - the only bird hunting is put-n-take game farms......fun to watch the dogs work...but it is like shooting chickens. My neighbor has the dogs and into it big time....it is not hunting.....

Don't know what to say.

Now, the DNR stocked about 20 turkeys 20 years ago....when I was a kid - never saw a wild turkey in my life......now, 20 years later - they are EVERYWHERE.....lots of them.....so, don't know why the turkeys can make it but the pheasants and chukars can't???!??!?

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Know what you mean ruprick. My grandad and I could walk the fencerows on our place, or any of a dozen others, and run out of shells before we ran out of quail. Nowadays, a wild covey is so rare I'd feel ashamed hunting them.

And you're right, put-n-take isn't real hunting. It's all we have here though, and what we do isn't a moneymaking operation. Strictly for our enjoyment, and the late fall invitation hunt, $20 per gun, goes to our local Hope Hunts.

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Whenever you place too many animals, to close together, then something like this could happen. Especially when you have males that are grumpy and full of testerone trapped in too close of quarters with others who can't protect themselves. (This might explain some human problems.:553:)

I did have a female turkey 'adopt' an adult chuckar as her chick. She tried and failed at several nests, so she picked out the bird that looked, in her mind, like a turkey chick. Charlene the chucker, as we called her, didn't mind the mothering since the turkey hen protected her from all predators.

I'm raising some quail and pheasants that will eventually find a way to excape to the wild. (Turning quail and phesants lose in Oregon is against the law unless you have a permit.) Unfortunately, I've read that up to 90% of quail don't survive being released into the wild. But since I have a farm with lots of bird food and habitat, and not the wild, I've had better success in the past.

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no, no, no - I wasn't poking any fun at the put-n-take bird hunting.....same problem here - I have a little boy and some day if i want him to learn to hunt pheasants....it will have to be a game ranch.....it is also all we really have around here. Put-n-take is just like real hunting in terms of the field experience...other than the birds tend to no want to flush and fly.....I really enjoy hunting with a pointing dog they are so interesting to watch... My neighbor has some great springers...so they chase the running birds a lot...it can be a workout for both man and beast.

Nearly any hunting is a great experience....I'll do a fair amount of game ranch hunting to teach the boy someday...

Just noting like finding them in the wild......it was fantastic when i was a kid.....I remember the first bird i ever got with my dad....about 100 yards out the back of the property....i was 12 with a brand new Winchester single shot youth 20 ga he bought me for my birthday.

I had a basset hound pet that I hunted rabbits with....taught it to hunt birds as well....I can remember putting up 30 birds in an evening after school in the late 70's....

In the end, we just eat the devil out of all the birds we kill....so it does not really matter how/where you shoot them.

I meant no offense by calling it "not hunting".....it is still a wonderful experience....I really like when you take young kids and let them do all the shooting.

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No offense taken my friend. Didn't mean for it to come out that way. What I meant was that, like you said, it's just not like the "old days".

Some of my best days and fondest memories were spent out there with my granddad. I learned more about life and what it means be a man up and down those fencerows and briar patches than I could have anywhere else.

My son is eight now, and I started him bird hunting with me when he was old enough to stay with me for a half day trailing our dogs. He started carrying a gun last year, and I love that he loves the outdoors like I did as a kid.

So again, no offense taken at all. I'm mostly just wistful and wishing I could follow that old man and that old dog around just one more time.

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Not sure what your area is like, but my state (Indiana) is void of fencerows. My dad and grandfather have always attributed the destruction of fencerows with the failing bird populations that were numerous when they (dad and grandpa) were younger. As for the limited quail I do see, the coveys are always in fencerow type habitat. Coincidence??? I doubt it.

Declining animal populations are always linked to habitat destruction.

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Without a doubt you are correct. We still have a goodly amount of fencerow and hedgerow property on my place, along with ditchbank and creek overgrowth. I had much of the interior of the place set out in timber 10 yrs ago when I got the place, and though I do think that plays a role in the loss of viable quail populations, most of our coveys had long since disappeared.

I'm bordered on my west and partially on my north by extensive cultivated fields and cattle, all of which are unchanged since I was a kid, and you could spend all day with a good dog and not flush two decent coveys.

I'd be willing to bet our decline is more a depredation issue than loss of habitat. Like I said earlier, fireants are the number one killer of quail here in the south, and you can't pitch a turd without hitting one of their damnable hills around here.

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You may have awsome habitat, but that will only go so far. That awsome habitat needs to be found regionally. Too many property owners look at their own slice of heaven and manage it to their desire often to futile attempts because the surrounding areas are not doing the same.

I visit hunting websites where guys are talking up how they manage and know all the deer on their 600 acre farm and how their efforts are producing world class bucks. BS!! 600 acres is less the a square mile. Those guys are dillusional to think they have a hand in herd development when those same deer have a range of lets say 5-10 square mile and visit their property once every 3-4 days. Those deer are good cause the region is good. So a few hundred acres of prime quail grounds will mean zilch if surrounded by 1000s of acres of subprime ground.

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I was into the CRP for about 10 years and had 80 acres set up for wildlife habitat, Statistically, the success of releasing birds, or stocking, has a very low survival rate. The birds do not grow up with a parent to teach them how to forage and how to be constantly alert for predators.

So the success rate is around 4-6% that they will live to breed.

They say it is better to spend your money and time in habitat development.

Tall grasses intermixed with patches of blackberry brambles maybe 20 yards in diameter do real well. That way the pheasants, or quail can get into the bramble patch and it's hard for a coyote or fox to get in there real quickly for the kill.

s

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Again teedub, I agree with you. Though, the "area" I was speaking of is actually quite considerable in size. My 208 ac is surrounded by my uncles' 340 +/-, a neighbor/farmer who owns and leases more than 5100 acres, a 16th section of 640, another leased farmland/cattle tract of +/- 500 ac, and a weyerhauser timbered tract of 300+ acres. All save the timber company tract are interspresed with fencerow/hedgerow habitat, and all are relatively unchanged from a time when quail were abundant.
I'm not counting the farmer/neighbors to the west and south of me, all of which have equally suitable habitiat.
I'm also not trying to be argumentative, but the only thing that has changed since I was a kid is the introduction of new predators to this area, i.e. fireants and armadillos. If anything, there is more habitat now than there was back then.

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Teedub...Stranger....i agree with you both.....I have several locations...all are suitable in their own way..

one site is a old homestead only accessable by fireroad...in the middle of 10s of thousands of acres of national forest (the ultimate off the grid BO spot and already set up)

one is family owned and control varies like stranger said..2-3000 acres plus the neighbors (food producing set up)

the specific site i am speaking of is within 5 miles of town..is acouple of hundred acres with miles of reasonably concious neighbors for many miles around, i want to use this site because it would allow hunts close to town and probably be where i will live and build in the future

and like previous posts it would be nice to estabish wild bird populations instead of "put n take" but i can learn how to raise the chicks or hire a local student to raise chicks for me to put n take...i already have wire outside cages of substancial size the previous owner raised some form of pigeons at.
i was just curious how long a person would need to aclimate the birds before releaseing them and or any other prepreatory items to consider before release. and i can of course run a feed spreader next to a brush row every few days if needed. and i dont mind donating birds to the neighbors if it helps establish a wild population

will probably need to talk to the Dept of Conservation to see how they will view/permit/regulate/ or whatever this release effort

Stranger...thank you for the offer of advice i will take you up on it if i run into any toe stubbers

Re: Stocking Quail
 

you need to talk to the wildlife managment in your area , they can help , you may also get help paying for the birds , here in ky they help you , i got free seeds grass they like to live in an eat from , it also cover for them to stay in