At a recent outdoors event, a man in his 40s heard a northern bobwhite whistle--"bob-white." He asked, "What kind of bird is that?"
I thought it a shame he didn't know.
That sound was prominent when I was growing up. I recall my father and his friends shooting a limit of ducks in the morning, having lunch and taking a limit of quail in the afternoon.
But quail disappeared as farming and land maintenance altered their habitat in the last 40 years. Since 1924, the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission has attempted several times to restore quail. The famed commission biologist Trusten Holder outlined some of the history in 1951, which showed that the 1924-32 efforts and others led to prolific quail numbers in the early 1950s, with coveys in every Arkansas county. This continued into the time I remember well in the 1960s and '70s.
But the farms I remember are not part of the landscape anymore. Today, I look out my window here in Corning across the highway at farmland as far as I can see; weedless, precision-leveled fields that go on forever.
The farms of my youth were much smaller, tiny spreads compared to today's huge fields, with many fence rows separating each small farm. Some areas around them weren't farmed and were left to overgrowth. Weedy ditches were abundant. We didn't have large fields of fescue with livestock grazing on them. While still a far cry from the prairie the pioneers encountered upon arriving here when quail were everywhere in the 1800s, it was habitat that was conducive to nesting, brooding and cover for safety.
We can't go back to that type of farming or land use that we knew 50 years ago. But we can create better and vaster connected areas of habitat that will benefit quail and help restore the birds' population, which will benefit people.
The commission is taking another step in quail restoration, using a more collaborative approach. We need help from our state and federal partners and, most importantly, our private landowners. As chairman in my final year, I'm confident that future chairmen will make quail restoration a priority. A proposed conservation education center in Northwest Arkansas and quail restoration are my 1 and 1A priorities.
The Arkansas Game and Fish Commission will dedicate resources for habitat improvement on selected wildlife management areas, but restoring quail will require partnerships on adjacent private land.
The Natural Resources Conservation Service is providing $600,000 for habitat restoration through the Working Lands for Wildlife program. More than 400 landowners have expressed interest in meetings, and those who qualify will work with Game and Fish private lands biologists to create habitat. Other programs are available to landowners who missed the application deadline for Working Lands for Wildlife; the Conservation Research Program, for example.
Game and Fish wildlife biologists and wildlife management area managers attended a conference in Mayflower with quail specialists who have been successful in restoration efforts in six surrounding states. We learned from their success, but their failures were perhaps more valuable for us because we won't have to go down those roads.
I've luckily experienced the days of plentiful quail, and I want Arkansans to have that same experience. Quail are beautiful creatures, and they're delicious. There was nothing quite like a plate of quail and gravy the way my mother could cook it up. When new quail hunters see 15-18 in a covey rise, they think the ground has blown up. It's startling.
People who don't hunt, bird watchers, and outdoor lovers will enjoy seeing and hearing the bird return to The Natural State.
Quail once were important game birds in Arkansas. With their restoration, the agency could say again, "Look what we've done. Now go enjoy."
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Fred Brown is chairman of the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission.
Editorial on 04/07/2017