The Brightside: Bringing back the Bobwhite Quail

QUANTICO, Md. – A species of small birds that once lived in abundance is now threatened. Still, due to conservative and land preservation efforts from local land owners, and conservation organizations, the Bobwhite Quail are coming back, and are hopefully here to stay.

Landowners John Long and Tom Fisher are creating a habitat where Bobwhite Quail can live, thrive, and multiply; Something we’re told they’ve been unable to do for decades. “I think the numbers have been like 95% in Maryland over the last three or four or five decades,” says Jared Parks, Land Programs Director for Lower Shore Land Trust. “Bobwhite Quail is a small bird that likes open land, scrubby habitat and there’s not a lot of that left.”

This subtle bird that whistles a bob-white ringing song could be heard on the Eastern Shore years ago. “Both Tom and I grew up at a time where quail were plentiful, we didn’t appreciate it until we lost them,” says Long. Parks adds, “It sort of loses a bit of heritage of the area to not have those things that were such a common part.”

Parks tells us, that the quail’s decline in population alerted local conservation groups like his and the Department of Natural Resources. Together they created a recovery effort by restructuring the landscape so their habitats could return. “You can take a normal eastern shore pine plantation forest and turn it into more of a quail habitat. So you don’t have to have these big wide open expanses of second growth or meadow habitat.” He goes on to explain, “You can kind of mimic that or make a thinned-out forest that looks like a savannah, kind of southern long-leafed pine forest.”

With the help of cost-share programs from both the federal and state governments, programs like Maryland ag land preservation or the rural legacy program give incentives to land owners to aid in these efforts. “It gives you dollars and depending on what your goals are, you can take those dollars and expand and put it back into the wildlife habitat development,” says Long. Fisher adds, “We took land that was marginal farmland but not the best timber land, and worked on that for corral habitat.”

Through strategies like controlled burns to give the surrounding forestry a reset, facilitating pollinator meadow growth, and thinning tree lines, they created a better space. Fisher says, “The forestry work, did some planting of good habitat for quail and it all helped it turn it around.” Long and Parks echoes by saying, “If you manage your quail, the turkeys, the deer, and the pollinators thrive.” “It’s not just about restoration, it’s also about conservation of the land, so there’s a space that can be utilized for any number of these things,” adds Parks.

More importantly, these organizations and landowners are showing others interested in how they can do the same, so more habitats can be generated over time. “We’ve learned a lot over the last 25 years of what not to do and we think now we have a model of what people could replicate,” says Long.

We’re told at the heart of these efforts are Marylanders like Long and Fisher and groups alike that are making sacrifices to help other species, such as the quail, live for generations to come. Fisher says, “Everyone here is interested in doing this type of thing to bring the birds back and it seems to be working.” Parks adds, “The fact that people are interested in giving up a little bit of their productive or unproductive land for restoration of that species and that habitat, it makes me feel good that people have a similar mindset.”

If you’re interested in preserving Bobwhite Quail or other species, please Contact Agricultural Outreach Specialist Beth Sheppard about habitat restoration
by calling 443-234-5587 or email her at bsheppard@lowershorelandtrust.org.

You can also visit their website, to learn more.