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QUAIL PARASITES FOUND AT RECORD-HIGH LEVELS

Date February 10th, 2012 | Category: Newsroom

ROBY, Texas—Poor-bob-white!  Parasitic worms in the eyes and intestines of bobwhite quail
have been found at record high levels in Texas bobwhites according to an ongoing research
project.  And, while researchers caution that their results are preliminary, early findings suggest
the worms could be impairing the quail’s ability to thrive as it historically has across west Texas.

 

To read more, download the attachment QUAIL PARASITES FOUND AT RECORD-HIGH LEVEL

Jan/Feb 2010 Shooting Sportsman Tom Davis “Rolling Plains Quail”

Date January 31st, 2010 | Category: Newsroom

44 January/February 2010
Rolling Plains QuailConservation Tom Davis
Back in Wisconsin, a February morning in the mid-20s would seem balmy. But here on the mesquite-dotted plains of West Texas—Fisher County, to be precise, about 50 miles west and a little north of Abilene—that same temperature feels shockingly, marrow-chillingly cold.
I’m sitting on the passenger side of Dr. Dale Rollins’ pickup, with the window rolled down and the engine turned off. We’re parked deep in the heart of the Rolling Plains Quail Research Ranch (RPQRR), the 4,700-acre property for which Rollins serves as executive director, listening for the lispy “wake-up” call of the bobwhite quail—the adored, imperiled handful of feathers whose preservation is the reason the ranch exists.
It’s early; the sun has yet to rise. But the pink glow on the eastern horizon is growing more intense, the stars are winking out above us as the canopy of sky fades from black to blue, and the thorny features of the landscape—so powerfully remindful of the African veldt—are beginning to reveal themselves. The place we’re parked, mile marker 11E, is one of 25 “listening posts” where Rollins and his staff tabulate the number of rooster quail they hear calling in the spring—data they use not only to index the ranch’s overall breeding population but also to gain a sense of its distribution and how it relates to vegetation, topography, land use and a host of other factors. (more…)