(Canyon)—Texas Agricultural Experiment Station and Texas Cooperative Extension personnel are trying to find out how and when quail populations in the High Plains will recover after last year's wildfires.
A study was started last spring to monitor the impacts of wildfire on quail, said Ken Cearley, Extension wildlife specialist in Canyon.
Dale Rollins, Extension wildlife specialist in San Angelo, said there "was a real knowledge void" of how large-scale fires influence quail habitat.
"This scale of wildfires is a rare event and presented a unique research opportunity for us," Rollins said. "We often use prescribed burning as a tool for managing quail habitat, but on a much smaller scale.
"Our main interest is determining how long it takes those quail to repopulate that area two, three, four miles from the unburned edge," he said. "The draws and sandier lands included in these fires are typically good quail habitat."
Laura Baar, a research associate, will spend the next month listening for spring calls from quail in six different sampling transects in Gray, Roberts, Hutchinson, Carson and Wheeler counties.
"We are interested in how distance from the edges of the burned area impacts quail abundance, both inside the burn and outside," Cearley said. "By counting calling males in the spring, we hope to be able to tell how many breeding birds are available going into this year's nesting season."
The transects are 10 miles long and extend at least 2 miles into one of the two largest blocks of burned area, each over 400,000 acres in size, he said. Mile markers are located along the transect, and all the sampling will take place at those markers.
Baar will listen for the birds beginning 30 minutes before official sunrise and continuing for one and a half to two hours, Cearley said. She will spend five minutes at each marker before moving on, and the count will be repeated three times on successive days.
The survey began last year, but the single year's data will provide limited information by itself, Cearley said. Last year was a dry year and that affected the number of quail almost statewide, so it probably also affected the survey in and around the burns.
A third year of data gathered in 2008 would be helpful, but that will depend on funding, he said. Already the survey had to be cut back somewhat from the first year due to lack of funds.
Funding for the study has been provided by the Panhandle Chapter of Quail Unlimited, several local landowners, West Texas A&M University and Extension's Quail Decline Initiative, Rollins said.
In the first year, scent stations and artificial nests with chicken eggs were used to determine how many potential nest predators – coyotes, skunks, etc. – were in the vicinity of each transect and could affect the survival of quail nests, Cearley said.
Habitat photos also were taken last year to evaluate shrub cover and nesting cover, he said. And forb diversity counts were done at each sampling station, to give an idea of food plant availability.
While the 2006 data are still being analyzed, Rollins said, preliminary observations from last summer showed the sandier sites with shinnery oak rebounded more quickly than the hard-land sites, which are typically short-grass communities with less vegetation.
"Often, we'll find out that a burn will enhance the diversity and abundance of forbs, so that will be useful data once it is analyzed," Cearley said.
"We are currently assessing the distance from the various mile markers to the edge of the burn from imagery provided by the Natural Resources Conservation Service," Rollins said.
This year is looking better for quail overall due to abundant rainfall, Cearley said. Much of the burned area looks good with what appears to be adequate cover.
"We expect better numbers," he said. "Last year there hadn't been enough regrowth of cover after the fire, early enough in the year, to attract the quail back into the area, or to provide for the survival of very many of them." 