Did you know that there were 16 varieties of bluestem. I learned that and a lot more than I ever thought I wanted to know about weeds and grasses as I hunted with Jim Willis Saturday. I also learned that he had some great Elhew pointers. Let's go straight to the pictures.

Here's Elhew Dixie with Jim doing the honors;




Here's a great Britt named Buddy pointing as Elhew Sue backing;



Elhew Dixie again;



Here's Sue pointing with Jim doing the honors;



Sue again;



I'm not making this up. Byron brought a Britt named Buddy and a GWP named Ranger. Here's Ranger pointing with Cracker backing;



Would you pick out ranger as a GWP?

I don't post many pictures of Cracker anymore, but she does point. Here you go;



I saved the best bird dog picture for last. Here's Yeats with ET doing the honors;



Jim liked to look at the guts. This crop was filled with a milo size weed seed;



After the hunt;



I mentioned ET's historic, restored farmhouse. It was built in 1910. Take a look at these 100 year old Live Oaks;


[img]http://i198.photobucket.com/albums/aa155/billoxner/024.jpg[/img]


Byron was headed south, and Jim is out somewhere burning pastures.

Those are some great photos Bill. Nice looking EP's also.

The GSP has what they call the white factor; that's when they are predominantly white. Overall, the parent club does not like it but they have to deal with because of the field trial folks.

That's a GWP which looks like a GSP. Is there a limit to the number of pictures you can post on one thread? I kept trying to edit the house in and I got the image codes every time. Here you go;

nice report bill.

how many coveys does willis think he has on his property

He said that he had up to 20 coveys in some of the past years, but around 10 this year. He gets a bunch of invites, and said that this was really a good year. He said that the hunts have had produced a lot of birds after the first of the year. Truchard gets some help from him.

Is Elhew Sue the dogs registered name? If so are they out of dogs at the Elhew Kennels or an Elhew prefixed champ, or now that Bob has passed are people using the prefix for any Elhew bred dog?

I have no idea what their registered names are. Jim said that they were both Elhew bred dogs. I made that Elhew Sue part up, but I didn't make it up about Ranger being a GWP.

Hey Bill-

I love that old house.

Sandi's parents' farm and house went on the historical register in Oklahoma five years ago. The farm is located on Indian Meridian Rd. which is the eastern boundary of the Oklahoma land run.

The family farm has raised five generations of farmers and is still producing today.

Sandi gets the house, two barns, and the grain silos in the will plus somewhere around fifty acres...guess I could retire from construction management, moved to Oklahoma and take up farming when the time comes. I told Sandi I would get her cows to milk...that didn't set well with her.

yes truchard mentions him from time to time. willis is one of his hunters he says

In his dreams. Jim can hunt almost anywhere he wants to hunt.

Byron was headed down to the now infamous Armstrong ranch. He had some good tales to tell about that, but this is the best tale of all;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dick_Cheney_hunting_incident

Those are some great pics Bill and beautiful country y'all are working.

Great report, great pics!! Thanks

Here's the thread that ET started, about the hunt, on The Snipe Hunters Forum.




http://thesnipehuntersforum.yuku.com/topic/4131/Bird-Dogs-a-Bird-Pup-and-a-Retreiver

Someone asked about Jim Willis on another thread. I didn't want to continue the hijack. Here are some more pictures of Jim. He's now working with the Quail Coalition. He told me last year that he had around 1 bird per acre. It's tough to count them this year because of the cover. One of the problems in his area is that there are no large ranches.

We had a little reunion today, in a different pasture, and Included David Lopries of TPAWD. The stated purpose was to map out some burn areas. We found that David was quite popular in the local establishments in Wharton county. Not because of his quail restoration efforts, but because of his daughter. She played softball for the Aggies, and went on to play professionaly. She's now back at A&M working on her doctrate in sports entertainment.

I hadn't planned on taking anymore pictures, but just couldn't help myself. Here's David and Jim walking in on a point by Jim's Sue. Beckett is literally honoring;



No running in the field David;



Cracker came back to this bush several times;





This picture simply doesn't do Yeats justice. I was a little late with my camers. Notice that he's a little down in the front. That's how he hit the point. The birds were feeding and got up all around him;



David and Jim were still talking about burning when I drove away.

Bill
Your getting close with the TPW guys and already know Willis. Is the general idea among these guys is that QC can have enough participation from landowners to make a big impact on quail numbers thru out the state? Or only a select few will get involved


It boils down to if the landowner is not a quail hunter and needs to be sold the idea that habitat restoration like Willis did will put money in his pocket in the long run. Is that possible

Good pics. Next time you see David, please give him best regards, from one of the old "JD Murphree regulars".

Jim liked to look at the guts. This crop was filled with a milo size weed seed;



Jim showed these seeds around to several so called weed experts. No one had a clue. David took some and promised an answer. Here you go;


"I took the seeds from the quail from the crops to our District
Meeting in La Grange Monday and the consensus on the identification of
the plant the seeds came from was Hercules Club.

If you will Google Hercules Club it will give a good description of the
plant.

David S. Lobpries"

I've never even seen such a tree! Thanks for the info though, I always like learning something new

use to chew toothache tree leaves as a kid. Been a long time.

I've marveled at those gnarly trunks before but did not know they bloomed and dropped seeds/fruit like that.

Wonder if all this warm weather stimulated an early bloom and fruit?

I never added the Jim Willis article to this thread. Here you go;

http://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/...ail-1764954.php

I heard Willis' name mentioned this past weekend, by the guys that were looking over our property. They didn't mention 22 different varieties of bluestem, but they did mention one ... "old world bluestem", which apparently is not too good for the quail, and the cows don't eat it either. The "love grass" we have in several fields is good nesting cover, but we don't have enough of it, mostly due to the on-going drought.

Lack of nesting cover seemed to be the main issue, as well as the coastal bermuda. It was a good visit though, and we did spot 3 coveys while riding some of the fence lines. The fact that we brought them ~3" of rain while we were there was a very good thing also. If we're lucky, the rancher will work with us and the quail, and begin skipping a few strips with the herbicide. The biologists said that they could see at least 15 covies on our place in a good year. That sure would be nice.

1971snipe, was that a picture of your pointer I saw in the PDJ? That is a great shot.

Pat