Especially given the struggles our quail are facing.

https://projectupland.com/culture/b...vTqrqS5hYrIUavlGGoy9pTUNsrUNSAVeg.XSVPXG

Good read and believe you are on to something. I have been an advocate of limiting the days or harvest number on quail. Feeling that they need X number of carry over (birds to reproduce for next year) to do well in good years and X number in poor years. The research says it takes about 6 birds in a covey for winter warmth and eyes for predators. I hear that % of quail are going to die off due to weather conditions, predators, illness, or age. That hunters need to work the dog, I paid for those days on the lease and the price is not going to be discounted on a poor production year. In bad production years, quail hunters are not going to hunt. The hunters are self-regulating. It costs money to get the numbers of active quail hunters. It takes time to get good numbers of birds every year. But who is going to help these birds, Universities, feed stores, quail outfitters, wildlife researchers, disease control, wildlife supplement producers, or hunters? Keep in mind Quail hunters are getting old, most new hunters are not walking-oriented or have time or space for bird dogs. It looks bad to reduce harvest numbers and quail hunters only hunt after deer season has been the outlook for a long time. So, quail hunters only hunt a month out of the season. It is easy for law enforcement to things the same in all countries. So, many reasons not to reduce days or harvest numbers with limited data hunt days and harvest numbers.

Four months to kill 15 birds a day. I would guess there is a large number of quail hunters who have not killed a limit in repeated years in a long time. Yes, there have been a few isolated population booms.

I venture to say that If today's quail hunters (upland bird hunters) do not self-regulate upland birds such as quail or pheasant. Bird numbers will continue to be lower. There appears to be just a lot of talk, spending money on magic cures, or just believing in the phase of "the good ole days will return". But this is one opinion for folks to criticize. Happy to hear your opinions or criticism.

It's pretty clear that the loss of habitat quantity and quality -- which increases vulnerability to predation and weather stresses -- and the spread of parasites like eyeworm have challenged Texas wild quail numbers. I can't imagine coveys sustaining 15-per-day bag limits (and 45 in possession) from multiple hunters and having enough left to produce the next generation. Taking pen-raised and released birds is another matter entirely.
It just pays for bird hunters to think not about quail in general but about the actual coveys they are hunting and pressuring with harvests and whether the level of harvest they are imposing with their dogs and guns will jeopardize the chance for the covey to survey and reproduce the following season.
I was young once, too, and thought the only way to measure a successful day in the field was to kill a limit of birds. Better to focus not on the pile of birds on the tailgate but to respect the ones you left behind, and hope for their survival and increase. The best course may well be to leave them alone for the rest of the season.

I don’t know the previous posters on this thread. But if you have been on a quail lease in Texas the last 20 years, do you really know of any hunters that keep and feed birds dogs all year, that actually go out and harvest a limit of bobs? I would be willing to bet the answer is no. The quail hunters I have hunted with, and others I have known, mostly are self regulating their harvest. They, and myself, are more interested in coveys pointed by their dogs than filling a limit. I’ve also been on guided hunts on wild birds, which have limits put on number of birds taken on covey rise. And some of the larger ranches that do guided hunts in Texas sometimes shut down quail hunting early to protect low bird numbers.
True Texas quail hunters are already doing their part to limit harvesting, without needing the the TPWD to intervene.

I consider myself a hard core quail hunter with several dogs. It is rare that I get a limit and it’s rare that I hunt prior to a good freeze. I’m not concerned with the number on birds in my bag.? Reducing the limit or shortening the season would not help the overall quail population is my opinion. Typically, the only hunters with true limits are the hunters that hunt “pen” birds. As already mentioned, habitat and rainfall are key.

Need a "like" button here.

Totally agree here. I don’t hunt to kill birds, I could and have gone out, just to watch the dogs have fun.

Me and my guests took less than one limit from our least the entire season...and I am fine with that. I was able to get my young Britt on a couple of coveys a day and that made the lease worth it.

I believe in killing them in the good years and working the dogs in the bad years. If everything isn’t right most of the quail are going to die no matter how many you don’t kill. Most quail hunters manage themselves pretty well.