Thread: Predator/varmint hunting

Originally Posted by bodebum

Even deer will eat quail eggs. Quail are like the shrimp of the grasslands. My wife and I watched crows eating quail biddies and leopard frogs behind the house some years back. it was the last year that we saw quail here.

INTERESTING , Good Day , learned something new

When I was a . young lad my dad had some really good bird dogs he trained himself. We grew up on quail and gravy and cathead biscuits. We had a covey cross the yard sometimes. Walking across the pasture could almost cause a dirty shot when they cameup under your feet. Been a while since I've seen any. Not sure why but we farm different grasses now.

Carolyn and I watched them move around here a lot, and the best times were when the hen and cock moved their brood from here to there. The hen always in the lead, low chirps and clucks, bringing the string along, the cock at rear guard. We miss them, greatly.

I don't doubt that predators eat some turkeys, but turkeys as a species have been dealing with predators for thousands of years. I think something else is responsible for their decline. I tend to suspect afla toxin poisoning from corn put out to bait deer, and I've read that the biologists blame changing weather patterns---we've been having chilly rains during hatching season. Probably a combination of things. We all want simple answers to complex problems, and that is something hard to come by. Turkeys are wonderfully adaptive and have learned to live and thrive, even in suburbia, along with urban coyotes and garbage raiding raccoons, so I hope they'll stage a comeback soon. I'm seeing so few turkeys on my ground right now, I doubt I'll be doing much hunting this spring. I'd hate to be the man who killed the last gobbler in the entire Township.

Originally Posted by eym_sirius

To be sure, if a hog comes upon eggs laid by a ground-nesting bird -- he'll eat every one of them! They'll eat anything!

Yep I've read and heard they've really hurt quail and turkey numbers. They trample all over the eggs and drive away nesting hens.