Pennsylvania Game News - August 2022 - 24

dependent species, appeared for the first
time or increased in numbers, " Kindlin
said. " The Pennsylvania-endangered
dickcissel appeared for the first time
this year and males were seen calling at
multiple locations across the focus area. "
Pennsylvania's Wildlife Action Plan
calls for having 10 to 15 breeding pairs
of dickcissels in the state - all told - so
" Letterkenny quite possibly had nearly
those numbers " alone, Murphy said.
Cottontail and woodcock numbers are
increasing, as well.
There are no bobwhite quail - what
Ward termed " the last piece of the puzzle
missing from old-field habitat types " - at
Letterkenny just yet.
But that's soon to change.
RESTORING BOBWHITES
The Game Commission plans to establish
800 to 1,000 bobwhites at Letterkenny
over three to four years starting in spring
of 2023 or 2024, depending on habitat
conditions. They will come from several
of the dozen states that have expressed a
willingness to supply wild birds.
Getting birds from different places that
way will " allow us to translocate enough
bobwhite to re-establish a population in
Pennsylvania without detriment to those
sources, " Ward said.
" We aim to translocate bobwhite from
states in the more northern part of their
current range, with similar winter conditions,
and from southern states that have
more robust bobwhite populations, " he
added.
Those quail aren't meant to provide
hunting, at least not initially.
" Our management plan calls for creating
habitat that could sustain a population
of wild bobwhite in Pennsylvania, " Ward
said. " Ultimately it would be great to
restore hunting for wild bobwhite, but that
is not the goal of this project at this point.
" We need to have a population of wild
quail before we can make those kinds of
PENNSYLVANIA'S QUAIL HISTORY
Here's a measure of how many bobwhite
quail Pennsylvania once had.
In spring 1897 - two years after the Game
Commission came into existence - Pennsylvania's
governor signed several laws aimed at
protecting wildlife. They banned some activities
outright: nighttime grouse hunting, spring
waterfowl hunting, hunting deer over salt licks
and with hounds, and selling game birds.
The laws also enacted more-restrictive
daily bag limits for several species, bobwhites
among them.
So how many quail could a hunter take,
every day of the season, under the crackdown?
Fifteen!
In between those heady days and the bobwhite's
total disappearance a century later,
the Game Commission tried boosting quail by
stocking farm birds.
24
It released bobwhites in 1906, then Mexican
and Gambel's quail between 1915 and 1918.
It turned to Mexican quail again in the 1930s,
releasing 5,000 banded birds in counties along
the Ohio, West Virginia, Maryland, Delaware
and New Jersey borders in one study. Hunters
were asked to turn in bands from harvested
birds. Only 12 came back.
Later quail releases provided recreation but
did no more to establish wild populations.
None of that is surprising, said Andrew
Ward, the Game Commission's quail biologist.
" Pen-raised bobwhite have a much lower
rate of survival and reproduction than wild
bobwhite, " Ward said. " They never learned
how to survive as they would if they were
moving around the landscape feeding and
evading predation straight from the egg, as wild
bobwhites do. "
Pennsylvania Game News - August 2022

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