March President’s Corner

-Our winter rain and snowfall has been good and can not hurt as we look forward to next season. It should make a difference for desert quail.

-U.S. Fish and Wildlife staff at Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge [BANWR] has released a little over 400 Masked Bobwhite chicks. Chick survival has been better than expected.  Buenos Aires NWR staff have found a previously unknown covey a few weeks ago but have not yet been able to release radioed birds with the covey to monitor them. We have 3 out of the 4 known coveys still being tracked. As the initial radio batteries or the collared birds die additional collared birds have been released that have joined with existing coveys.  These coveys were being tracked by sight since we know the location they hangout in. However, a week ago radioed female masked bobwhites were released into the 3 known coveys to make our monitoring more accurate and to be informed on any unexpected long distance movements. Currently more masked bobwhite females are being released into the monitored coveys to help the coveys sex ratios.  Once warmer weather arrives, the male masked bobwhite chicks released last year should fill the air with their famous “bobwhite” mating call.

-Biologists from several western states met in Sonoita in early Feb for the Western Quail Working Group.  Jim Littlejohn and I attended one day of it and were impressed with some of the new technology that may aide in quail research and the cooperation between the states.

Access to Public Lands:

-Thanks to all that helped with our winter road cleanup in Feb. We had a good turnout and covered more of the highway than normal.

-San Rafael Valley.  The public has lost driving access to a large area in San Rafael Valley.  Details were provided to those that attended our Dec meeting.  CNF is evaluating bypass routes before starting the NEPA process required before road building can start.  Work on this has been delayed by the government shutdown and our next meeting with CNF and AZ G&F on this subject has been moved back to 19 March.

Habitat:

-We are getting several opportunities to help out with habitat work at Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge.  This gives us a special opportunity to help out with the Masked Bobwhite which is an endangered species.

-Jim Littlejohn met with Santa Cruz Natural Resource Conservation District ( NRCD ) in Patagonia to explain our habitat program.  As a result ranchers and government divisions are more aware of what we want to accomplish which could lead to a project in Santa Cruz county.

-We will hold our last meeting of the season 14 Mar in Sahuarita at the American Legion Hall Post 66.  We will get a presentation on the impact of the farm bill to AZ.

-All meetings will be 7-9 PM with social starting at 6:15.

–Please send me your thoughts on our meetings to help us provide what members want. 

We reviewed lessons from our banquet to make next years event even better.

-This years event at Empire Ranch was well attended by participants and volunteers.  We had great weather although the wind did start to blow late in the day.  The trap station allowed us to get many new folks out in the field shooting over the dogs.  We saw a lot of new faces, had several young women and adults participate.  The event was conducted with safety as our first priority. National Wild Turkey Chapter out of Sierra Vista crew were a great addition this year adding the trap station, running the BB gun range and providing the dining tent – we want to keep this partnership going.  If we don’t get more youth outdoors and involved in hunting, hunting will transition to a European model where only the rich will hunt in the not that distant future.

-We are making a donation to Arizona Outdoors Adventures to support a camping trip in the White Mountains for at-risk youth.  We received a brief on their activity at our Dec meeting.

We work to keep our sites current.  If you see an error or recommendation for improvement please let us know.  We are always looking for pictures, stories or articles to add.  Many of you have seen our slide show that we show at QuailFest and the banquet – if you have pictures that would be a good addition please send them to me.

Please consider volunteering to be a member of one of our committees.  We need help on habitat, banquet and youth committees or you can just help out with an event like QuailFest, the banquet, road cleanup or BANWR habitat.  We also have some open positions on our board.