It was the late 70's and I had a brand new mortgage, a new Toyota 4x4 PU, a young family and a 2 year old GSP Amy (named by my daughter after her best friend). I got up at 5:00 AM on a Saturday and drove about 90 miles into far North Eastern Oklahoma to quail hunt. It was frosty, in the 20's with some sparse snow cover. The Sun was up but cloudy. I let Amy out and we skirted some fence cover around a long ago harvested bean field. I turned Amy back toward the truck through a shallow dry creek and the largest covey I've even seen flushed and sailed a 100 yards or so directly toward the truck. Three deer had jumped ahead of Amy and in turn flushed the quail. I can still remember the rushing sound of that flush on that cold still morning. I called Amy to heel and then sent her ahead. Within moments she went on point. I flushed and made the kill. She retrieved and the scene was repeated a point, flush, kill and retrieve. This continued until I reached my limit of ten. I then realized I had moved a total of about 5 yards. Amy continued to point and I would flush and allow the bird to fly.
I have no idea have many birds were in that covey but would estimate it had to be near 50. A great day that ended way too soon!
Ken, about 10 years after your hunt, I enjoyed some great quail hunting in SE KS. It seems, unfortunately, that that part of the country isn't much for quail any more. The DNR says they're coming back here in IA, but I can't imagine--mostly due to changed farming practices--that we'll ever see anything approaching the quail numbers we had in southern Iowa 40 years ago.
