Some years back, a bud & I concluded that it cost $2500 a weekend to hunt quail, if we were honest about the real costs involved w/good dogs, training, dog food, dog trailers, vet. bills, dog tags, micro chips [JIC one cut the wrong scent & made a bad decision] & dog related accoutrements ad infinum, leases that might or might not harbor movable numbers of coveys, guns chosen & bought exclusively to that purpose, clothing &c. Wot had motivated us to even wonder of such things? Dementia? We elected to leave our findings alone, being best disremembered and continue to hunt as long as we were able, which left all of those dogs spoken of to run out their years in bliss, cutting a bird scent when the opportunity arose, honoring one another much of the time, but not always, not buying replacements to be trained, but keeping a coupla working retrievers & constant companions at a minimum and ultimately subsequent disposal of trailers, kennels, Dogtra's and not renewing leases that held native birds no longer due to the changes w/crops & pesticides as much as anything, IMHO. It was regional, not a locally specific phenomena, but it certainly affected the areas we were leasing for a number of good years prior. I'd even lay some of it off to crop dusters which are highly non-selective to where their vapors land and one must remember that a quail's best & primary source of protein is bugs. Sounds dismal I know and it was and remains so for that particular area. Last season we hunted on the last lease kept in that area we took one dove. Excluding everything aside from the lease fees, we had $1200 apiece in that stupid bird! Prolly flew too close to a magnetic field of some sort and lost its built in compass settings as it was clearly lost. Not sure there was another within two counties that year and we never saw or moved the first quail on that place that year either. Hope springs eternal, eh?
On the positive, birds [quail] have undergone a remarkable recovery in parts of W. TX over the last couple of seasons and it was possible to move numbers of covey not seen in the previous twenty years last season, as some members here can attest. My main hunting pard these days & I hunt with friends and/or an outfitter who is also a friend out Joe & Mike's way. Wild birds were prolific last season and the need for flight-pen raised birds was honestly non-existent, but he can supply them as well, when/if needed or desired. Those hunts run roughly $300+ a bit/day [inclusive of tips] over rough terrain w/an opportunity to take a limit over good dogs. Usually limited to four guns alternating opportunities much of the time w/two handlers and from four to six bird dogs [two to three on the ground at any one time] and a retriever. Weather and temps rule how long the dog(s)need to be out hunting. Of course you have to get there, have a gun & ammo, cover hotel & per diem expenses &c. Me? I call it a bargain.. and should Joe be w/us he makes up for my misses w/ease, since Mike has truly trained him very well in the art of shooting guns w/inordinate amounts of drop, hammers & other obstacles that would cause some city slickers to kennel up!
I've yet to see either of them take a dove off a wire from a vehicle moving 50mph. One or both being somewhat disremebersome in the shell game sense of hand eye math & fizziks.. Joe's old truck never had an accurate speedometer to begin with.. and I'm not positive Mike's even has one.
