The Northern bobwhite, a bird of open woods and fields, has been part of an ongoing study by the Pennsylvania Game Commission and various partners. The detailed Pennsylvania Breeding Bird Atlas of 2012 determined the bird was confirmed to be breeding in only 18 of the more than 4,000 state areas surveyed. A PGC population study is expected to be completed this summer.
Bobwhite is a species of greatest concern in the state's wildlife action plan. The Northern Bobwhite Conservation Initiative, a Tennessee-based consortium of state agencies, conservation groups and hunters, dedicated to saving the bobwhite, says the bobwhite could be in danger of being extirpated as a wild breeding species.
Personally, I have witnessed the birds in the wild only twice. Once when I was a teenager while riding on a tractor through a field off the Westminster Road, just south of Hanover. We came upon a covey of the birds. As the startled quail lifted off we could see that they were roosted in a wheel-shaped circle.
The second time, a bobwhite flew across the road while traveling in the White's Ferry area in Maryland.
The PGC maintains a hunting season for quail, but hunting, for wild birds, is closed in 20 southeastern and southcentral counties including York and Adams counties. In 2011, hunters harvested 2,260 quail. The number does not include pen-raised birds harvested on hunting preserves. The NBCI estimates that more than 60,000 pen-raised birds were released in the state in 2011. The PGC does not raise or release bobwhites.
Birding guides show southern Pennsylvania is the northern-most range of the species which occurs over much of the southeastern portion of the state. The bird is named for its familiar call which is described as a "loud whistled 'bob white' or 'bob bob white' that increases in pitch."
In decline over much of its range, the bobwhite, according to the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology, is one of the most intensively studied bird species in the world. The decline of Pennsylvania population could be the result of habitat loss and urbanization, changes in farming practices and the bird's sensitivity to cold weather. Hard freezes have been known to wipe out entire populations.
The Cornell Lab states the bobwhite genus is represented in fossils believed to be at least 2.5 million years old.
Some people who enjoy seeing the birds have kept them around their farm properties where shelter is provided and where they will eat bird seed from ground feeders in backyards, especially yards with shrub cover.
FISH SYMPOSIUM >> The Lake Marburg Fishing Advisory Committee is holding the fourth annual Lake Marburg Fishing Symposium on Saturday, Feb. 15, at the Dub's Church Annex, Dubs Church Road.
Seminars will be presented on bowfin, catfish and the red-bellied turtle. Refreshments will be available. Doors will open at 8 a.m. The snow date will be Feb. 22.
OYSTER POACHERS >> The Maryland Department of Natural Resources reported arresting a Virginia truck driver and seizing a tractor-trailer rig loaded with undersized oysters.
The truck contained 188 bushes of oysters. DNR officers and cadets took more than six hours to measure every oyster. All but one of the bushels contained bivalves measuring below the legal limit of three inches. The DNR says 187 bushels were illegal. Maximum state fine is $1,000 per bushel. They said the illegal oysters, which filled the bed of a one-ton pickup truck, represented the daily limit of 16 oystermen power dredging and was worth more than $8,000.
This is the halfway point in the state's six-month harvest season, a time when poachers tend to keep undersized oyster to make up for increased scarcity. The DNR said the smaller oysters were returned to an Eastern Shore oyster sanctuary.