I am not a “beginner” to all things “Hunting”. I consider myself an avid, experienced, and dedicated hunter. My first shotgun was a Christmas gift at the age of eight, I have been in deer stands with my father since I was five, and I have hunted my way across the US. I hunt because I love being outdoors, I love the camaraderie of friends and family, and mostly….I love to cook and eat. Cooking and creating recipes from the memories we have in the woods is what I love to do. Every roast of venison, filet of cobia, every rabbit, every duck breast, each one has a story. What did it take to get to that hunting spot? Who was with you? How were the conditions? The weather? What kind of crazy, funny, amazing, or dangerous turn of events happened on that hunt? Every little piece of information from that trip is etched into your mind and you get to re-live those wonderful times when you cook that meal. This is what drives me to get up at four o’clock in the morning, to get countless pounds of gear prepped, drive, travel, to sit in the rain\snow\sleet…in the dark. So, I am not trying to toot my own horn here, I am just trying to establish that I am not a total “newbie” in this whole hunting thing. Ok?
Now that we have that out of the way, I can be honest and say that I didn’t know a damn thing about Quail Hunting. Yes….I know what I am doing when it comes to deer, ducks, turkey, dove, small game….even grouse. But Quail? Nope…sorry….I have read enough….but just never had the opportunity to go…
My First Quail Hunt
One cold February morning I was fortunate enough to get a crash course on “Quail Etiquette”. My first time was a rather eye-opening experience. I got an invite to hunt on a private plantation down in south west Georgia. And by “private plantation” I mean a 110% BAD-ASS, private, 4,500-acre, prestigious hunting plantation that has been dedicated to quail hunting since some time after the Civil War. This place was unbelievable. Imagine having the financial means to manage thousands of acres to the dedication of sustaining a wild quail population day in and day out. I am talking hundreds of thousands of dollars and dozens of skilled workers that focus year-round on catering to a wild bird population that has potential predators around every corner (or tree). This land does not make any money. Right? You get it? It is not farmed, they do not charge groups to come and hunt, there are no corporate retreats. This is an “invite only” kind of place….ie.. you gotta know someone. If you ever, ever, ever get an invite or the chance to go to one of these places….do it….I mean…you have my permission to skip work, cancel that anniversary dinner, I hate to say this but there are very few things I can think of that would outweigh an experience like this.
Alright let’s talk about the crash course that started at 4am. I get up early, I was up and ready to go at about 4:15 downstairs at my girlfriend’s (at the time) parents’ home. My soon to be father in-law got the invite the day before and just told me to be up and ready at 4:30. Done. The second he saw me sitting in the kitchen, he asked me in a disapproving sort of way…”uh is that what you are going to wear?” I was in wearing jeans, boots, and a fleece. I looked at him….. he looked like he just walked out of an Orvis magazine add. He had all the cool stuff, Russell boots, “Briar Proof” riding pants, Barbour jacket, and some kind of expensive oiled hat with a feather in it. I kid you not! So yes, I figured out real fast that my clothes were going to make him look bad. He gave me an old Barbour jacket, a green sweater with a padded shooting patch on the right shoulder, and some leather gloves. I added some khakis to the mix and I looked almost like I knew what I was doing.
Next, as we were packing up the truck, my future father in-law takes one look at my gun and starts in again…..”uh…is that what you are going to hunt with”? Unbelievable right? I was beginning to think that we were not going hunting at all…maybe we were just getting all gussied up and going to a fancy breakfast. So, I answered the only way I could “yes, I…. uh, was going to hunt with this gun……uh” Needless to say, there was a problem with my gun. It was a Mossberg 20-gauge pump. My father gave it to me when I was a little kid and it is an absolute work horse…. That gun has seen some things man! Deer, dove, ducks, turkey, squirrels, you name it that gun has seen a lot. I know it is not the prettiest of shotguns, but it’s a great gun, and to tell you the truth it was the only 20 gauge I had at the time. Rain, mud, snow, it does not matter…that gun will shoot straight…….. So……obviously I was again making my future father in-law look bad…so he told me to go to his gun cabinet and take the last shotgun on the right-hand side. I followed orders and strapped a 20-gauge Browning Citori into my truck and kept my head down…in hopes of not making another “rookie mistake”.
A little side note here……..there was a little more to the gun choice than just looking good. I am not sure my father in law knew….he seemed to be more concerned with looking the part. But after getting to know our hunting guide, he explained to me that he does not like guiding hunters with semi-auto or pump guns. He explained it as a true safety issue. As he talked about the advantage of over/under or side by side shotguns…his main point was that when your shotgun is “broken open” it will not shoot anyone. He knows that you only have 2 shotgun shells, when those are gone…there is ZERO chance that there is a third hidden in your gun. There is zero chance that you “forgot” that you loaded in extra shell. Our guide liked each of us to keep our shotguns broken open as we followed him to the birds, only when he told us to “lock up” would we be holding guns capable of firing. So, there are some great safety advantages to a “break-away” gun….now keep in mind that I have been on other quail hunts where the guides never mentioned a dislike for semi-autos or pumps….but it makes total sense to me. Either way…I now had the added stress of shooting a gun that was worth more than my entire gun collection combined….I know……times were tough……
Anyway, back to my disappointing first day. It was not all bad, it was actually a once in a lifetime experience. After getting sized up for my horse, having a safety briefing with out guides, and getting an overall rundown of where, what, and when…..we packed up our guns in the scabbards next to our saddles, got all the dogs in the mule drawn wagon, and headed off into the pines. Our guide in front of the line and all of us paired two by two behind him with the wagon bringing up the rear. In the wagon there were two black labs up front sitting with the driver and 3 sets of pointers in their cages behind (I think the dogs were a mix of English Pointers and German Short Haired Pointers). This wagon was straight out of a painting…..titled “Quail Hunting in the 1940’s” or so it seemed. I have to think that this wagon was in this family for at least that long. It was incredible. They had coffee, snacks, etc on board and the mules plodded along as we sauntered along to our hunting area. After about a 20 minute ride the guide turned around and gave us the run-down of what we were about to do. We would be hunting an area of about 600 acres that day. They had not hunted this area yet that year and felt that the quail population was holding strong. He would go first and we would continue to follow in pairs. The pointers would be in front of him tracking the quail in kind of a crisscross pattern. When the dogs found birds and got on point, he would stop his horse and lift his hat straight up in the air. Once his hat was in the air, we all were to stop our horses and wait for his instruction. The first pair of hunters (the pair directly behind him) would get down off their horses, take their shot guns out of their scabbards, break them open, insert two shells, leave them open, and walk to the right and left of him. The guide would point to where the dog was, and the dog would be frozen in place, tail straight out, rock solid. The guide would then walk both hunters up to about 20 feet from the dog. The hunter to the left of the guide (and dog) has 90 degrees to shoot the flushing bird….so from 12 o’clock to 9 o’clock. If the bird goes past 12….it is now in the other hunter’s range (this would be the hunter to the right of the guide). If the bird goes beyond the 9 o’clock line…it is off limits. Keep in mind, this 12 and 9 rule is VERY important…..a very famous vice president shot one of his friends….. See, past 9 o’clock….is where everyone else is…sitting on their horses, watching you……don’t do this….. Once the covey flushed, you shoot your birds, the black labs get to retrieve the quail, while the guide and pointers move on. It was a well oiled machine. Total thing of beauty.
So, in a nutshell, that is how I was introduced to quail hunting. It was amazing. I think it was one of the finest hunting trips I have ever been on. The property was incredible, the hospitality was second to none, the talent of the guides and dogs were unlike anything I had seen before. As I said earlier, if you have the opportunity to hunt at a top notch plantation….do it….. I have been quail hunting a dozen or so times since my fanciful first day and nothing was as “nice” as my first time. Granted, I have never been able to re-live the experience, and I have been to some wonderful hunting resorts and properties since then. Now, I still consider myself a beginner. I don’t think that 10-12 hunting experiences can make you an expert no matter what you are chasing….shoot, I have been deer hunting for 33 years and would consider myself average at best…..but back to the quail. Not everyone can go to these incredible fancy plantations, so what are you to do? Well, fortunately, there are lots of other opportunities to quail hunt that don’t require an invite or being part of some storied southern lineage. There are places you can go that release birds and have paid hunts. Yes, I am sure you have seen some magazine adds for some of them. Depending on where you live, these “hunting preserves” can range from a few hundred to over10,000 acres. They usually offer a range of sporting activities to keep you busy and engaged. These hunting preserves are big “pay to play” destinations. The last hunt we took was just outside Savannah Georgia at a place called the Dorchester Hunting Preserve. The offered lodging, home cooked meals, sporting clays, fishing, and the chance to hunt quail, pheasant, and wild boar. While they did not saddle us up on horses, we took modified jeeps out into the woods with our guides to hunt both wild quail as well as released birds.
Wild Birds or Pen Raised?
Now let’s talk about “wild quail” versus “pen raised and released quail”. Before I get all sorts of Quail Purists mad at me…..let me say that I am not an expert, hence the whole “beginner” part of this article. I do however, ask a lot of questions. And I have been fortunate to have a few great guides that did not mind telling me the finer points of what to do, how to do it, and how they go about their jobs. They explained a lot about how to attract, keep, and maintain wild quail populations. How to fight off predators, how to burn underbrush and when to do it (prescribed burns). Last but definitely not least, they explained how “pen raised” birds differ and how they are susceptible to predation and exposure. Pen raised birds do not help natural populations thrive, they do not help a decimated quail population rebound. If released in large numbers they can actually hurt a native quail population. In the hunting preserve we spoke about above; they do not have a wild bird population (or not one that is of any real size or impact). They release thousands, actually tens of thousands of birds per year. Now, how long do these birds survive? We don’t know. How many are harvested by hunters….that is easy to tell, they just count them up after the hunt. But how many are killed by foxes? By hawks? How many meet their end by the seemingly friendly owl families that are residing in the trees? It is hard to tell, I even heard a story of wild turkeys eating quail chicks before…….yep…..damn! What I do know is that most reputable shooting preserves will have healthy quail coveys. Our dogs pointed the pen raised quail just as we found the wild birds in South Georgia. For the most part, the released birds flushed when the dogs jumped them. These birds were fast as hell in the air. Occasionally there were some birds that refused to get off the ground. These birds would shuffle around, the dogs would have a melt down wanting to go after them, we would leave them alone for the most part. After all we were there to shoot birds, flying birds, it doesn’t take much skill to shoot a bird on the ground….but anyway. My point is that released birds are a ton of fun! You need a great guide, smart dogs, you need to pay attention, and be fast on the draw. Don’t sleep on an invite to one of these hunting preserves. A few days of walking, hunting, eating, and drinking can do everyone some good. Just because the birds are not “wild” or “native” does not change the camaraderie with friends and family. It does not change the beauty of the land. It does not change how great those quail taste as you cook them up for dinner.
Cooking Your Birds
Ok, now for the part of this article that is finally in my wheel-house. I am not a hapless beginner when it comes to the kitchen. Let’s talk about cooking your quail. Don’t be afraid to bring those birds home, if some of your buddies don’t want theirs….take them too! Quail are one of my favorite things to cook. Just like their domesticated cousins (the turkey and chicken) you can serve quail a thousand different ways. Do you have a favorite roasted chicken recipe? Just substitute two (or three) quail per person and have a go at it. Looking for side dishes? Think Thanksgiving and roll with anything from mashed potatoes to stuffing to the dreaded green bean casserole (kidding here). The key to good quail is to make sure you do not overcook your birds! 10 minute cook time in a 350 degree oven is about all you need. Pull the quail and let them rest under a foil tent for a few minutes and you should be all set. If the juices are running clear…you are all set.
A few tips for quail……I like to cut the rib cage out and make my quail “semi-boneless”. Just use a sharp knife or kitchen shears and cut down the side of the breast bone. Remove the rib cage, flatten the bird, season liberally with salt and pepper, and you are ready to rock.
Try our recipe here for Huli Huli Chicken. Or you can use a buttermilk marinade for a few hours and drop your quail in the fryer (this is one of my absolute favorites). Grill or sauté with veggies (try a beurre blank sauce…..reduce half a cup of white wine with your pan drippings….and add a half stick of butter at last minute……..this is incredible). Anything you can do with a chicken…you can do with a quail….just remember……overcooking can ruin your birds real fast! If you want, break out your smoker and dry rub and pair your smoked quail with a White BBQ Sauce.
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