Bobwhite Quail (Colinus virginianus)

Bobwhite Quail (male)

The Northern Bobwhite Quail (Colinus virginianus), which is known by many as:
Bobwhite Quail
” Bobwhite “
Quail

belongs to the order galliformes derived from the Latin term gallinaceous meaning ” of poultry”.  Colinus meaning quail and virginianus implying the first species was discovered in Virginia. These beautiful creatures, related to turkeys and chickens -gallinaceous- utilize their short legs as they move about throughout upland habitat foraging for seeds, insects and select fruits.  Their beaks which serve a multipurpose role, are stout and short which are ideal for their feeding characteristics, primarily consisting  of upland habitat related seeds and forage.

They possess a beautiful coloration of plumage and the male and female are easily distinquishable by their plumage colors. The male bobwhite quail has a white band of feathers underneath his beak and a white stripe on each side of his head.  The stripes on the side of his head start at the base of the beak and both end at the rear, lower portion of his head.  The female on the other hand, doesn’t possess these white streaks of feathers but rather these bands of feathers are a light brown on the females.  Thus making it easy to distinquish between the male and the female bobwhites.

Bobwhite quail have a high mortality rate and 80% die before they are a year old mostly due to predation of avian species and reptiles such as snakes.  Snakes and birds devour many of the eggs prior to their hatching as well as catch many of the small birds for food as well.  Make no doubt about it, avian species impose a significant threat to these birds feasting on many of the birds within a covey.

Nature however has a method in which to compensate for the overall quick mortality rate amongst bobwhites as well as many other species of quail.  During a good breeding season they are able to have a couple of clutches of eggs with numbers as high as 25 eggs per.

A Beauty of the Wild World.

Beauty of the Wild

When talking to various persons abroad not only in my hometown but within different capacities that i serve in, i have spoken with various persons about the wonderful world of nature.  It is somewhat neat to me when speaking of wild things, they shun the topic about Snakes.

It is not that I love them, neither do i lie down with them.  Let me explain further, i remember a story told of a man in the bush at one time and was caught in a torrential downpour such that he flipped his canoe upside down and slept the night underneath the canoe.  He awoke at some time to discover a cottonmouth moccasin lying underneath the canoe with him.  He simply looked at it and went back to sleep. Talk about being at peace with the natural world…

Now I may not go so far as to execute a feat such as this but when i do run across snakes in the wild I understand that they like any other breathing organism serve and fulfill a select niche.  It is the understanding of this role that they play in the natural world and the niche that they fulfill that brings them even greater respect for they certainly do a great job of ridding the world of vast array of pests including large amounts of insects.

Some of them are not only beautiful because of their excellence in fulfilling their niche but some are beauties on the outward appearance as well.

Now there are none so beautiful as the Diamondback Rattler and recently when i was in Texas i saw in about one months time approximately 15 of these babies.

Due to my business at the time i had to allow many of them to just move along but i managed to perform a little wildlife management and harvest one of these Diamondback Rattle snakes, to utilize it’s skin on the limbs of a custom made Osage Orange bow that i am presently making.

I did learn that they are really a misunderstood species in regards to their assumed aggression.  It was not the case with me, in my experiences with them, many of them simply attempted to get away as I attempted to get them to coil and rattle.  I attempted to agitate them to the point of aggression and couldn’t manage to cause, not one, to coil up and rattle.

Out of approximately 15 snakes not once did i have one respond with any rattling whatsoever.  It was neat just to be able to see such a beauty in the wild world of nature out there doing what they do best, fulfilling their niche and presenting me with awe-inspiring appreciations.

Signed Chris Harrell

Duck Impoundments: Installing Water Level Regulators

Creating your very own waterfowl impoundment is certainly within arm’s reach if you presently have a flooded swamp or dammed creek upon your property.

If you already have ducks that is great but this article and it’s advice contained therein will aid in creating a more sought after waterfowl magnet.  You will be able to create your very own personal waterfowl honeyhole for your family and friends to enjoy.  The installation of the following devices are bi-fold in their purposes.

One being that the regulation of water levels prevents flooding of agricultural and timberland resources.  Millions of dollars worth of damage are wrought every year by flooding. The mere prevention of these losses is surely to make any landowner happy with your installation of said devices. Second, with the abilities to regulate the depths of waters in any given beaver swamp (pond) one is not only benefiting puddle ducks by creating shallower depths, but also benefiting the entire community of wetlands plants and many other wildlife species as well.

Sunlight is now able to penetrate areas of waters whereas before it couldn’t, due to depths.  Now with this newly received sunlight reaching the bottom of the swamp, the dormant seedbed which contain many sought after waterfowl plants can be birthed.  Many of these plant species thrive in 8-10″ of water maximum.  All the more reason for the insertion of such water regulators to create this much needed depth throughout the majority of the wetland.

Many amphibians, reptiles, mammals, songbirds and waterfowl all thrive when a wetland environment is maintained to produce these natural hydrophytes, not to forget to mention phytoplankton which produces half of the world’s oxygen through their photosynthesis which is another topic altogether.

It is this manipulation of water levels in swamp environments that produces this magnitude of abundant plant and wildlife species.

There are many hunting preserves, state and federal lands which use electrical driven gate valves and such to regulate water levels in many wildlife management impoundment areas across North America.  But the plans that you see below are some of the more feasible, economical plans for the do-it-yourselfer waterfowl manager.

Below you will find some convenient, economical methods that you and a buddy can implement into your duck swamp with minimal cost and efforts.  Furthermore, one should be able to complete the job in less than an hour.

It will require just a little bit of work but you shouldn’t reach exhaustion.  All you will need for the implementation of the water regulators are the prefabricated parts of the regulators and a pick-ax or two.  Once you have built the regulators, head to the swamp and grab your pick-ax.

Simply knock away some of the top of the dam and allow the current to wash the remnants downstream.  It gets a little easier after you finally get the water flowing.  Not really as hard as one might assume.  Pick your way downwards into the dam to reach the level where you are wanting your pipe to be placed.  Install your pipe and stake everything as well as your cage enclosures.  You can leave this valley through the dam open and the beaver will readily build right over top of your new pipe shortly after your departure, not affecting your new installation.

Feel free to copy the plans below for your convenience and usage.

These water levelers will prevent beavers from attempting to block the pipe’s water intake area.  The pipe’s engineered facets will allow the pipe to take in water without creating any type of water gurgling or running noises.  It is these water noises which trigger beavers into attempting to repair all leaking areas of the impoundment.

You will want to have the end of the pipe that is on the opposite side of the dam elevated to the appropriate position to the depth you would like your impoundment.  In essence this end of the pipe is to be elevated higher than the side in your impoundment.  This end is the means whereby you regulate your depths dependent upon how high or low this end is.

Due to the fact that the devices are completely submerged allows water levels to be manipulated with ease.  Because the beavers will not hear running water they will build on top of the pipe securing it in place, with the intentions of repairing what it was the you altered.  However, they will not attempt to build around the pipes’  intake areas due to it’s stealth in intaking water.

The beaver will usually get to work reconstructing the dam that you altered, shortly after you depart the area, actually further securing your device in place.

Check out some of the different devices below and their descriptive notes for your usage.

Simply click on the plans diagrams below to ENLARGE

Click on plans for larger view of Drilled Pipe water leveler
Drilled Pipe Water Leveler

Drilled Pipe Exploded View
click on image below

Take care guys and remember never wade in swamps without having in your possession a wading stick with you at all times which is a helpful tool to prevent major incidents.  These wading staffs can be used for multiple applications during an emergency.  You will want to ensure that you have a stout lanyard on the handle end with about a 10″ loop which works great to lasso around an object in the event of stepping or falling in a deep hole.

Be safe out there and take care,

Chris

Beneficial Factors of Beavers

Yeah i know….

Right now you are wondering like so many, “What in the world can possibly be beneficial about a beaver?”   “I lost so much of so and so to beavers!”, you state.

Please don’t hang me just yet but rather hear me out.  There are so many of us that have heard all of the negative facets of beavers and such by their havoc created by extensive floodings.

But there are great goods created by this neat creature that affect man’s environment when they are fulfilling their niche of creating wetlands habitats.  Some of the many positive arenas of the wetlands, created by the beavers damming of waterways, is the prevention of erosion and contaminant runoffs.  The newly created wetland area is a filtration system that leaches out dangerous chemicals and such from agricultural lands and many other pollutants that make their way into our streams.  The dammed waterway improves our water quality thus benefitting fish, wildlife and man.

This ecosystem created by beavers also benefits many of our other furbearing animals and provides water during times of drought that are oft times utilized by farmers as they pump water out for the irrigation of croplands.  Furthermore, the increase of waterfowl specifically the wood duck has drastically increased since the inception of the beaver into North America.  Wood ducks utilize this environment for feeding, roosting, and the development of young which provides a safe haven against predators.

That ol’ Beaver’s created some trouble…

The Beaver (Castor canadensis)

Castor – “Beaver” ,  canadensis – “first collected beavers came from Canada”

The Beaver, a unique structural engineer being the second largest rodent in the world are growing and very numerous in North America.  But it hasn’t always been this way until 1939 when conservation groups of government affiliations and other agencies reintroduced the beaver into North America.  Those beavers bred and multiplied exponentially over the years to follow, reaching numbers as high as 60 million.

But since 1988 those population numbers have drastically reduced as they are now in the range of  6-12 million respectively.

Beavers are nocturnal mammals that excel in their detailed oriented construction of dams which are capable of holding large amounts of water, thus creating an entirely new ecosystem.  It is in this new ecosystem that supports the growth of various types of hydrophytes which are not found anywhere else except in a wetlands environment.  Furthermore, this new ecosystem becomes the home to various species of reptiles, amphibians and mammals which thrive on this ecosystem created by the flooded woodlands.

Although the beaver is fulfilling a wonderful niche and carrying out their designs there are times when they need to be dealt with through sound management practices, thus excluding them from an area.   Beavers are so good at what they do: engineering and building dams that it creates some unpleasant side-effects if left unchecked by their creation of dams and the oft times extensive damages wrought by their flooding that is created.

In the State of North Carolina, Beavers create approximately 5.5-6.7 million dollars of property damage yearly throughout the state, leaving behind damaged and altered landscapes, eroded and damaged agricultural lands, damaged road beds, loss of valuable forest resources and damage to public roads and highways caused by their extensive flooding of what was at one time a drainage way or natural watershed.  The NC Department of Transportation alone spends over 1 million dollars a year to repair these damaged roads and highways.

It is these unpleasant by-products of the beaver’s ingenious activities that have to be dealt with at times by State approved exclusion techniques to remove the beavers from your property.

The approved methods in most states are by the utilization of full body traps that euthanize the animal quickly and effectively.  The traps that are on the market today have undergone extensive research, engineering and field studies.  These field studies and research were performed by wildlife management professionals and biologists from various geographical locations to ensure that only the designs that dispatch animals quickly and effectively, would be manufactured and thus sold.  Furthermore, the usage of these traps are further regulated by local State laws regulating the where, when and hows of using the trap.  It is the consolidation of these trap’s designs, the regulated usage of and the methods of use that are known globally in the trapping arena as (BMP’s) – Best Management Practices – for trapping.

Now that we have talked about some of the negative facets that can created by a beaver let us briefly describe some of the beneficial factors that this beautiful creature is capable of creating.

signed Chris Harrell

My Philosophy of Prescribed Burns for Wildlife Management

In regards to forest fires and prescribed burns, do I think that the adopted philosophy that the United States Forestry Services has adapted is good overall?

I don’t necessarily agree with it, primarily because I understand and have seen the effects of forest fires of the incidental and prescribed means. I have seen the good that has came out of them. I understand that a monitored prescribed burn can work wonders in a woods or abandoned fields in regards to habitat re-development and construction for various wildlife species including but not limited to mammals, reptiles, amphibians, avian species and bundles of insects that  feast on the natural forbs that are birthed after a forest fire.

I understand that if a burn is monitored, it does very little damage to the mature stands and yearling timber, if the wind, season and water table are all taken into consideration during a live burn.

In my opinion and recollection it seems to do more good than harm.  I know that early successional plants volunteer themselves in the types of soil that are left behind, which have being lying dormant in the seedbed.  Life of various plant species and natural forbs are brought to life through the release of nitrogen and other organic compounds that are released during a fire of the old growth.

Great forage for many mammals and songbirds, including our prized whitetail deer, cottontail rabbit, and bobwhite quail and more benefit tremendously from the habitat created during this early succession after a burn.  The rabbits and quail multiply in great numbers throughout the early successional growth which typically grows back after a burn. They utilize this type of vegetation for cover and concealment for the raising and development of young as well as feeding on the numerous available seedlings.

I also understand that we the believers are the minority. There are so many in ‘high places’ that say if we burn a selected tract of woods that we are responsible for our smoke and such. This is understandable to a certain degree. But not the none sense here of a federal government funded entity such as the forestry service that has been giving the authority to maintain our present forestry resources having their hands tied.  The prescribed burns initiated and executed by them has begun to diminish greatly as they feel threatened of being sued due primarily to the issue of this smoke creating cancers and such in nearby livestocks.

Because of scenes such as a hog farmer that claimed his hogs developed cancer from the smoke that swept across his farm from a nearby burn.  I think that is rubbish, “What about your stinking hogs my man that stink for miles and your lagoons that overflow into our streams and rivers killing phytoplankton and fishes during this overflow?” Answer this one for my dear hog farmer to which the smell remains much longer than any lingering effects of smoke.  Not to forget that the death of phytoplankton robs the air of precious oxygen just as your argument of smokes.

Phytoplankton account for half of the photosynthetic activity that occurs on earth thereby producing most of the oxygen content on the earth’s atmosphere.  Wow, now thats a lot of oxygen that can be potentially killed when our rivers and such are permitted to be polluted. Another subject altogether.

The point i am trying to convey is that the benefits of a prescribed burn far outweigh any losses or negative facets taking place during a prescribed burn.

A prescribed burn is a very beneficial factor to the overall growth and management of wild species including game.  However we are living in a day of unprecedented habitat loss, shortage of fertile habitats, urban sprawl and lawsuit happy persons.  Such has had a diminishing effect on prescribed burns being utilized for management practices.  Unfortunately.

By the way there are many forested areas that are significantly overtaken by undergrowth making them a prime candidate for prescribed burns.  This would certainly rid the forest of overwhelmingly thick undergrowth which prevents new forage from entering the scenario.

It is time for some persons of understanding to educate the uneducated in this realm.  For there truly lies dormant in those seed beds new forbs which would significantly increase the overall production of wildlife and songbirds.  There are uncovered treasures that lie therein that are awaiting to be released.

Let us release these early successional plant growths by rendering and executing a well planned and monitored live burn.

signed – Chris Harrell

 

Turkey’s Reproductive Capabilities

You know every spring, turkey hunters flock to the turkey woods in order to pursue one of the most beautiful birds in the natural world:

That is the the beautiful wild turkey (Meleagris gallopavo)

Although not the same bird of course, but the species have been hunted for thousands of years. There are even records of many persons hunting the wild turkey prior to Christopher Columbus discovering the western world. Neat that such a beautiful creature has survived and passed on such healthy genetics throughout the years to it’s offspring.

Speaking of offspring that brings a topic to mind in regards to Turkey and the manner in which they breed and produce young.

Although Turkeys are able to breed like most other vertebrates through sexual reproduction involving both sexes: the hen and the gobbler.  They are also capable of producing eggs through a process known as parthenogenesis.  Although it is spoken of by some that the hen turkey is capable of producing eggs through what is known as asexual reproduction, the manner in which most invertebrates are known to reproduce, it would be more correctly stated that she does so through a process known as parthenogenesis (fertilizing an egg without copulation with a male).

The female has a sac or storage area, if you will, called sperm storage tubules where  sperm can be stored for up to 75 days after copulation with a male and maintain it’s vitality. When her biological timeclock decides to release an egg (ovum)  from her ovaries, they are fertilized at this moment.

Why would turkeys possess such a unique quality in the arena of producing young?

Well although the exact design motives are not that clear, “May it be the creator’s motive to produce a feature that would enable it to successfully survive amongst it’s natural predators?”,  could be a potential argument.  The turkey’s location in the food chain possibly has bearing on the engineering behind the turkey’s ability to reproduce in this manner.

… They are rather low on the food chain, the ground walking fowl, that is. Let’s think about it, many birds every year fall prey to coyotes, wolves, dogs, fox and other predators, man being included.

Was it with this forethought that God made the original blueprint for the turkey so that the species could multiply and grow exponentially without fear of losses during their breeding cycles?

With this capability the females being much more numerous than males, the females don’t have to await to his presence by relying on process of parthenogenesis.  She can produce her eggs and fertilize them at will when she sees fit.

Furthermore, during a season when avian predators, snakes, badgers, raccoons and other ground predators on on the prowl locating these eggs; nature has a way of ensuring that every female can produce fertilized eggs amidst the shortage of the gobblers in the hen to gobbler ratios.  All in the wonderful creator’s original design, “Wow what engineering?”

Once again we have enjoyed learning what it is that the natural world does best.  That is to bring us to awe, to it’s intricacies and details, in the complexities of how every organism relies on one another and the survival of the species lies buried in their physiological capabilities.

So next year when you are out hunting, take a moment to appreciate this magnificent creature that we call the Wild Turkey.

Beauty revealed, even if they aren’t a gobbler in full strut.

Until next time, take care  -  Chris Harrell