Quail Hunting Forecast  |  10/08/2018

Arkansas Quail Hunting Forecast 2018


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Weather and Conditions

"The nesting season weather in May, June, and July was dry for most of the nesting period, thus I think that nesting was fair to good across Arkansas," says Marcus Asher, quail program coordinator for the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission. "I haven't analyzed our brood surveys yet, but staff are reporting similar to the average numbers of broods."


Habitat and Programs

"Habitat is on the increase on both public and private lands," says Asher. "We have had several partner agencies that have implemented thinning and prescribed burns on their properties. In particular, the Forest Service around Sylamore and Big Piney Ranger Districts, Arkansas Natural Heritage Commission lands, and Arkansas State Parks land. Thousands of acres of improvements have and are occurring on our quail focal area WMAs, as well. The NRCS Working Lands for Wildlife program has funded over 8,000 acres of habitat work in the last two years and AGFC's Acres for Wildlife Native Seed Establishment program keeps increasing with over 1500 acres of native species planted this last year. In addition, we will have another $600,000 that is funded through another NRCS program known as the Regional Conservation Partnership Program.  This will fund projects in the northernmost counties of the Ozarks. Things are looking very bright on the habitat side of things."


Top Spots

The west, central, and northern parts of the state are your best bet for quail, as years of call count and brood survey data show this is where we see the most detections of quail in the state."