Once birds start visiting your bird feeder, you may see one that you are not familiar with.  The best way to identify an unknown bird species is with a field guide.  There are plenty on the market.  I like the ones that are designated for a specific area or region.  I have the National Audubon Society Field Guide to the Southeastern States and Stokes Beginner’s Guide to Birds of the Eastern Region.  During the migration season you may need to check out a larger field guide because you might see birds that are not native to the area and not found in the local guides.  Field guides in book form make it easy to identify unknown birds by simply thumbing through the pictures and looking for similarities.  The birds may not look exactly like the birds in your yard, but once you have pinpointed a species, you can look online for more pictures.  Birds look different in the summer from the way they look in the winter.  The juvenile bird in a species doesn’t always look like the adult of the species.  That is also the case between the male and female of a species.  The female usually has a duller color scheme to aid in camouflage, while the male will have the brighter plumage in order to attract the female.  This is a Rose-breasted Grosbeak couple.  Notice how they look like two different species of birds, but it is simply the difference in the male / female coloring.  This male cracked the shell and allowed the female to eat the inner seed.

The male Northern Cardinal is very choosy about who he shares the feeder with.  He will run off other Cardinals before perching on the feeder.  The Red-bellied Woodpecker is the same, but seems to be tolerating this Cardinal.

The female Northern Cardinal seems to be a more sociable eater.  I have seen the female Cardinal eat with almost every species of bird that has been on my feeder.  They don’t mind eating with other female Cardinals, but will usually only eat with the male if he is the mate.  Common Grackles normally flock together on the feeder, but only a pair flew down on this day. 

As I wrote before, you don’t even have to leave your house to go bird watching.  I have seen over 16 species of birds just by looking through the sliding glass door at my feeder.  I was able to get much closer to aid in identification and get a good picture.  You are also able to watch how the birds interact with each other.  By watching birds on your feeder, you will notice that bird behavior is just as different between the species as their appearance.  Each day, you see something new and interesting.  It is a very entertaining and rewarding past time.

You don’t have to travel far to become a birdwatcher.  You don’t even have to spend money on an expensive pair of binoculars.  All you have to do is put out a bird feeder, fill it with seed, and sit back and watch. It may take a day or just a few minutes, but once the birds notice the seed, they will start to visit your yard.  Of course, you will have to make a few decisions before you can get started and there is some expense involved.  When I decided to put out a bird feeder, I found out that there are a lot of different types of feeders to choose from as well as different types of bird seed.  If you know the kind of birds that you want to attract and if they are native to the area, then that will narrow your choices.  I choose a platform feeder because I wanted the birds to have a lot of room to move around.  Also, it is easier to view birds on a platform feeder.  I like to watch Northern Cardinals and Blue Jays, so I found out that they liked to eat black oil sunflower seed and cracked / chopped corn.  Some stores have a wild bird mix that includes millet, but when I used it, the millet was always left on the feeder.  Since then I’ve stuck to purchasing a 50 lb. bag of each.  I buy my seed at the farmer’s supply store, because it is a lot cheaper than a specialty bird store.  It is usually fresher, too.

Cardinals like the sunflower seed.

Quail have always been one of my favorite bird since I was a small child.  I remember my father telling me stories about the many coveys that called the family farm home and even at a young age I always knew the distinctive “bob-bob-white” call from the beautiful birds.  Whistling the “bob-bob-white” call on my grandparent’s back porch as the sun went down in the evening is one of many cherished memories that I keep from my late grandmother.  She loved the outdoors and nature as much as anyone that I have ever know.As I grew older the quail covey sightings on the farm became less and less frequent.  Most of the farm became plots of planted pines and very little of the land was used for cultivation.  I still had fun walking around the farm trails and the occasional open areas finding a covey, but the sightings were rare.  The most important thing to me at the time though was getting outside and hiking around the farm on my own.  I was not very good at shooting them anyway and I really enjoyed getting out and finding them more than anything.  I’m sure I would have been more interested if I had a great bird dog on my side, but even today I would rather watch the dog work to find the birds.

The older I got the more interested in hunting I became and the more I started to learn about how to improve the property for wildlife.  I read a lot of information form county wildlife extension offices, books, and also met with county wildlife agent to help access the property for all types of wildlife.  I will discuss many different improvement areas in the future, but for now I will mainly focus on quail habitat.  Most of the ideas for quail are also good for your turkey population and many other wildlife species. 

One fact that you can not ignore

If you do not have any birds, no matter what you do to improve your habitat it will not help.  To improve your quail population you must first have some population.  Your best bet, if you do not have any birds, is to purchase and release some good quality and well raised ones.  Make sure that you purchase them from someone with a good reputation for raising birds that are to be released to the wild.  The birds should have been raised in isolation with little or no exposure to traffic noise, humans, dogs, predators, domestic animals, etc.

Hedge your bets

Any hedge rows, old fence lines, or uncultivated or unharvested rows you can leave on your property, by all means leave them.  Quail need nesting sites and cover from predator as much as anything else.  The lay of the land years ago was a great number of family farms split by various means, all of which created little hideaways, of fences, uncut borders, hedge rows, etc.  By leaving or creating these type of areas on your property you are allowing the quail to hatch and raise their young easier.  Reproduction is the key to increasing your quail population.  The government in many cases will also offset the loss of revenue associated with wildlife management practice, so check with you local county farm agency for details.

Giving up some short-term gains

When dealing with planted pines, giving up some short term gains by thinning prematurely will pay long term benefits to your quail population.  With normal pine thinning almost all the undergrowth is choked out by the needles.  After about five years the planted pines will shade and cover the ground with needles enough to kill off most of the weeds and other sources of food that quail must have to sustain.  By thinning your pines before the food source is eliminated the quail have a diverse and steady supply of food.  Another must for planted pines is to adhere to a good burning program so hardwoods can be suppressed and the steady build up of litter can be eliminated.  It is also a good idea to routinely disc areas around your pines, not only for fire prevention but for diverse habitat for your quails.  Young quail need soft areas to find and hunt insects and seeds.

Diversity and Food Sources

The last thing I want to talk about is diversity and the types of food sources that are available to your growing quail population.  I touched a little on diversity in the last section but here is a list that I feel you need to ensure proper diversity.

• Borders to allow hide aways from predators and nesting areas.
• Various forms of food, planted and native.  Improving and increasing the yield of your native food sources is on of the best practices that can be done easily and does not cost a lot of money at all.
• Uncultivated and uncut areas.  If the property you are working with is being cultivated, try to arrange a 15 foot border that will not be harvested or cut.  Be sure to leave areas uncut for a couple years to allow good nesting areas on your property.
• Limit the number of pesticides that are used on crops and planted plots.  By killing off the insects you eliminate a valuable food source for your quail.
• Create patches that allow your young quail to flourish.  Basically all of the above with added areas of disc or plowed soil to make it easier on your little quail.

To me the most valuable and cost effective ideas is to supplement your native sources of food.  If you have native grains, berries, or nuts on your property simply fertilize those areas to increase your yield.  Native plants are almost always more hardy than anything you can plant and are also more resistant to local insects which might damage planted crops.

I hope this article will give you some ideas on simple ways to improve your quail population.  There are many source out there, one of the best being your local county agencies, that can be found so be sure and read them all.