Point! Makes an excellent case. Upland hunters find ourselves in a dilema. The sport and birds we love have been in a long term decline since the mid 1960's, former states with superior numbers, like Pennsylvania pheasants, Alabama and Georgia quail, have dwindled to remnant populations barely huntable, put and take operations or isolated carefully managed private and pricey habitat. Kansas and South Dakota stand at the apex of the the problem, as the last of the best available. For the record, as a long time hunter of Kansas going back to the late 60's, I can absolutely guarantee that the hunting is a pale comparison to then. With fewer and expensive opportunities elsewhere, it's debatable if we have lost bird hunting opportunities or bird hunters at a faster rate. One thing is certain, the remaining and largely aging, bird hunters are and will continue to find their way to the remaining areas with birds. The concern I here coming through this blog is can this last. Probably not. Already the eastern third of Kansas is primarily lost, a combination of habitat loss, weather changes, farm practices, and population pressure. More pressure stresses an already fragile resource, particularily when quail are considered. We can squeeze waterfowl into small concentrations with carefully managed wetlands, quail and pheasants require huge expanses of ground in specific habitat mixes to acheive the same objective. There is not the will power, and more importantly the financial incentive to reset the clock, barring some natural or man made cataclism. At 56 years of age, I expect, from a practical standpoint, to see an end to wild bob white quail hunting in my lifetime. None the less, I work and pray dillegently to avoid this daily, honestly not sure I even want to live in a world without bobwhite quail. I wish I had savored the glory days even more than I did. I guess we enjoy what we have, for as long as we can. The pressure of states to balance budgets, on farmers to turn a profit, competition for a dwindling resource, will drive up costs to hunt, drive off potential participants, and push the sport toward elitism, much like Europe. The Kansas program of WIHA and other efforts in a handful of other states, is one of the few bright spots if we don't kill the golden goose, by loving it to death.
