Bobwhites may be aged to young of the year (birds hatched in the latest breeding season) and older birds. The older birds are more than a year old but you cannot tell how much more.

Young of the year have one or more white tips on feathers called the primary coverts (see arrow in accompanying image; original photo by Dale Rollins). The primaries are the large flight feathers on the outer part of the wing. The primary coverts are a group of feathers that overlap the primaries towards the front of the wing.

The wings of older birds have solid-colored brown to grey-brown primary coverts (no white tipping).

Aging bobwhites gives a notion of productivity in the last breeding season. In Oklahoma, a ratio of two to three young per adult indicates low production. A ratio of four indicates average production and a ratio of five indicates high production.

A continuing mystery to fans of the bobwhite is how any chicks ever survive to adulthood. Chicks weigh but six grams (one-fifth ounce) upon hatching. They lack the ability to generate body heat (they’re cold-blooded) for the first four weeks after hatch. During this time, adults brood (cover chicks with their body and wings) to keep the little ones warm.

The first four weeks after hatch are critical for bobwhite chicks. During this time, they tend to experience high death rates to various causes.

Chicks can fly at about two weeks old.

The diet of chicks must contain high amounts of protein during the first few weeks of life. During this time the young birds eat large quantities of insects and spiders, which consist mainly of protein. The birds reach a maximum growth rate at about thirty-five days of age. They reach adults size at about 150 days old.

The survival rate of chicks from hatch to adult size is about 50%. This means that fifty of every 100 hatchlings enter the adult population in fall.

Studies of the bobwhite diet indicate that they eat hundreds of species of plants and animals. The most important food by bulk changes with geographic location and season. For example, the seeds of western ragweed (photo) are extremely important in the winter diet of bobwhites in the southern Great Plains.

Greens are good sources of vitamins and water but provide few calories.

The seeds of wild grasses such as bristlegrass provide moderate loads of calories. Domestic cereal grasses such as wheat, milo, and corn are loaded with carbohydrates and calories but are insufficient in protein.

Forbs (broad-leaved herbs) provide important seed foods. Members of the sunflower, euphorb, and legume families are notable providers of fats, carbohydrates, and protein.

Invertebrates (insects, spiders) are essential for the protein nutrition of breeding bobwhites. These animals are excellent all-around foods whenever they are available.

The fall shuffle is an annual event in the lives of bobwhites. In the 1930s, the shuffle was considered a coming together and mixing of singles, pairs, and small broods. These movements created the best covey size of about eleven birds. Coveys of eleven survive the winter at higher rates than smaller or larger coveys.

In the 1950s, the shuffle was also described as movement from summer to winter range and back. The range shift might involve distances of a few hundred yards or several miles. Early-day biologists believed bobwhites in western Oklahoma moved ten miles or more from summer to winter range.

Of course, some bobwhites occupy range that is suitable as summer and winter cover; such birds likely follow the old notion that bobwhites generally stay within a quarter-miles radius of where they hatched.

Seasonal range shifts sometimes explain why bobwhites disappear from areas at the end of summer, only to reappear at the start of the next breeding season. They have simply shifted ranges. Winter ranges are characterized by more woody cover than summer ranges.

Few people realize that blistering summer days are downright dangerous to bobwhites.

The bobwhite heat index, like that of humans, runs higher than air temperature. On a day with air temperature the same as a bobwhite’s body temperature (108 ^oF), virtually all the cover available to bobwhites becomes hot enough to cause moderate to severe thermal stress.

When thermally stressed, bobwhites cool themselves with gular flutter, a vibration in the throat region. This evaporates water and cools in the same sense as a panting dog.

Heat stress, as evidence by gular flutter, is a problem for most incubating bobwhites when air temperature exceeds 95 ^oF.

Bobwhite heat indexes high enough to kill bobwhites are common on hot days. Fortunately, the sun goes down before we lose birds from heat overload.

Manage against heat stress by insuring that mid-day coverts (sand plum, fragrant sumac, other woody cover) are well dispersed on the management area; these coverts provide cool sites for resting. Also insure that ground cover is boot-top high. Temperatures of bare soil can exceed 150 ^oF on hot, sunny days.

Before the 1980s, biologists believed bobwhite hens produced at most one brood during a breeding season. The subsequent confirmation of second and third broods produced by the same hen was an interesting biological discovery.

The same hen does not necessarily attend to all broods. She might turn incubation and brood-rearing duties over to a male, or she might abandon a brood early so that she can begin another nesting attempt.

The first brood, however, remains the major influence on production. It puts around 70% of chicks on the ground with about 28% coming from second broods and 2% from third.

Third broods have piddling effects because it is improbable that a hen will be associated with three successful hatches. Indeed, only about three of every 1,000 hens might raise three broods in a typical year.

You cannot tell which nesting attempt a hen is on later in the breeding season. However, late July through September hatches may represent multiple brooding.

Bobwhite hens begin to lay about mid-April. During the next three weeks, there is a threshold-like increase in laying activity in the population. The activity remains high through May, and the last hatches may occur in early October.

The number of eggs in a nest averages 13–14 over the nesting season. However, nests laid earlier have more eggs than those laid later. For example, nests started on May 15 average 15 eggs, whereas those started on August 15 average ten eggs.

Males and females incubate the eggs. This is not a sharing of duties. Rather, the individual responsible for a nest handles all incubation, which lasts 22–24 days.

The main function of an incubating adult is to keep the eggs warm when it is cool and cool when it is hot. High temperatures are more likely to kill the embryo in an egg than low temperatures. The average temperature in a bobwhite nests hovers are around 86 ^oF, which is below the temperature recommended for artificial incubation (99 ^oF).

The eggs hatch more or less at the same time. The attending adult may take chicks away from the nest soon after hatching or remain at the nest for several hours.

March brings the fading of winter and the flourishing of spring. It is a good month to judge the status of nesting cover for bobwhites.

Bobwhites nest under many different species of plants. As a group, though, perennial grasses such as little bluestem and western wheatgrass are most important.

During March, these grasses form what is called residual nesting cover. It is the dead-standing stems and fine leaves of grasses that grew in the last growing season. Bobwhite hens nest in residual clumps at least a foot tall and a foot in diameter.

Such clumps should be broadly available when hens start laying about the middle of April. In general, the greater the number of nesting clumps, the better the odds that a nest will be successful (less likely to be lost to a predator).

Also, nesting cover available early in the nesting season fosters the all-important first attempt. This attempt puts about seventy percent of chicks on the ground that are going to hatch in a typical breeding season.

The roosting circle formed by bobwhites is a unique behavior among quail. California and Gambel’s quail roost in the limbs of brush. Scaled quail roost on the ground but individuals in a covey are scattered about.

The roosting circle of bobwhites is thought to serve two purposes. First, it gives a 360-degree field of vision for a covey. The broad field of vision may assist birds in detecting the approach of ground predators.

Second, the circle is a means of heat conservation. Bobwhites roost in a compact formation with tails together and heads pointing out. Because of this huddling, heat lost by one bird is absorbed by the next. The net effect is that bobwhites burn less food energy because of the roosting circle and therefore they need less food than if they roosted as singletons.

During extremely cold nights, the roosting circle may morph into a disorderly pile of bobwhites. This behavior has been observed in the laboratory and in the field. Birds at the bottom of the pile experience temperatures much higher than air temperature.

The oft-repeated dogma is that bobwhites experience 80% mortality each year, which implies 20% survival. These numbers apply to birds that have reached adult size. Actually, bobwhites in southern climes sustain about 70% annual mortality (30% annual survival). The survival rate varies from year to year wherever bobwhite populations persist.

Nest survival typically averages 30% with values of 40–50% commonly reported. Bobwhites counteract low nest success rates with large clutches and multiple nesting attempts.

The annual survival rate starting at the drop of an egg is quite shocking. We might expect 100 eggs to yield five adults a year hence (95% loss).

Bobwhites in Oklahoma reach adult weight (6.3 ounces) at about 150 days after hatching. In September, all birds—younger, older, male, female—average about 6.3 ounces if they are at least 150 days old. Bobwhites north of Oklahoma tend to weigh more, while bobwhites south of Oklahoma tend to weigh less.

After September, the average weight begins to increase. October bobwhites average 6.5 ounces, November bobwhites 6.8 ounces, and December bobwhites 6.9 ounces. A few trophy birds might exceed 8.3 ounces.

After December, there is an orderly decline in bobwhite weights. By March, birds weigh about the same as they did in the preceding September.

Actually, the heaviest bobwhites of the year are laying females. Their weight increases because of eggs and the reproductive tissue necessary to form eggs.

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