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Joined: Jan 2006
Posts: 15,456 Likes: 86
Sidelock
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Sidelock
Joined: Jan 2006
Posts: 15,456 Likes: 86 |
There are a handful, if that many, of SW GA quail plantations that offer wild quail hunting to the paying public. Usually reserved for the owner's family and friends, a few days a year are opened on a limited basis. A friend took his son and another father-son to such a plantation and a day and half hunting was $25,000 for the 4. This included lodging and meals. I wouldn't no more believe they were wild quail than I believe a horse could fly.
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Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 13,206 Likes: 1179
Sidelock
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Sidelock
Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 13,206 Likes: 1179 |
There are a handful, if that many, of SW GA quail plantations that offer wild quail hunting to the paying public. Usually reserved for the owner's family and friends, a few days a year are opened on a limited basis. A friend took his son and another father-son to such a plantation and a day and half hunting was $25,000 for the 4. This included lodging and meals. I wouldn't no more believe they were wild quail than I believe a horse could fly. 'Tis so. Mostly around the Albany to Thomasville area. It's probably the only place left, east of the Mississippi, that has such a vast area managed for wild quail. As Gil said, that's the "secret". These 1000 acre tracts won't cut it for really allowing wild bird numbers to build back from the few coveys already there. They need tens of thousands of contiguous acres. You can help, on small tracts, but nothing like what's in SW GA. Chokee Plantation, near Leesburg, is such a place. A couple years ago the going rate was $11,500 per gun. SRH
May God bless America and those who defend her.
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Joined: Mar 2011
Posts: 2,988 Likes: 108
Sidelock
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Sidelock
Joined: Mar 2011
Posts: 2,988 Likes: 108 |
I love to quail hunt, but not enough to pay $11,500 per gun per hunt. There must be tons of money in Georgia if folks can afford that!
Socialism is almost the worst.
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Joined: Mar 2011
Posts: 4,091 Likes: 486
Sidelock
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Sidelock
Joined: Mar 2011
Posts: 4,091 Likes: 486 |
Not that many Georgia folks own the plantations much less have the money to pay the fees to hunt such places. The folks who own plantations often commute to Thomasville and Albany by private jets. Just so happens my friend at this point of his life realizes he can't take it with him and he couldn't possibly spend it all if he tried. I'm not sure if Chokee still offers the wild bird hunts to the public but that's one of the places h he has hunted, but not this year. He also owns 6500 acres of quail property near here, but on one tract it's early season released birds on 1500 acres; on 5000 acres 60 miles from the 1500, he's attempting to resurrect wild bird populations with a plan formulated by Tall Timbers. Neither place are within 200 miles of SW Ga. Gil
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Joined: Mar 2011
Posts: 4,091 Likes: 486
Sidelock
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Sidelock
Joined: Mar 2011
Posts: 4,091 Likes: 486 |
Go to Google Earth. "Thomasville, Ga." There's a patch of land 30 x 20 miles to the SW. Note the absence of production fields, but a wad of smaller patches, food plots. Then travel down to Iamonia, FL, just below the Ga/FL line. Zoom in to an area; doesn't much matter where. You'll note checkerboarding. This is "blocking" which is usually 30 x 30 or 40 x 40 yards. Lanes are cut through the underbrush and grasses to allow food trails to be established for the wild birds. It also facilitates bird hunting. With two guns walking in different lanes with the dog handler flushing, it's a safe approach to the covey. This is just a sampling of the scale of bird plantations near Thomasville and Albany.
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Joined: Jan 2006
Posts: 15,456 Likes: 86
Sidelock
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Sidelock
Joined: Jan 2006
Posts: 15,456 Likes: 86 |
Ames Plantation with the University of Tennessee studying it can't have wild quail.
And you think they can.
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Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 7,704 Likes: 103
Sidelock
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Sidelock
Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 7,704 Likes: 103 |
They'll figure out the wild quail problem one day. It won't be in time for you and me though jOe...Geo
At least we enjoyed the best of the end of it!
Last edited by Geo. Newbern; 01/13/19 01:08 PM. Reason: added final sentence
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Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 13,206 Likes: 1179
Sidelock
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Sidelock
Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 13,206 Likes: 1179 |
I see small coveys of wild birds at least once a week, this time of year. I saw a covey fly across the highway Friday afternoon. But, the coveys are very small, seldom over 10 birds each. My hat's off to the little boogers. They are true survivors, of whatever it is that decimated their numbers.
I bought a 526 acre farm in 1989 that had been repossessed by Farmer's Home in 1979. It had sat idle for 10 years, and had grown up in broomsage, scattered briar patches and volunteer pines. Beautiful habitat. There was at least 10 coveys of wild birds on the place. I had to cultivate the fields to plant crops, in order to pay for the place. We got a couple of good years of bird hunting on it, but the coveys dwindled down to about 2-3, which remain to this day. I see them often, but seldom try to hunt them.
SRH
May God bless America and those who defend her.
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Joined: May 2008
Posts: 8,158 Likes: 114
Sidelock
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Sidelock
Joined: May 2008
Posts: 8,158 Likes: 114 |
Just out of curiosity- re-reading a SC article 2013 about the National held on the old Hobart Ames property.(1) Are the birds pen-raised, or native stock? (2) Do they shoot the birds over the dawgs points, or flush them and fire blank shells instead, as they do with dog trials here in MI-??
"The field is the touchstone of the man"..
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Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 2,993 Likes: 302
Sidelock
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Sidelock
Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 2,993 Likes: 302 |
Its complicated fox.
The grounds at Ames are managed to differentiate between the most elite birddogs.
So, in field trials, no shooting of birds is done. Thats not the purpose. But, there have to be enough on the courses for the dogs to find enough over the course of three hours to differentiate between the best and all the rest. So, they supplement the native stocks.
Out there doing it best I can.
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