“I want to manage for quail” is a statement made by many landowners and managers across Texas. While that is an admirable goal, many landowners balk at using one of the best tools to manage for quail, which is prescribed fire. This notion is understandable, if largely misguided. There are seemingly any number of reasons to avoid applying fire to the landscape, but I won’t list those here to keep you from thinking about reasons not to burn when I’m hoping to get you in the mindset to do just that.

The lack of fire on the landscape today is due to suppression activities that have occurred for at least the last 100 years. The lack of fire has led to the degradation of our habitat and has negatively impacted quail habitat across Texas. We notice degraded vegetation communities as it relates to grass production for livestock and nesting cover and increased woody encroachment. More subtly, if we look closely and with a trained eye, we notice that a lot of important grasses and forbs are missing. Historically much of our rangeland burned on a frequent schedule of 3-5 years. Fire and herbivory shaped the grasslands into what they are today. Certainly, in East and West Texas those fire return intervals were slightly different, due to vegetative productivity and rainfall, but 3-5 years is a good starting interval.

Texas, in general, has been slightly hesitant to embrace use of prescribed fire, but we are improving by putting more prescribed fire acres on the ground. In 2018 we increased our acreage of prescribed fire use by 50,000 acres to a total of 402,017 acres (Texas A&M Forest Service). However, more fire is needed in a state of some 171 million acres. One suggestion to increase acres burned is to expand the “burn season.” Many managers fall victim to the idea of an arbitrary burn season. The typical prescribed burn season is understood to be during winter and early spring, which is the dormant season for warm season plants. In the last 70 years this has become the de facto burn season due to warm season grass response for livestock production.

However, there is nothing sacred about dormant season burns and there are some issues with burning in February and March. Particularly when looking for the correct weather conditions to burn. Managers soon discover that burning all the units planned is difficult due to not having enough days that fall within the prescribed conditions set forth in their burn plans. Perhaps the wind speed and direction are not quite right, humidity is too low, or spring rains have made conditions too wet to safely navigate firebreaks. Burns that are not completed are put at the top of the list for the following year and the list of desired burns becomes longer as burn seasons come and go. It is a vicious cycle when attempting to complete necessary prescribed burns. Especially when you have an eye toward expanding the use of prescribed fire.

Growing season burns can be incredibly beneficial for not only quail and other wildlife, but cattle as well. Protein levels following a growing season burn are higher in grasses than they would have been due to putting the grasses back in the vegetative stage. A common concern with application of growing season burns for quail managers is burning during nesting season. Prescribed burning during bobwhite reproduction is not something that should concern managers. If the conditions are right for reproduction and a nest is consumed by the fire, bobwhites will likely re-nest. The improvement in habitat conditions on a larger scale is a much greater in the long run for a population than concern over a nest.

Growing season burns have at least three other benefits that spring burns don’t provide for wildlife. First, forb diversity is higher than in spring burns. Second, summer burns provide excellent food sources heading into winter (Weir 2017). Finally, unwanted woody cover is reduced better during growing season burns. An unexpected benefit of burning during the growing season is that the chance of spot fires and escapes is actually reduced due to vegetation being green and growing. Burning during the growing season, particularly earlier in the growing season, reduces cool season grasses and favors warm season vegetation. In case you are wondering, vegetation will bounce back quickly, provided there is adequate soil moisture.

When discussing quail management, plant heterogeneity and diversity are always stressed. Having different vegetative structure and food sources available on the landscape allows for bobwhite survival in varying conditions such as heat stress, or food preference. Burning at different times of the year enhances this heterogeneity. Splitting properties into different burn units and subsequently burning those units in different years and different seasons will provide more vegetative structure and plant community diversity across a property. When evaluating vegetative response to late summer burning, Weir 2017, discovered that forb production exhibited twice the response observed in early spring burns. He noted that the greater observed plant diversity, creates a more diverse and abundant food source, that will be available during winter.

Growing season burns can accomplish many wildlife and livestock objectives. They can also help to alleviate backlogs of needed prescribed fires. Reach out to a biologist and ask if your property would be suitable for a growing season burn.

Weir, J.R., and J.D. Scasta. 2017. Vegetation responses to season of fire in tallgrass prairie: a 13- year case study. Fire Ecology 13: 137-142.

Prescribed Fire Conducted 7/2/2020 Montague County, TX.

by Derek Wiley | Coordinating Wildlife Biologist | Oaks and Prairies Joint Venture Pheasants Forever, Inc. and Quail Forever

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