Passport to Texas

Conservation license plate supporting quail conservation in Texas.

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This is Passport to Texas

As a teen, Kelly Thompson of Fort Worth, cherished time outdoors hunting quail with his friends. It usually involved walking with bird dogs through a variety of habitats, before ever seeing a bobwhite.

Sometimes you won’t see a quail all day.

Even when the young men never saw quail, Kelly says the fellowship and time in nature was worth it. As it is today.

Years ago, many people measured a successful hunt by how many birds you got in your bag. Today we measure success by how many birds you found—not at all how many you shot. As a matter of fact, we’re so much more thoughtful about the conservation aspects of quail than we are about the harvest of quail. It’s much more fun to find them than to shoot them.

Yet, quail are declining in Texas, and Kelly wants to reverse the trend. As a member of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Upland Game Bird Committee, he and others worked to get a quail license plate added to the conservation plate collection.

Specialty license plates cost $30; $22 would go to the Texas Parks and Wildlife Foundation [through TPWD] for quail conservation efforts in Texas, including: habitat conservation, education and some small-scale habitat projects. The funds will be directed by a committee of representatives from quail-related organizations, and administered by the Texas Parks and Wildlife Foundation.

View the new quail plate at conservationplates.org.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.