By: Cole Payne, TAMU WFSC ‘17
There are many different
ways to provide supplemental water to wildlife. In states like Texas, where
extended periods of drought are common, making sure that animals have usable
drinking water is an important management need. For livestock, keeping troughs
and stock tanks full generally solves the problem. In the world of quail,
standing water may not be the most effective way to quench their thirst in
times of limited rainfall. Animals generally obtain their water in three ways:
free-standing water that they drink from streams, lakes, and other sources;
metabolic water derived by digesting their food into its chemical components;
and preformed water, which is bound within the food itself. Quail get most of
their water from within their food itself. Plants, seeds, and arthropods
provide enough water content to meet their daily nutritional needs (see: Habitat Guide for Northern Bobwhite). With that being said, in times of drought, it is
not uncommon to see quail taking advantage of standing water in places such as
livestock water troughs, but as referenced earlier, the best way to provide
water to quail would be to promote the growth of plants and insects on your
land, and one way is by using spreader dams. If livestock water troughs are
already on your property, and you would like to use them to benefit quail,
consider leaving them brim full, allowing the wind to occasionally push water
over the edge. This will give quail a source of water on the ground, while also
creating a cooler microclimate when compared to the surrounding areas. Building
a ramp up to the water level may also be beneficial to quail, decreasing the
likelihood of them falling into the trough.
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| If livestock water troughs are already in place on your property, simply build a ramp up to water level so small animals such as quail can benefit from the free-standing water when needed. Photo courtesy of Dr. James Cathey. |
Spreader Dams, sometimes
called “quail oases,” can be used to create habitat pockets that provide
additional food resources and cover (Habitat Guide for Northern Bobwhite), while also helping protect ranch roads from erosion
due to runoff. A spreader dam can be made fairly easily, and relatively cheap
compared to most water developments. It takes is a small bulldozer (D4 or D5),
and a little bit of time and effort. In order to build a spreader dam, a dozer
is used to push soil from the side of the ranch road, onto the ranch road,
creating a divot adjacent to the road. Using the soil from the newly formed
divot, you would then create a “speed bump” along your road, which would divert
flowing water from the road, and into the divot that you had created. The
diverted water would fill the divot, and seep into the soil profile, in turn
creating a “quail oasis” by increasing forb production, which would also
increase the number and diversity of arthropods in that area for quail to use for
food and water. In some instances where spreader dams were used and monitored,
there was an 25x increase in forbs and a 5x increase in arthropods in the areas
formed by the divot of the spreader dam when compared to the immediately
adjacent areas on the property. While the impact of a spreader dam on your
property may not exactly match these numbers in terms of overall increase of
plants and insects, over time, these oases will prove beneficial for your
quail. Increasing the amount of green forbs in an area will also help create a
cooler microclimate for quail, which is always helpful during hot Texas
summers. Another benefit of creating a spreader dam is that you are diverting
flowing water off of your ranch road, helping to preserve the stability of the
road by decreasing erosion.
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| Quail get most of the water they need from their food sources, such as insects. Photo courtesy of the Texas High Plains Insects Website. |
As far as cost for
constructing a spreader dam, it is estimated that the amount of dozer time it
would take to properly construct one would cost somewhere around $50-$100 per
hour. The number and spacing of the spreader dams on a property is completely
up to the discretion of the landowner. More spreader dams would mean more
benefit for quail, too few may not have a positive impact on the total quail
population in an area, but finding a happy medium is dependent on the landscape
and the land manager’s opinion in the end. (See the video: Form & Function
of Spreader Dams to Improve Quail Habitat, linked below)
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| A proper spreader dam will divert water from the road, into the divot, allowing the water to soak into the soil profile. |
For more information on
the use of spreader dams, and the overall importance of water in the lives of
quail, be sure to view the following videos produced by the Texas A&M
AgriLife Extension Service:
For information on
other ways to provide supplemental water to quail, check out the blog post
entitled Supplemental Water for Quail by James Cash.
Literature Cited
Texas A&M AgriLife
Extension Service. 2015. Habitat Guide for Northern Bobwhite. WF-020.
Wood, K. N., F.
S. Guthery and N. E. Koerth. 1986. “Nutrition and condition of northern
Bobwhites in south Texas”. Journal of Wildlife Management 50:84-8