In April our friends at New Jersey Audubon released the second group of translocated quail on our property, and now, for the second year in a row, they are reporting active nests!

University of Delaware graduate students, Phillip Coppola and Evan Drake, contracted by NJA, discovered six active nests at the Pine Island Cranberry Bobwhite Quail translocation study site while conducting their weekly radio telemetry surveys on the quail.

This is big news!

“Not only is it very exciting to find these nests, but one nest is occupied by a collared bird from this year’s release that has paired up with an un-collared bird which means that bird is from last year’s offspring,” said Quail Initiative researcher Phil Coppola. “Nesting by individuals that were translocated only months ago reaffirms the effectiveness of this tool for augmenting Bobwhite breeding populations. This is a major step in the overall reintroduction effort for this species here in the New Jersey Pinelands.”

Pine Island Cranberry is enormously proud of taking part in this project. Our site was chosen for several reasons, among them “…a State Approved Forest Stewardship Plan outlining long-term management goals and the extent of existing quality habitat already onsite from years of active forestry work, prescribed burning and agricultural best management practices that made it stand out above other sites in the region”, according to John Parke at NJ Audubon. Caring for the place where we live, work, and grow is one of our core values, and this project is a unique opportunity to give back to the land that sustains us.

“If the quail are thriving, then we’re taking care of the land just like we’re supposed to,” says CEO Bill Haines. “Thanks to the hard work from NJ Audubon and everyone else involved with this project, we’re seeing some real progress on bringing the Bobwhite quail back to New Jersey, and I couldn’t be more pleased.”

* Photos courtesy of Phil Coppola and John Parke.