Thats a long standing debate among Texas hunters. I agree the quail get hit hard by fire ants the moment they come out of the shell but we have a couple of other forces working against them with feral hogs being one and change in habitat being another. Here in West TX we don’t have a fire ant problem but we are starting to get a hog problem. another critter that place hell on baby quail is Road Runners, they eat baby quail like popcorn.
Well I have this notion for feral hogs.
Trap em, then clean em out like you kinda would a crawfish.
Put them on corn and peaches for a few weeks, then let the Charcuterie commence.
They are a pest.
Why not make lemonade of dem lemon?
I never would have thought of the road runner as an issue.
I have lived all over the west, in their habitat and the quail populations are strong.
I never really thought about what road runners eat.
I guess I always figured RR’s eat like lizard and such.