Hunting the Quails of North America - Tapa dura

"Hunting the Quails of North America is quintessential Ben O. Williams--taut, direct, suffused with earned knowledge, and permeated by a gentle humor. It is a joyous book, brimming with its author's love of life afield, and while easily the most useful guide extant on the subject of wingshooting North American quails, it is also far more than a how-to manual. Its pages serve up wisdom, vision, and finally the ineffable and heartbreaking beauty of days spent out of doors."

"Williams writes with an expertise earned by sweat and strong legs. He's a been-there, done-that kind of guy. He combines hard fact with educated opinion, all wrapped up with an unassuming humor."

"These are lessons not from some unemotional lab researcher, but from one who has spent decades of personal time in an intense pursuit of the whys, whens, and wheres of quail."

"It only takes a few pages to realize that William's knowledge, respect, and love for quail runs deep. He gently inter-twines accurate natural history data with memories about his first hunt and the landscaped around it."

For Ben Williams, there is something very special about bird hunting. This book is not only about hunting game birds, bird dogs and bird guns, although they have been an important part of Williams' life. It's also about each bird's origin, distribution, life cycle, behavior, habitat, food and daily routine. It's about what Williams calls Learning Wild Things. Six species of quail are covered, each discussed in terms of when Williams first hunted the bird, exploring the bird's life cycle, and explaining how Williams hunts the bird today. These essays are about hunting wild things and wild places with clouds moving overhead and rocks beneath one's boots.