THE COMMON QUAIL. 
69 
It is a remarkable facb that^ Vv6iile during the last half century the 
cultivation of England has been so much extended and improved, 
the quail should have decreased, while, during that period it 
has from the same cause increased in Ireland ; in which island, 
too, there has been a decided augmentation of late years, to 
the numbers, remaining during winter. In the wheat districts 
around Belfast, quails were always common. In a part of the 
country, stretching towards the mountain base, where oats had 
been grown in quantity, they did not appear until the introduc- 
tion of wheat ; but after this grain had ceased to be cultivated 
there, the birds continued in the district. In a letter from J. Y. 
Stewart, Esq., dated Bockhill, Letterkenny, Eeb. 3, 1837, it was 
remarked, that quails are only found in the most improved 
lowland parts of the county Donegal; where some years since 
they were very rare, they are now becoming annually much more 
common, wdiich is to be accounted for by the increased growth of 
wheat."’"’ In the year 1837, I learned, from the late T. E. 
Neligan, Esq. of Tralee, that within the preceding eight or ten 
years the quail had become much more common in the county of 
Kerry, within wdiich period cultivation had much extended."’' It 
is very singular that they should thus keep pace wdth the cultiva- 
tion of grain, even to the north-wnst and south-west extremities 
of the island, wdiile the opposite result prevails in Great Britain. 
The slovenly system of farming, unfortunately too common in 
Ireland, is, hownver, greatly in their favour, as the seed of 
weeds among the stubble, supplies these birds during winter and 
at other seasons, wdth abundance of food. 
Although fields of grain are the quail's chief resort, clover 
fields in grain districts are sometimes its favourite haunt in spring 
and summer ; meadows also, indeed, occasionally are so. In an 
extensive meadow district near Belfast, I one season heard them 
daily calling from the end of March to that of May ; and my 
attention was attracted by the notes of numbers of them early in 
August, in that great district of meadowy-land near Toome, over 
which Lough Neagh spreads its winter floods. During the 
latter season the quail is often met with in turnip fields. 
