Two Quail Species in the Brush Friday, Jan. 6 At a New Year's Day barbecue near Álamos, we find that an ideal location to look for both elegant and Gambel's quail is, by sheer coincidence, a ranch owned by our hosts. During the meal, we arrange to meet at their other ranch the following morning. We scout at this ranch but hear only elegant quail. We look and listen for Gambel's quail, which are not as responsive as elegant quail to recorded calls. We connect the iPod to the powerful truck stereo to amplify the recording of the Gambel's quail call. I am disappointed, but it turns out that our hosts own yet another ranch eight kilometers down the road, and ask if we want to try looking there. This time, it is Gambel's quail that we see, but no elegant quail. We are closing in on the zone of species overlap, but to maximize our chances, we decide to keep looking for more sites. On the way home to Álamos, we drop by the home of another local rancher named Carlos Acosta. He runs a hunting business on the side, Hotel Rancho Acosta Alamos, and is very knowledgeable about quail and where we should look for sympatric sites, mentioning two of his ranches. The following morning, we meet Carlos before it is light and drive on a narrow, rocky, hilly, winding dirt road. It seems as if we are driving up a riverbed, but we are only crossing areas where the rivers have washed out the road. About an hour later, the Sierra Alamos and Sierra Madres are on the horizon. We are just outside the foothills, in a spot where the terrain opens into a flat area. The vegetation has elements of both tropical dry forest and Sinaloan thornscrub. The moment we arrive at the ranch, we see Gambel's and elegant quail together in the brush. I am very excited. After getting the nets and traps ready for the morning, we leave and drive 45 minutes north to the other ranch, where the quail are sympatric. Again, both species are everywhere, and again, we are in another place where the foothills meet the thornscrub. Carlos drives us to the watering holes there. We hear quail everywhere. On one of the ponds there are white pelicans making a ruckus before they turn in for the night. This ranch is so thick with vegetation that catching quail will be difficult, so for the remainder of my season - just a few days - I decide to focus all the effort at the first site. On our first day at this field site, trapping is complicated by the wind. The nets are billowing and obvious and falling over. To make matters worse, though we were told that the cattle would not graze in this area, they chose today to turn them out to pasture here. Cattle cannot see the traps and trample them. Still, we manage to learn a few things. First, we see Gambel's quail walking along the side of the road, jumping up occasionally to eat the seeds off the sorghum that is planted here. I have never seen Gambel's quail as tame or bold as these. They seem to run up to us as they go along the road foraging. Again and again they approach us within a few feet. Compared with the quail I study in California, this is odd behavior, especially in such an open area. Does this mean there are fewer predators here? Another thing I notice is that the female Gambel's quail are small and have hints of male facial plumage, just as I had discovered in Navopatia. Next, we see elegant quail. They are much shyer than the Gambel's quail but still are visible on the side of the road. What I notice right away is that the first group seems to be nearly all male. It turns out to be five males and a single female. The second is four females and seven males, and the third is two females and four males. Finally, I get the chance see what I have been waiting for: Gambel's quail and elegant quail moving together in groups and eating side by side. Male Gambel's quail seem to be as aggressive as male elegant quail. Elegant quail appear to respond more strongly to their own kind. We watch them until the last possible moment, when they roost, and end up closing the nets in the dark. Though we are getting a clearer picture of these quail, we have had no luck catching them. Now that we know when they are active, we will move our nets and traps and try again tomorrow.