Animal of the Month

Desert Birds

Meet the Gambel's Quail

There are four species of wild quail living in the Chihuahuan Desert, the scaled quail, the Gambel’s quail, bobwhite quail and Mearn's quail.  Here in El Paso we have scaled quail and Gambel's quail. 

The Gambel's Quail, Callipepla gambelii, is a small ground-dwelling bird in the New World quail family. It inhabits the desert regions of Arizona, California, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada, Utah, Texas and Mexico. The Gambel's quail is named in honor of William Gambel, a 19th century naturalist and explorer of the Southwestern United States.  

These birds are easily recognized by their top knots and scaly plumage on their undersides.  Gambel's quail have gray plumage on much of their bodies, and males have copper feathers on the top of their heads, black faces, and white stripes above their eyes. Gambel's quail can be commonly confused with California Quail due to similar plumage. They can usually be distinguished by range, but when this does not suffice, California quail have a more scaly appearance. The two species are sister taxa which diverged during the Late Pliocene or Early Pleistocene, 1 to 2 mya (Zink & Blackwell, 1998).  Source: http://en.wikipedia.org