A little while ago we were asked how we came up with the name “Quail Run”. It’s a simple little story, not at all remarkable, but something I figure should be told, for posterity.
We had been at the farm for about a week, it was in the dead of winter, there seemed to be nothing around except snowy mounds of sage brush and a few cold lonely trees. I was in the master bedroom, unpacking, I’m sure, and I looked out the window. A little ways away was a pile of old dead sage brush, we figured it had been piled there when the land was cleared to build the house. It had been there a long time, the old sage brush was very dry and sad looking, it was on the top of our list of things to take care of once the weather warmed up. Well, that day as I gazed out the window I noticed movement in the pile of sage brush, a lot of movement, so much that the brush looked alive. I squinted and looked closer, there were little gray-brown animals moving in and out of the pile, all over, as if the spirits of the dead sage brush were rising and taunting me, begging me to figure them out. I called Dadzoo and we both looked for a bit, then he decided he was going to get a closer look to see what in the world was making its home in that pile. I stayed at the window while he put on his boots, hat and warm winter coat and strode towards the mystery animals. Suddenly birds darted in waves out of the pile, as if in a panic for their lives and disappeared in their little coveys among the bushes and trees. There were at least a hundred birds, if not more, darting out in all directions. There were hundreds of California Quail, the males with their proud fancy plumage and top-knot feather bobbing around and the females with the young birds soft and grey easily hidden in the dusty green bushes. Hence the name of our little farm, Quail Run, I think she named herself on that day when she showed us her little birds.
This winter has been a tough one for the chickens.
