It's not unusual when I'm sitting in a deer stand on an Osage County ranch to see quail moving through the underbrush on the forest floor beneath me.

I've watched many coveys passing by in single file along a deer trail, or picking their way though the leaf litter on the ground, searching for tidbits to eat.

The ranch I hunt is mostly open pastureland; maybe 30 percent is wooded. So why are the quail in the woods instead of out in the grass, or in the plum thickets or blackberry and dewberry thickets scattered about the open prairie?

Could it be that -- quite unintentionally -- we've been selectively breeding for quail that have a tendency to live in the woods?

A veteran Oklahoma dog trainer and breeder, former shooting preserve manager and a very observant outdoorsman, Greg Koch, once told me that he believed we have been systematically killing off the birds that occupy open ground, while allowing birds that live in the thick cover of the wooded creek bottoms and upland forests to get by with less hunting pressure.

I've discussed his theory with Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation biologists, and they declared it an interesting idea, although one that to their knowledge has never been properly studied. Koch told me once that he believes more quail are in the woods these days than in the grass. The woods, after all, afford more protection from avian predators like hawks and owls that might swoop down easily on birds in the open.

In the eastern third of Oklahoma, woodlands dominate the landscape. Yes, prairies and farm fields and pastures are present in our eastern counties, but many square miles of forests are there, too.

In central Oklahoma, the habitat is mixed. In the south-central area, a wide expanse of the Cross Timbers region -- dominated by blackjack and post oak forest but with lots of open land around it -- extends from the Texas Hill Country up to near the Kansas border. The farther north you go, the fewer the trees, and the more numerous the stretches of prairie.

In Western Oklahoma, woodlands are scarce. You'll find timbered areas along streams and the occasional copse of post oak or elm or, in some counties, shinnery. But the semi-arid climate of far Western Oklahoma is more suited to grassland than to forest.

Historically, the open lands of the west have provided Oklahoma's best quail hunting. But even out west the populations have been down significantly in recent seasons. And even there, the few trips that I've taken in recent years to hunt birds have resulted in my finding more quail in the shinnery mottes and post oak thickets than in the open grassy areas.

So finding quail these days may require spending a little more time in the woods than in the fields -- and hunting in the woods might call for adjustments in both techniques and tools.

I believe most bird hunters (certainly including me) would prefer the easier walking and shooting found in the open pastures and prairies. But if the birds are in the woods, it only makes sense to plunge in after them.

Hunting quail in the woods can be somewhat like hunting grouse in northern states. Grouse are notorious for flushing in thick cover, where it's difficult to swing a shotgun. Most grouse hunters tell tales of having grouse erupt from the underbrush but being unable to raise or swing their gun because of tree limbs and twigs all around them.