This is Episode 83. It’s all about birds in the family Odontophoridae. These are the New World quails.

Why is this the family of "New World" quails?

Because there’s a whole mess of birds we call quails that live in Europe, Asia, Africa, and Australia. But those birds all belong to the pheasant family, Phasianidae.

New World quails are shy birds ground-dwelling birds that walk or run around in the daytime, looking for tidbits of food in the leaf litter.

If they sense any kind of stranger danger, they hunker down and hide in bushes or other vegetation. Their first instinct is to sit still and rely on their camouflage, rather than to fly away.

These birds may be shy around strangers, but they’re generally very social with members of their own kind. They’re gregarious little buggers.

In this episode, I go into detail about what New World quails look and sound like, about their diversity, and about the ways they live their lives.

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Link to this episode on the Science of Birds website

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