| Window | Dates | Days |
|---|---|---|
| Season | 15 NOV 2026 – 15 FEB 2027 | 93d |
As publishedNov 15, 2026 – Feb 15, 2027
Regulated jointly with Scaled, Gambel's and Montezuma quail under a single statewide season and shared aggregate bag limit. No zones. HIP not required (upland game, not migratory). Falconry quail season runs Sept 1 2026–Feb 28 2027, 3/day, 30 possession.
Northern bobwhite sits at the extreme western edge of its range in New Mexico, and both NMDGF's own habitat page and an NMDGF magazine feature agree on the same southeastern corner. NMDGF's own upland-game page is explicit that shinnery oak is a defining habitat component for the species specifically in southeastern NM, and a named-locality feature narrows this to specific BLM/state-land areas in Lea and Eddy counties, the same shinnery-oak counties that anchor lesser prairie-chicken's range, though bobwhite occupies the brushier microhabitat within that broader ecosystem.
Governing source is NMDGF's “Fall Roadside Survey” (combined scaled/Gambel's/bobwhite/Montezuma quail), described by NMDGF's own Turkey and Upland Game Biologist Casey Cardinal as being in “preliminary stages of implementation” as of 2022 reporting. A Cardinal quote describing quail as having “rebounded extremely well” with “outstanding production” comes from a November 23, 2016 source article (wildlife.dgf.nm.gov, “Southeast New Mexico is your best bet for quail”) describing the 2016-17 season, not 2026. No 2026 NMDGF quail forecast has been published. 2026 statewide drought conditions (D2 Severe Drought by late April, earliest snowmelt on record) suggest a weaker year by the same precipitation-driven logic Cardinal referenced, though that is inference rather than a published finding.
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