BirdTrout

Northern bobwhite Hunting in Michigan

Colinus virginianus

Open October 20, 2025 to November 14, 2025 — the days depend on the zone, and they are in the table below. In Michigan it is barely present.

Last updated 2026-08-24 · from MDNR data · 2025–26 licence year

The bird
Where it is
Season and limits
Where to hunt it
Hours, orange and licences
The questions
By region
Other states

The bird

A small covey quail in steep decline across nearly all of its range. It wants brushy fencerows, weedy field corners and shrub thickets — the scruffy edges that modern field margins have largely removed, which is the whole story of what happened to it. The male carries a bold white throat and white eyestripe outlined in black; on the hen both are buff.

Written for this app. Not an agency description and not a regulation — everything below this point that is a rule carries the page it was read from.

Where it is in Michigan

barely present An editorial summary of the bird's status in this state — not a population estimate and not a survey.

All but gone. It hangs on in a few of the southernmost counties and nowhere else, which the occurrence data on its card shows plainly, and Michigan publishes no bag limit for it.

Open this map in the app

Stronghold Regular Present Occasional No records The 10 units in the table below 3 units too small to draw

35 of 59 subbasins draining Michigan carry a northern bobwhite record. Observed occurrences, not a range map and not a habitat model. Scored as a share of all bird records in the same cell, so a well-watched county does not read as better bird country than an unwatched one. The mesh is the subbasin — the unit this app scores in — and not the state line, so its edge is a drainage divide rather than a border. The green is the 10 public units in the table below, drawn as PAD-US records their boundaries: context, not permission.

Season and limits

MDNR's own dates for the 2025–26 licence year, read from MDNR. Michigan lists this season as Northern bobwhite.

Zone	Opens	Closes	Days
Open counties	October 20, 2025	November 14, 2025	26
Closed to quail	Closed season — Michigan shuts this zone

Bag limit: 5 per day, 10 in possession
Hunter orange: required Small game hunters must wear a hunter-orange cap, hat, vest, jacket or rain gear as the outermost garment, visible from all sides. Camouflage counts if it is at least 50% orange.
Sundays: No statewide Sunday closure for small game. A few counties restrict firearm hunting on private land under PA 319 of 1994 — not mapped here.

The Department of Natural Resources opens quail in 27 counties — Branch, Calhoun, Clinton, Eaton, Genesee, Gratiot, Hillsdale, Huron, Ingham, Ionia, Jackson, Kent, Lapeer, Lenawee, Livingston, Macomb, Monroe, Montcalm, Oakland, Saginaw, St. Clair, St. Joseph, Sanilac, Shiawassee, Tuscola, Washtenaw and Wayne — and states that quail may be taken in those counties only. Wildlife Conservation Order 3.504(2), read August 2026.
Section 3.504(3) lets the Department's director close any or all of those counties by interim order on the June breeding quail survey. An interim order is not carried in this app — check the digest for the county you are hunting.
Effectively gone from Michigan outside a few southern counties — 1,769 recorded observations statewide against the grouse's 36,948.

Where to hunt it

Michigan's huntable public land, whole. MDNR does not publish a per-parcel species list, so this is not filtered to northern bobwhite — it is every unit this app draws as legal to hunt.

Class	Units	Acres
National forest	21	2,879,026
State forest	64	1,817,144
State game area	211	525,385
Wild & scenic river corridor	48	293,856
Total	344	5,515,411

PAD-US says who manages a parcel, not where its boundary runs on the ground and not whether a unit carries a local closure. Context, not permission — check the unit with MDNR before you park.

Hours, orange and licences

Shooting hours

One half-hour before sunrise until sunset.

Michigan's small-game rule, and the one this app's hunt planner draws every day against. It is not “until half an hour after sunset” — that is the waterfowl rule in some states and it is not this one. Waterfowl and turkey run on their own hours. MDNR

Licences

Base licence
Everyone, before any other licence — Required to hunt small game in Michigan, and it is what every other tag is added to.
Hunter safety certificate
Anyone born on or after 1 January 1960 — Or an apprentice licence, which lets an uncertified hunter hunt under supervision.
Federal HIP registration
Woodcock and every other migratory bird — Free, but not optional — it registers you with the federal harvest survey.
Free woodcock stamp
Woodcock hunters — Free and separate from HIP. Both are required.

The questions under this one

A page each, because each one is its own search. This page is the whole picture; those answer one thing and show the rows behind the answer.

Where in Michigan

Northern bobwhite hunting in southern Michigan