At last, the dog days of summer are behind us, and we're looking forward to reaping the rewards of our efforts for all the habitat work and planning we have been doing. If you have been keeping up with the articles from Roger Wells on habitat tips we offer throughout the year, this should be a productive season afield for you. For our dove hunters, months of waiting for the opener is finally here. I hope the birds will be plentiful for you. Why not take a kid to a dove shoot and give him or her the opportunity to enjoy a great day outdoors? For our quail hunters, we still have a little wait.

  I mentioned in a previous editorial that we are going to give you a better magazine with more articles and more information on our chapter projects. I have received a few letters from members with questions regarding what we have done in their geographical regions. It's obvious that we still need to do a much better job of keeping our members up to speed on our projects, whether they be habitat, youth or research related or whether they relate to our seed program, the farm implement program or other QU programs.

  I was looking over a letter that one of our regional directors recently answered to a member in his region regarding our projects in Missouri. Just a few of the Missouri highlights included over $173,730 spent on projects, not including all of the 2004 numbers or any of 2005 (2004 and 2005 numbers, when completed, are estimated at an additional $210,000), co-sponsored, with the Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC), landowner workshops focusing on quail, established quail as a priority species with MDC, (created much more funding for quail projects in the state), and was responsible for establishing the MO Quail Habitat Initiative (a program where MDC matches QU chapter habitat funds 1:1, doubling our habitat projects in that state). Now, chapters in Missouri can tell their members that they spend 120 percent of the funds they raise!

  More interesting, our regional director mentioned projects done by two chapters in his region that have become inactive. However, our last records from those two, fairly small chapters showed that, for just a two-year period, those two small chapters in northern Missouri distributed over 6,250 pounds of our seed to landowners, provided $900 to support an FFA Trap and Skeet Team, funded six scholarships, supported a native grass/quail roosting cover research project, purchased $1,775 worth of prescribed burning equipment, purchased a root plow and trailer for $1,050, supported Missouri youth programs with a $1,275 grant and spent $6,140 on miscellaneous projects, all aimed at helping LOCAL quail populations recover! All this work from two small chapters, and in just a two-year period. Perhaps if we had all done a better job of informing our members and the general public, these chapters would still be active today. Their work will be missed.

  You'll see more of this type of information in upcoming issues. I hope you will read Dr. Lenny Brennan's article in this issue on Texas quail research that has been supported so well by our Texas chapters. QU chapters are alive and well all over the country and are funding these types of programs to insure a better future for all species of quail.

  I hope you'll support the chapter banquets and events in your local community by getting involved. There are doers and there are talkers. Become a doer. If there's not a chapter in your area, give us a call. We'll meet with you and help you establish one. If there is an active chapter in your area, why not see about joining them? All QU chapters need new committee members. When you join a QU committee, you'll help raise needed funds in your community. More importantly, you'll be a part of the group that makes decisions on how these funds are put to work for wildlife, right where you live. That's not a bad thing.