There's only 1 quail left in San Francisco, and cats are likely to blame

Ishi, the last remaining California quail in San Francisco, pictured above in Golden Gate Park's Botanical Gardens in San Francisco on May 18, 2016. Ishi, the last remaining California quail in San Francisco, pictured above in Golden Gate Park's Botanical Gardens in San Francisco on May 18, 2016. Photo: Bob Gunderson Photo: Bob Gunderson Image 1 of / 43 Caption Close There's only 1 quail left in San Francisco, and cats are likely to blame 1 / 43 Back to Gallery

The swan song of San Francisco's last known remaining California quail is a sad one. Three lilting notes – chi-ca-go – cries the adult male from his perch in Golden Gate Park. There is no response but the chatter of human neighbors.

The quail population in San Francisco has nosedived in the past few decades and efforts to reintroduce them have proved fruitless. Quails were once plentiful, having been present in San Francisco when the Ohlone tribe ruled the coast, now there is just one known example of the state bird in our fair city. Local birders have named the specimen – a 3-year-old male – Ishi, after the last known member of California's Native American Yahi tribe.

Ishi's sorrowful call will likely never be returned by a female mate. The ground-dwelling birds are known for their charisma, not their mobility, and a city-slicking bird already has the cards stacked against it, even if it is the official city bird of San Francisco, as the California quail was designated in 2001.

But, as is true of many localized extinctions, humans are largely at-fault – or rather, their pets are.

"Cats are the dagger," said Cindy Margulis, executive director of the Golden Gate Audubon Society. Margulis cites the domestic animals, in conjunction with habitat destruction, as the reasons quails first faltered in San Francisco, then disappeared nearly altogether. Other wildlife experts interviewed for this story backed up Margulis' theory.

Felines, whether domesticated or not, are hardwired to pounce, Margulis said, and they don't distinguish between pigeons and treasured bird species.

A 2013 Smithsonian study estimated that free-ranging domestic cats kill between 1.4 billion to 3.7 billion birds annually, and attributed the animals to multiple wildlife extinctions on islands. The study goes on to cite cats as "likely the single greatest source of anthropogenic mortality for US birds and mammals."

Elsewhere in California and the Bay Area, like Marin and the East Bay Regional Parks, quails are flocking together by the dozens to form coveys for the winter months. The striking creatures are social ones, and they prefer the company and protection of group life.

Ishi has never known the companionship of a robust covey, even before he was the last known quail in San Francisco. According to birdwatcher and former deputy director of San Francisco's Department of the Environment, David Assmann, Ishi has been on his own for at least two years now, and before then, there was only a smattering of quails – the population peaked at about 25 in the 2000s – in Golden Gate Park and the Presidio. No quail has been seen in the Presidio since 2008.

Ishi is not totally solitary, however, as a fleet of local birdwatchers, including Assmann, keeps tabs on him throughout the year. The bird's last reported sighting was as recent as Oct. 16, and a handful of other birders have spotted him earlier in the year.

Even if you know where to look for him, says Assmann, the bird can be hard to find. Quails prefer the cover of underbrush and shrubbery, and Ishi is known to hide among the brambles of Golden Gate Park's Botanical Garden.

Assmann, who speaks of Ishi like a friend, describes the bird as equal parts "lonely," "vocal" and "street smart."

"Though he's certainly not shy," Assmann said.

Street smarts aside, the chances of Ishi's longterm survival are grim. Quails live up to six years, which means Ishi is already middle-aged. And if the circle of life doesn't drag him under, the colony of feral cats roaming Golden Gate Park just might.

Not everyone is convinced cats are to blame, however, like Damien Raffa, program manager at the Presidio Trust.

"I'm not saying cats weren't a factor in the Presidio, but Golden Gate Park, I think, is a different story," he said. Raffa says the quails were already deeply vulnerable, and being a ground-dwelling bird means any predator, including raptors, will attempt to make you its prey.

Raffa ultimately chocks up the bird's disappearance to a string of "bad luck," including loss of habitat and extenuating circumstances, like a freak weather event about 20 years ago that decimated one crop of chicks.

Raffa's been touting the quail cause since the 1990s, when he began working at the Presidio. For him, the disappearance of San Francisco's official bird is personal.

"I get a little choked up when I think about the loss of the quail," he said. "We just invested so much."

The writing on the wall had been visible for years, said Raffa, and he and fellow environmentalists were determined not to see the California quail go the way of the bobcat or the black-tailed deer, both of which disappeared from a San Francisco where once they were rampant.

In 2001, Golden Gate Audubon and the Presidio Trust launched the "Save the Quail" campaign, a comprehensive monitoring and restoration campaign to preserve the dwindling species. The plan ultimately "failed to materialize," said Raffa.

The story behind its failure is "messy," he said, citing "bureaucracy" as a major contributing factor.

Margulis, who was not executive director of Audubon Golden Gate during the campaign, believes that the effort probably failed due to human selfishness. People didn't want to rein in their cats, she said.

The chances of reintroducing quail to the city in the near future are slim, according to those SFGATE interviewed for this story.

"With a fairly concerted campaign, it's possible you could reintroduce them to the Presidio," said Assmann, explaining that the Presidio offers a decent amount of habitat suitable for quail. Nonetheless, "it would take money and effort and years to make it work," Assmann said, and "nobody has shown the interest or inclination to do that."

Margulis spoke more bluntly of the predicament. "If we felt confident we weren't setting up quails to be slaughtered, then we think there would be a lot more interest," she said. "We don't want things getting killed needlessly."

"We lost one. We tried. It just didn't work out," Raffa said.

None of this makes the tale of the quail any less sorrowful; Raffa can hardly stand to even walk by State Bird Provisions in the Fillmore, a Michelin-starred restaurant known for its succulent fried quail. (Note: Quails are not an endangered species, and hunting them is legal in California.)

"I don't want to overstate the mournful symbolism, but it's like seeing a shadow of a species that is now absent," he said.

Raffa points out that San Francisco is named for St. Francis of Assisi, the patron saint of animals. And the Bay Area, he said, is a society that increasingly values that which is local and authentic.

Such sympathy, he said, might not extend to the city's native wildlife.

Michelle Robertson is an SFGATE staff writer. Email her at mrobertson@sfchronicle.com or find her on Twitter at @mrobertsonsf.