New sculpture to be dedicated at Palomares Park

By: BETTY JOHNSTON - Staff Writer | Monday, August 9, 2004 10:10 PM PDT ∞

A new denizen ---- actually, a group of natives ---- of Palomares Park will be honored on Aug. 19.

From 5 until 7 p.m. that day, "Family Gathering," a bronze sculpture by William Ware, will be unveiled and dedicated in the Sculpture Garden of the park.

The "family" will be one of the California quail, since 1931 the official state bird of California. The dedication ceremony, which will start at 5:30 p.m., will include a talk by Dr. Claudia Luke of San Diego State University's Santa Margarita Ecological Reserve. She will present a review of the "neighborhood" status of Callipepia californica, the California quail. An interpretive brochure will be available for those interested.

Ware's sculpted depiction of a small, family covey of quail will join an earlier work of his to be installed in the Sculpture Garden ---- the "Crowned Prince," his larger-than-life-size statue of another local bird, a roadrunner. The two should be at home together, since, in nature, they enjoy the same habitat. "Crowned Prince" has now inhabited the garden for more than a year.

The California quail is described on the Natureworks Web site as " ... a small, plump bird with a short black beak. The male has a gray chest, and brown back and wings. It has a black throat with white stripes and a brown cap on its head. The female has a gray or brown head and back and a lighter speckled chest and belly. Both the male and the female have a curved black crown feather on their foreheads."

California quail live in coveys of 10 to 200 birds in the winter, but pair off during mating season. The male mates with only one female, which will lay from 12 to 16 cream-and-brown speckled eggs in a shallow hollow or scrape in the ground, and incubate them for about three weeks. Both parents care for the chicks, who make their first attempts to fly at about 10 days old.

Residents of Fallbrook and Bonsall who live close to brushy areas of natural vegetation report frequent sightings of cock quails leading their families across their lawns, foraging in the grass for seeds and insects. The flocks generally feed in the early morning.

The acquisition of "Family Gathering" represents a collaborative effort between the Art in Public Places division of the Fallbrook Village Association, the Fallbrook Land Conservancy, and the Santa Margarita Reserve.

Palomares Park & Sculpture Garden is located at 1815 Stagecoach Lane at Calavo Road in Fallbrook. For more information, call (760) 723-8384.

You may contact Betty Johnston at (760) 7316720 or (760) 451-5009, or by e-mail at bjohnston@nctimes.com or johnston@nctimes.net. You may also read her column on the Internet at www.nctimes.com.