The Quail Stakes first appeared at Kempton on Easter Monday 1982. It was a six furlong conditions race. The wildlife on the preceding year’s card was the Playboy Easter Bunny Handicap.
Grey Desire won it by 15 lengths in 1985 for the self-made millionaire Mel Brittain, and again the following year. Other notables in the roll of honour include 17-time-winner Hard To Figure and, in 2002, the Richard Hannon senior-trained Reel Buddy. He was destined to win the Sussex Stakes fifteen months later.
The quail is a small game bird. On that same Kempton card in 1982 there was a Redshank Maiden, which did not stand the test of time; nor did races named after blackbirds and kingfishers. The Quail Stakes was last seen in 2004, before Kempton converted to all-weather flat racing.