This is a cage I designed and built for my button quail. I found some large cookie sheets on sale. They became the dropping pans. The rest of the cage is built from 1/2" x 1/2" hardware cloth, clipped together with j-clips.
We now have a total of 6 button duplexes for a total of 12 "apartments".
First residents of the Button Duplex are Tater(cinnamon) and Sunny (white) on the left and Diablo (Double Factor Blue Face hen) and Rocket (Red-breasted Wildtype) on the right.
The Italian Coturnix is a Pharaoh quail with the yellow gene switched on. They are popular for their looks and for egg laying.
I have two hens and four roos. Today I moved them out of the plastic tub into two growout cages and weighed them each. Hens: 209g, 182g. Roos: 153g, 150g, 135g, 123g. I put the two hens in with the largest rooster for now. And the other roos are in their own cage.
There are more Italian eggs in the incubator, so stay tuned.
Yee-haw!!! A new batch of baby buttons arrived Wednesday night. They are a rainbow of colors! Hopefully there are plenty of hens in the bunch. In the last batch, there were only two hens, so I've got a bunch of eligible bachelors waiting around.
These white coturnix chicks are growing so fast and there are so many, I had to separate them into two brooders. They are especially sweet-natured.
At four weeks the button quail were developing colorful new feathers and personalities. They copy each other on new skills - like flying.
My quail are laying! This morning when feeding, I found the first egg lying in the pine shavings. A few hours later, I found an egg in each of the two cardboard hiding "houses". What good birds!
I was not expecting this quite yet. They are a few days short of 6 weeks, when laying usually begins. Surprising, too, that all three started laying on the same day.
We don't have a quail rooster, so these eggs are infertile and will be eaten.
Hard to believe the Pharaoh Quail are already 5 weeks old! It looks like we've got three hens, which is okay because we want the eggs. They don't need a rooster to lay non-fertile eggs for eating. So that's their next milestone.
Our little chicks have grown into really sweet birds. Peep enjoys being petted and likes to sit on top of their little box house. Princess Leia thinks the house is her personal space, but sometimes shares with Groundwalker. These two have been very close since they both hatched at the same time.
I was expecting these eggs to hatch Saturday, but the little pranksters began hatching Thursday evening, almost simultaneously. Sixteen hatched before midnight and three more just after. The last one hatched about 5:00 am.
Two days early and the mischief did not stop there:
My little button quail chicks are putting on feathers of many colors. There are quite a few silver, a couple of cinnamon, and some I-don't-know-what. Each one is beautiful.
Their diet is expanding as they are now having some salad greens. They are eating ground gamebird starter with a small amount of ground kitten food added. (1/4 c. kitten food to 2 c. gamebird starter)
And what a surprise: they can fly even this young! I learned the hard way when my precious Quailito flew out and was killed by one of my chihuahuas. A couple days later it happened again while I was feeding. And I was trying to be very careful! The chicks are now in a dog-proof area.
The chicks started avoiding the heat light, so I changed the light bulb from 60 watt to 40 watt and they now seem comfortable. Soon they will need a larger brooder as they become more active. (sigh) How quickly they grow!
By 2 pm Sunday, seven more chicks hatched. The final total was 12!
Saturday brought three darling silver chicks. They are fitting in just fine. I cannot tell them apart, so they don't have names yet.
Fourteen hours after the first egg hatched, two more little quail hatched at the same time. Peep was ecstatic when they joined her in the brooder.
Their brooder is a cardboard box with rubber shelf liner in the bottom. I added a little hay so the chicks could have something to pick at besides each other. The box is covered with a cookie cooling rack and a towel over the cool end. A 60 watt bulb sits on the wire rack for heat (93F). The food and water are at the cool end.
They are eating Purina Gamebird Starter crumble that is ground to small bits in the blender. Their water bowl is a peanut butter jar lid with marbles to keep them from getting drenched.
This is my first-hatched coturnix quail, Peep. She is about 12 hours old in this video.
Just before she arrived on the scene, I made peeping noises to the eggs and then went to bed. Very soon there was a ruckus in the incubator as baby Peep hammered her way out of the egg in about four strokes!
