Paneubert's Quail Aviary Adventure

[paneubert]

Starting to settle in under the light.

Big and little versions of the same coloration at the nipple waterer.

 

[paneubert]

Aaaaaaaand nobody is under the light now that it is dark. Haha.

All against the wire where predators can snatch their little necks.

 

[paneubert]

Well, the next morning they were all under the lamp, so at some point they decided to get smart. Not much else to report between then and now. I did find one dead last night, but I think it was just a natural death. All the rest seem happy. Growing. Pretty good variety of colors from this batch.

 

[Binki]

Yes nice colors I'm glad the younger and older ones got along (except for the runt hehe).

Any updates?

 

[paneubert]

No real new news. They are growing bigger and consuming a ton of food. I have not tried to sex them yet. But I will when I have some time to sit and watch what they do. No more deaths, so that is nice. Still have the lamp in there for them. But I might cut them off sometime soon. I set out some rat traps around the exterior hoping that if any come back, I catch them. No sign of them trying to dig in yet, but the amount of food that is being eaten is large, and I think when the rats dug in last year they were the ones eating or stealing a ton of the food.

 

[Binki]

Ahh hope it's not rats, they're tricky to catch, something about needing to smell a kind of food on another rats breath to be comfortable enough to consume more than a nibble xD

In case you don't know, rats will plug up their holes with dirt clods, a decaying peach, etc. so they can be especially tricky to discover. They also hide their poop... So yeah difficult to detect them, good luck! I use my camera

 

[paneubert]

I figured it was time for another boring update. So far I am still only aware of ONE male from this batch of 30+ babies. Whenever I am out there and hear a male crowing, I immediately try to figure out who it is coming from and 100% of the time it has been the ONE male I already leg banded. How weird would it be for me to only have had one male hatch? I guess it is a good problem to have.....I can rotate him in with specific ladies to try to get specific offspring. We will see if any others decide to announce themselves before the laying season is completely over. Maybe they are saving their teenage hormones for next spring.

Now that I look back at my recent posts, I realize they were born really late July. So they are only about 6-7 weeks old. My one known male started crowing weeks ago. So maybe he was just SUPER early to mature? I will have to keep an eye on things.

 

[Dani xxx]

That would be so cool if u only have 1 boy out of 30!

 

[paneubert]

That would be so cool if u only have 1 boy out of 30!

Yes and no. I think servicing 30 ladies might reduce the overall fertility rate! But maybe not.....I have read that the ladies can store and use the sperm for a while. So it is not like he would need to mate at a ratio of one mating to one fertile egg or anything like that. But if he favors some ladies over others, I will have some ladies who never give me fertile eggs. On the plus side, I don't think I would need to worry about any aggression or over-mating....

I didn't think I would ever say it, but I might have to pick up a few known males from Craigslist in the spring if I don't discover any new males from this group. I know I have my "old" males from when I first started, but they should be winding down their fertility at this point and I doubt they would produce much come next Spring. But who knows!

 

[paneubert]

Wow....have not posted since September. Well...here are some photos. One egg every 2 days from 30+ birds. Haha. They need to get to work. Still only know of 2 males total in this group.