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  1. Susan Skylark

    Update on hatchlings

    They are fun little guys, especially in the brooder, a friend showed me a video of her pea chicks and I wondered what was wrong with them, they just sat there while my quail are always on the go!
  2. Susan Skylark

    lost another quail :(

    Sorry about your troubles. In young birds overheating or dehydration are major issues, while everything on backyard chickens dies of coccidia or merricks something infectious isn’t likely your issue. Also is your feed medicated? Unless you are feeding crumbles you must grind the pelleted feed...
  3. Susan Skylark

    Egg Candling! Tips, Tricks, and Best Practices.

    Candling obsessively doesn’t bother the eggs, and maybe the best part of hatching. There isn’t a way to sex an egg/chick prehatch and for many species/breeds you can’t even tell for weeks after hatch (certain colors or traits are sex linked recessive and if bred for specifically can tell you at...
  4. Susan Skylark

    Egg turning frequency vs equal timing

    As long as it is 3 or 5 times daily, it can be 10, 8, and 6 hours apart or whatever, don’t rush home over lunch or get up at midnight, they’ll be fine! But according to some study I read you can increase hatch rates by 1% if you turn 87 times a day, personally I don’t think it is worth it but...
  5. Susan Skylark

    Checking for heart beat on eggs

    This is a 15 year old post but an interesting concept. I’d like to know if it is actually feasible, I’d think the sound would be very faint and prone to artifact, but a curious idea!
  6. Susan Skylark

    Should I give up?

    Definitely give her some time, candling is a good idea too, my first hatch for quail was day 19/20, it was supposed to be day 16/17, but a cold incubator delayed it significantly (boy was that a long couple days!). Try to be patient!
  7. Susan Skylark

    Neutering male quail: a philosophical discussion

    Has anyone ever neutered a male coturnix (caponized)? I know this sounds ridiculous (it is!). Meat quality isn’t an issue in quail so that isn’t the issue here. Keeping the bird in the dark so he doesn’t sexually mature also isn’t an option, (he’s going to be with the breeding flock or...
  8. Susan Skylark

    Flexible Coop Interior

    You could rig up a mosquito netting curtain (something like a stiff canvas hem a couple inches wide around the edges) and have loops or holes or something to secure it to hooks or a frame. I actually use a pop up mosquito mattress tent for my breeding flock and the stuff allows air flow...
  9. Susan Skylark

    Placement of Water Cups

    Quail and water are always a mess! Glad you found something that works! I switched to nipple buckets in a large group enclosure and it is way less mess than water bottles were in our small pens but the birds like them better though. They act like they are dying of thirst any time I fill the...
  10. Susan Skylark

    Colour genes question

    Egyptian would be a pharaoh carrying roux, roux is a sex linked recessive, hens carry and express one gene and cannot pass it to daughters, males can carry one or two genes but only express with two, a homozygous male will pass it to all his daughters, meaning you can tell which are female at...
  11. Susan Skylark

    Quail colour breeding

    Check out pipsnchicks website for the best coturnix quail genetics available. I’m having trouble following your genetic short hand so will just try to summarize what little I know. The main base colors are pharaoh (wild), Italian (fawn), and EB (Rosetta/Tibetan) with white, silver, ginger...
  12. Susan Skylark

    Too many roo's

    You could theoretically keep them in a dark environment (8 hours or less of light daily) so they never sexually mature and just keep them as pets, but learning to eat your culls and extra birds is an important part of keeping poultry, a severely injured bird, deformed chicks, mean bird, extra...
  13. Susan Skylark

    chick born with swollen belly

    It probably has internal issues, sadly a humane euthanasia is probably best, I’d guess developmental issues with the gut, nothing you can do, just a freak thing.
  14. Susan Skylark

    Incubation question - chicks forming where air cell is?

    You didn’t do anything wrong, shipped eggs with saddled or detached air cells have been through the wringer and are highly stressed. The good news for this egg is that it is as likely to hatch as any other in this batch. The bad news for you and your eggs are that the whole batch has been...
  15. Susan Skylark

    Two sick quail

    Respiratory disease (exacerbated by heat?) is probably your issue, mycoplasma can be recurrent and hard to cure (goes away and then comes back) so it is a possibility in your eye bird (yes, upper respiratory issues can affect the eyes, sinuses, etc.). Your other bird almost sounds like a...
  16. Susan Skylark

    What gender and color are these Coturnix quail?

    Scarlet fee tuxedo (Rosetta roux with fee and white genes, decent chance it is female as roux is sex linked but not guaranteed) for the first bird, maybe a ginger on the second, could be cinnamon (red eyes) or a roux as well, not sure on base color, pharaoh maybe?
  17. Susan Skylark

    ‘Chocolate’ Coturnix!

    So I fell in love with American Pansy (check thieving otter or pipsnchicks for pics/info) and happily got a nice male in some mixed eggs I hatched this spring, his single fertile egg from his first hatch (just nine weeks old at the time) is now a handsome 6 week old gentleman: I crossed him...
  18. Susan Skylark

    Quail chick keeps breathing heavily and weak, don't know if I'm doing this right!

    Make sure you have grit or sand available too, maybe she swallowed a piece of bedding, etc and it lodged in her crop, also possible birth defect. Be very careful giving water, don’t want to drown her!
  19. Susan Skylark

    Egg hatching currently concerns

    I’ve had quail go 60 hours, be patient, the pip allows extra oxygen into the egg which the chick need to hatch or even just exist but often the umbilicus/yolk sack isn’t fully absorbed and until then hatching is disastrous! The need for extra air causes the pip reflex but the zip isn’t...
  20. Susan Skylark

    Winter Water System for 100 Chickens in -40 with Wind Chill

    Other considerations: is the coop insulated, will there be enough chickens confined inside to raise temps significantly, how long is it that cold? I used to live in northern mn, it would be -30F (temp) for weeks. In my new locale we usually hit that low for about two hours overnight once a...
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