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  1. Susan Skylark

    Peach quail, so much for awesome theories!

    This is a lousy pic, but easier than camera/download/edit/upload! These birds are driving me crazy! In my first hatch ever I got a peach/beige colored hen. A year later I sold her but I collected 2 eggs and both hatched, one was also a peach colored male, which is the only same colored chick...
  2. Susan Skylark

    Mugged

    I was viciously attacked by a trio of hens today when I was innocently checking their water, they just walked up and started pecking my hand, and considering their size this unprovoked attack was quite unpainful. But they aren’t to blame, I believe my son has incited this violent behavior by...
  3. Susan Skylark

    An Actual Purple(ish) Quail (Just click for Cute Chick Pictures)

    The Blue-Laced Red Wyandotte (or whichever order the colors go!) looks purple to me, there are Lavender Orpingtons (a shade of gray), now it is time for the purple coturnix (sort of): Behold the Scarlet Blau or 'purple' quail! This guy is out of a hatch of nine, all out of a Blau italian...
  4. Susan Skylark

    Purple er lavender quail (a tongue in cheek color diagnosis)?

    So my mystery beige quail that I’ve been trying to discover his (and his mother before him) color since I got quail, finally solved the mystery: purple, but since poultry don’t come in purple, we’ll settle for lavender even if he is orange, I’ll get there, just wait, and yes this is written in...
  5. Susan Skylark

    Light exposure and golden pheasant breeding season?

    I run some Christmas lights in my garage for my quail (light sensitive layers) during the darker months of the year, will this screw up golden pheasant breeding/laying or not be an issue? Thanks!
  6. Susan Skylark

    Any hints on taming down a red golden pheasant, 1 yo male?

    We just acquired a yearling male red golden pheasant who is rather high strung and nervous, obviously he’s a pheasant and hasn’t been around people much. We have coturnix quail, which by comparison are super chill (but the species has been domesticated for centuries and ours are all home...
  7. Susan Skylark

    Are chickens really evil or just misunderstood, at least concerning biosecurity?

    So I’ve been haunting byc for about a year and raising coturnix quail for a few months longer than that, during that time I’ve run across several posts regarding ‘keep chickens away from quail/gamebirds because they carry lethal diseases for gamebirds.’ Does anybody have a list or even an...
  8. Susan Skylark

    Looking for a female red golden pheasant in ND/SD/MN/MT

    Anybody have a healthy female red golden pheasant in North Dakota, South Dakota, Minnesota, or Eastern Montana they'd be interested in selling?
  9. Susan Skylark

    Spa day!

    It has been hot here, and the quail just go nuts when I refill their water jugs, not that they are short on water but apparently they are intrigued by the pouring water, almost like cats! I have a little solar powered bird bath fountain thing that doesn’t work all that well outside with our...
  10. Susan Skylark

    Anybody have any Poultry swap tips for a newbie participant?

    It seems I’m going to a poultry/random small mammal swap this weekend, very low key and informal (literally no registration or organization in the parking lot of the local feed store). I have a couple laying hens and a dozen chicks to sell, maybe some hatching eggs, and thought maybe a cooler...
  11. Susan Skylark

    ‘Fun’ with food poisoning?!

    I’ve never had food poisoning before just now, better than influenza but certainly not a fun experience. But instead of being able to stay home and wait it out, I was obliged to attend a professional meeting and sit through lectures on various topics to keep up my licensure. It wasn’t too bad...
  12. Susan Skylark

    Hermit crabs?

    So I had to ‘rescue’ a quail chick the other day, and a couple other times previously, they’ll zip 2/3 of the shell then pop out their heads and feet but get the shell stuck like a crab or snail like pac man on their rumps, wish I had a picture! Do other species do this or just my ridiculous birds?
  13. Susan Skylark

    A tale of two hatches

    So you buy and ship some expensive eggs and end up with 1 bird you keep out of 40 eggs (saddled air cells, shipping disaster, 25% hatch rate, psycho chicks…) and then you just throw 20 random eggs in the incubator and go on vacation (literally unsupervised for a week) not really caring if they...
  14. 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...
  15. 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...
  16. Susan Skylark

    Ambassadors of Quail-dom

    It has been a learning experience this summer, my son took his quail to the country fair for 4-h and ended up having to show pigs and a steer too! But then it was also a surprise for the kids with said steer and pigs to have to take their turn at showing a quail, something none of them knew...
  17. Susan Skylark

    Choosing your show birds (a light hearted ramble)

    My family will embark on our first poultry exhibition adventure this weekend, long have we been anticipating this moment (we hatched our first eggs, from some random eBay seller in March 2024, as you can see we have invested heavily in our hereditary show stock). I will also qualify that we...
  18. Susan Skylark

    To bathe a quail

    No, not a dust bath, a real soap and water bath. Peaches took it like a champ! He’s going to the fair next weekend and was a little dirty, or so we thought, but actually he just has some grayish feathers coming in on his head. He will also be my son’s showmanship bird, he was a complete spaz...
  19. Susan Skylark

    Quail pullet egg abnormalities, how long is normal?

    I had lots of wonky pullet eggs from 5-8 week old birds on a 28% protein starter, I hardly ever have a wonky egg since switching to 21% layer feed (birds also start laying at 7 weeks instead of 5), until just recently. I have three 9 week old hens in a separate pen, 2 are celadon and lay normal...
  20. Susan Skylark

    Quail math!

    You start with 10 viable eggs and go into lockdown, halfway through the hatch you notice you have 3 chicks in the brooder, 5 in the incubator and 3 left to hatch. Afterwards you have eleven normal sized chicks. 11/10 isn’t too bad except there are no twins, which means I can’t count, nice...
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