➡ Quail Hatch Along🥚

[Kiki]

My Tennessee Reds just started laying, yesterday! I've had another bout with Ergot poisoning!...so far just 1 Amherst hen. Thought she was going to die, yesterday for sure but she's much better today. Still not too mobile but more alert than yesterday.

Oh no. I missed the ergot poisoning...
What happened?

 

[007Sean]

Yep

Would a higher protein be better in colder temps though? I know it’s almost spring now, but I’ve lost two birds just during this cold snap, and a few more over the winter. I remember that I lost quite a few birds this time last year as well

I know this is a little late but it's not unusual to lose hens in the early spring time. Their age and condition play a bigger factor than the cold temperatures. Their bodies just get more 'run down' than male birds.

 

[007Sean]

Oh no. I missed the ergot poisoning...
What happened?

Don't actually know for sure but just got a new batch of feed milled, started feeding it and some new white heart sunflower seeds. I'm pretty sure it's the sunflower seeds that have the fungus. 1st day I feed them some (all my birds) everything's ok, feeding them yesterday, the hen was laying upright but head was drooped and eyes closed and you could tell by the dirts disturbance that she had recently had a seizure. I picked her up, well muscled up, not skinny...thought maybe she might be egg bound but wasn't....she put up a struggle when I picked her up.

Today, she's laying down, upright but looking around, alert, and tried to move away from me. We'll see what tomorrow brings!

 

[Kiki]

Don't actually know for sure but just got a new batch of feed milled, started feeding it and some new white heart sunflower seeds. I'm pretty sure it's the sunflower seeds that have the fungus. 1st day if feed them some (all my birds) everything's ok, feeding them yesterday, the hen was laying upright but head was drooped and eyes closed and you could tell by the dirts disturbance that she had recently had a seizure. I picked her up, well muscled up, not skinny...thought maybe she might be egg bound but wasn't....she put up a struggle when I picked her up.

Today, she's laying down, upright but looking around, alert, and tried to move away from me. We'll see what tomorrow brings!

Oh man. I hope she gets to feeling better.

 

[007Sean]

Oh man. I hope she gets to feeling better.

I do too! She's 1 of only 3 F2 Amherst hens that I have right now.

 

[Nabiki]

@007Sean I hope she recovers quickly! Let us know how it goes.

 

[Kiki]

 

[Dandichook]

Hi all! I didn't post here before because I didn't want to jinx it...but about 3 weeks ago I drove a few hours and picked up an order of 50 jumbo wild and 2 dozen Celadon eggs from Godfather Quail Farm in FL. We stuck them in our homemade incubator 24hrs later, sat back and had a beer, celebrating maybe a bit early...

24 hours later the homemade egg turner broke and we panicked. Clearly, our hatch was going to fail and be terrible.

Fast forward 16 days spent obsessively hand-turning 80(!!! they gave us a few extra!) eggs 5 times daily, and we had chicks!

Clearly we had some hot spots, because of the 48 that hatched, 2 came out on day 16 and 4 on day 19, so will have to troubleshoot that...but we did get 48 chicks! Our first chicks and first incubating experience ever. I know that isn't a great hatch rate, but it's more than we hoped for.

A couple needed some help getting out of the shell, and we had a couple die for unknown reasons within the first 24 hours, sadly, but overall we're feeling pretty optimistic about our quail project.

We appear to have 2 white chicks, and some appear to have little tuxedo patterns, and most are the wild type looking color we expected. Excited to see how these guys grow up!!

We have been delighted with how friendly they are. Most of them will come running when we make the right sounds. Super cute!!

 

[Kiki]

Hi all! I didn't post here before because I didn't want to jinx it...but about 3 weeks ago I drove a few hours and picked up an order of 50 jumbo wild and 2 dozen Celadon eggs from Godfather Quail Farm in FL. We stuck them in our homemade incubator 24hrs later, sat back and had a beer, celebrating maybe a bit early...

24 hours later the homemade egg turner broke and we panicked. Clearly, our hatch was going to fail and be terrible.

Fast forward 16 days spent obsessively hand-turning 80(!!! they gave us a few extra!) eggs 5 times daily, and we had chicks!

Clearly we had some hot spots, because of the 48 that hatched, 2 came out on day 16 and 4 on day 19, so will have to troubleshoot that...but we did get 48 chicks! Our first chicks and first incubating experience ever. I know that isn't a great hatch rate, but it's more than we hoped for.

A couple needed some help getting out of the shell, and we had a couple die for unknown reasons within the first 24 hours, sadly, but overall we're feeling pretty optimistic about our quail project.

We appear to have 2 white chicks, and some appear to have little tuxedo patterns, and most are the wild type looking color we expected. Excited to see how these guys grow up!!

We have been delighted with how friendly they are. Most of them will come running when we make the right sounds. Super cute!!

Congrats!

 

[heatherbeast]

She did it! This little cinnamon grizzled lady is a momma now! FIve of six eggs hatched.