➡ Quail Hatch Along🥚

[CoturnixComplex]

This only makes sense to you.
So you know/knew that ordering say Pearls you really aren't getting all pearls right?
But us regular people don't know that.

Well now we kinda do but...

I didn't really know, just assumed it was a possibility because I know nothing about pearl genetics except the fact that "falb fee were used in their creation," whatever the heck that means. It's one of the newer colors so I just would expect a certain amount of deviation? And then I got a bunch of things somewhat-related to it from pearl parents so that kind of confirmed it.

But, like, A. showing the full range of possibilities is always nice, and what I try to do when people really want specific colors, and B. some colors I really wouldn't expect that to be the case with because I do know more about them, and they're really simple to isolate and get true-breeding groups (like tibetans).

 

[BReeder!]

I

What do you guys use as a waterer? Will a regular chick waterer work? With marbles maybe?

ETA- for baby quail chicks

Put small smooth stones in a regular chick water.

 

[CoturnixComplex]

with my pearls, I hatched 13. 12 were yeller. the other one was falb fee. as adults, 2 of the 12 are more “italian” and a couple are “dirty pearl” with a smattering of golden in the white. So, if pearls hatch 75% true and you ordered 100 eggs (that all hatched) you could get 25 that were not pearl, but were falb fee, italian etc. If you order 200 eggs of a color that hatches 75% true.....then that means 50 chicks could hatch different. with wild type or egyptian, your chances of getting an odd chick is less than 1 out of 100 eggs hatched.

Yeah, like, this makes sense to me and is what I would expect as a possibility. @dpenning I would probably expect about the same spread. It's still majority pearl-types, and if it were less than about half I'd be irked or disappointed. Y'all had better luck than I did in that department! But I also had to toss a bunch of eggs early that hatch due to leaking and I figured with my luck that was all the pearls

@CayugaJana we need more pics of your 'tibetan' babies. What % are you estimating at dark red based (even if they have a tuxedo or bib) vs. just wildly different colors?

 

[muddy75]

pearls as chicks < 1 week vs pearls at 3 weeks (this was the only hatch that I intentionally ordered all eggs of a single color. ) I’m still trying to get my son to help me with updated photos now that they are outside.

 

[CoturnixComplex]

View attachment 1739942 View attachment 1739941 View attachment 1739943 View attachment 1739944 pearls as chicks < 1 week vs pearls at 3 weeks (this was the only hatch that I intentionally ordered all eggs of a single color. ) I’m still trying to get my son to help me with updated photos now that they are outside.

Them be pearls! That's basically what I'd expect. There's just a little variation. @dpenning do your babies more or less look like these guys?

 

[muddy75]

in other news..... we finally took out the last 5 cockerels from my december chicken hatch today!!! NO MORE boy chickens for me!!! the last few that hubby has cooked have been terrible and keeping this batch as long as I did cost me a silky girl and at least 1 quail (that i found dead this morning). My splash silky was acting broody this afternoon so I left 1 egg under her uncollected to see if she stays broody or goes on about her business tomorrow. if she sticks with it, I am tempted to close her off in the little coop where she is and stick the 9 eggs under her that are in the bator and see how she does.
planning to get back to work on the aviary tomorrow after work and hoping to have it ready to start moving quail in by Sunday. here’s are pics of the area from yesterday.

 

[Kiki]

View attachment 1739966 View attachment 1739965 View attachment 1739964 in other news..... we finally took out the last 5 cockerels from my december chicken hatch today!!! NO MORE boy chickens for me!!! the last few that hubby has cooked have been terrible and keeping this batch as long as I did cost me a silky girl and at least 1 quail (that i found dead this morning). My splash silky was acting broody this afternoon so I left 1 egg under her uncollected to see if she stays broody or goes on about her business tomorrow. if she sticks with it, I am tempted to close her off in the little coop where she is and stick the 9 eggs under her that are in the bator and see how she does.
planning to get back to work on the aviary tomorrow after work and hoping to have it ready to start moving quail in by Sunday. here’s are pics of the area from yesterday.

This is very nice. Will you be adding a roof/cover to it?

 

[CayugaJana]

Oh no I’ll be sure to add marbles!

Yes! Add them, just don’t loose your marbles!

Not all of them breed true...but this is also frustratingly untrue. They can always be hiding genes, but to say that you can't breed them true is just false. Every single chick I've gotten from my tibetan boys crossed with non-reds has been a red range, as expected.

Hello! English whites! Lavenders! Recessive silvers!

Go with JMF next time.

I may have over simplified what he explained to me. He did tell me all my yellow would turn to white feathers and that it wouldn’t change. And he may have said they breed 60% true as muddy said. But now I can’t remember. I was expecting them to be the same like when I ordered the bobs, so that’s why I was scratching my head.

Are they at least bibbed tibetans? That makes sense to me! Not so much the other colors altogether.

I’ll post a video of what I have. I wouldn’t know what a bibbed tibetan looked like if it bit me! Bibs are a no go for me except for maybe a pretty one for the kids to do enter into 4H.

breeding for color = designer quail.....as low as 60% true hatch rate (in the collections like ssc and pastel) because of different color gene combinations. and dominant vs recessive colors and lethal gene combinations etc
breeding for weight in “wild type” otoh is 99+% true hatch

This I did not know until today. I’ve never ran into it with other birds so it never occurred to me before!
But now I know!

grow out the oddballs and make them dinner!!

That’s probably what we will do. Especially males. And probably train our personal dogs with them. Then save the others for our hunting buddies. Save the best for company you know?!

The only things that "can't breed true" are lethal dominants (of which, admittedly, there are more than a few). You can get homozygous of dominant, incomplete dominant, and recessive within a few generations of work.

I would (and am) crossing to mostly pure pharoah lines before releasing colors as "set" in order to clean them out. Everyone else I know would do the same.

If they're knowingly selling extremely diluted mixed genes as "that color!"...well...not how I would run my business but to each their own. That's why mine are all currently only mixed or pick-your-parents.

That’s an easy way to explain it when selling them! Great idea.

To be honest and say the parentage is slightly mixed is one thing...to say they "can't breed true"....is not.

I may be butchering what he said but that’s what I understood from our conversation.

with my pearls, I hatched 13. 12 were yeller. the other one was falb fee. as adults, 2 of the 12 are more “italian” and a couple are “dirty pearl” with a smattering of golden in the white. So, if pearls hatch 75% true and you ordered 100 eggs (that all hatched) you could get 25 that were not pearl, but were falb fee, italian etc. If you order 200 eggs of a color that hatches 75% true.....then that means 50 chicks could hatch different. with wild type or egyptian, your chances of getting an odd chick is less than 1 out of 100 eggs hatched.

Zack explained this to me in so many terms and asked what my goal with the quail was and what to order in the future based on what I was wanting.

I hear peeping!

That’s so exciting!!

This only makes sense to you.
So you know/knew that ordering say Pearls you really aren't getting all pearls right?
But us regular people don't know that.

Well now we kinda do but...

Yep, Me’s dumb too.... not just the chicks

Yeah, like, this makes sense to me and is what I would expect as a possibility. @dpenning I would probably expect about the same spread. It's still majority pearl-types, and if it were less than about half I'd be irked or disappointed. Y'all had better luck than I did in that department! But I also had to toss a bunch of eggs early that hatch due to leaking and I figured with my luck that was all the pearls
I’m the same way.

@CayugaJana we need more pics of your 'tibetan' babies. What % are you estimating at dark red based (even if they have a tuxedo or bib) vs. just wildly different colors?

I don’t really know!

View attachment 1739942 View attachment 1739941 View attachment 1739943 View attachment 1739944 pearls as chicks < 1 week vs pearls at 3 weeks (this was the only hatch that I intentionally ordered all eggs of a single color. ) I’m still trying to get my son to help me with updated photos now that they are outside.

Was the all yellow one a pearl as well?

View attachment 1739966 View attachment 1739965 View attachment 1739964 in other news..... we finally took out the last 5 cockerels from my december chicken hatch today!!! NO MORE boy chickens for me!!! the last few that hubby has cooked have been terrible and keeping this batch as long as I did cost me a silky girl and at least 1 quail (that i found dead this morning). My splash silky was acting broody this afternoon so I left 1 egg under her uncollected to see if she stays broody or goes on about her business tomorrow. if she sticks with it, I am tempted to close her off in the little coop where she is and stick the 9 eggs under her that are in the bator and see how she does.
planning to get back to work on the aviary tomorrow after work and hoping to have it ready to start moving quail in by Sunday. here’s are pics of the area from yesterday.

Abusive males go in a heartbeat at my house too!!

Here is a video of some of them.

 

[CayugaJana]

They look crunchy in the above video because I accidentally put too much water in their food then they all jumped in it. I normally wet down the birds feed for the first 2 weeks but I got today’s a little too soupy so they all were letting me know how unhappy they were to be wet!

 

[Kiki]

Yes! Add them, just don’t loose your marbles!


I may have over simplified what he explained to me. He did tell me all my yellow would turn to white feathers and that it wouldn’t change. And he may have said they breed 60% true as muddy said. But now I can’t remember. I was expecting them to be the same like when I ordered the bobs, so that’s why I was scratching my head.


I’ll post a video of what I have. I wouldn’t know what a bibbed tibetan looked like if it bit me! Bibs are a no go for me except for maybe a pretty one for the kids to do enter into 4H.


This I did not know until today. I’ve never ran into it with other birds so it never occurred to me before!
But now I know!

That’s probably what we will do. Especially males. And probably train our personal dogs with them. Then save the others for our hunting buddies. Save the best for company you know?!


That’s an easy way to explain it when selling them! Great idea.


I may be butchering what he said but that’s what I understood from our conversation.

Zack explained this to me in so many terms and asked what my goal with the quail was and what to order in the future based on what I was wanting.


That’s so exciting!!


Yep, Me’s dumb too.... not just the chicks


I don’t really know!


Was the all yellow one a pearl as well?


Abusive males go in a heartbeat at my house too!!

Here is a video of some of them.

I would call your colors a mix of everything.
The tuxedo at the end, this yellow belly one:

I need him!