Another Egg Question

[mochicken]

Ok I know you guys hate the "why is my quail not showering me with tons of little eggs" lol but I have a quick question or two.

I keep my Tibetan breeder pen with only four quail, 1 male and 3 females. I keep my English Whites one male to two females, I get eggs from the whites almost every day but the Tibetans rarely lay. I am lucky to get 5 eggs a week from three females, they are on a 14 hour light day with a red heat light on them at night ( they were spoiled when I got them so I have kept the light on, plus it keeps their water bottles thawed, thats a plus lol )

I took a male out from their pen because he was getting pretty aggressive with them, that was about 10 days ago, the new male is breeding them too and is starting to get a little too rowdy as well. I think I will separate him and give them a boy free break for a while.

My question is this.

What can I do to get their egg production up? I think they are around a year old and will be replaced when I get some of my new birds of age but I wanted to get eggs from them before they meet the ol smokey smoker lol.

I feed them 28% Gamebird feed with bird seed mixed in every other day, they have grit ( sand ) and they have a nice sandbox to dig and play in.

Any ideas guys and gals?

 

[mochicken]

anybody have ideas?

 

[TedJan92_in_Idaho]

Ditch the red light and get a regular bulb

 

[Stellar]

Yeah, I don't like red bulbs. They produce a lot of heat, yes, but they also bring out aggression from experience. You can also add a full spectrum light added on to the white bulb. This will help with them getting more natural daylight and wavelengths.

 

[mochicken]

Yeah I kept them on white light 24 hours but I didnt get any more eggs then either

 

[TheRealTimShady]

i don't think its the light causing any issues...i've had a few birds that NEVER lay an egg, ever....

its probably the new male, or maybe the change in feed every other day, mix the seed in to their normal gbs so they get it everyday, you want EVERYTHING to be as constant as possible(i even check my birds at the SAME time everyday so that they get into a routine)

i've noticed, the SLIGHTEST change in ANYTHING can throw it off, temp, food, mates, lighting, who knows what


maybe they just greedy

 

[MobyQuail]

http://www.sp.uconn.edu/~mdarre/poultrypages/light_inset.html

 

[Stellar]

I don't recommend keeping them on lights 24 hours a day either Mo. What helped me was 14-16 hours of white light WITH the addition of full spectrum lighting with all the proper wavelengths. Model A has posted a good link to more info on lighting. You can add a black light with the other two lightings for added help. I am getting a lot of eggs right now so lighting does play a role.

Now I have gotten 3 hermaphrodites in my raising of coturnix. These are coturnix that look like hens, some lay one egg and then they turn. The one ovary they have shrivels up, they start crowing, and they are rather useless after that...

 

[chrishel]

That's scientifically cool!

Just out of curiosity, about how many cots do you think you have raised so far? I was wondering what the percentage is.

It just screams for a joke here but I can't think of any that would be remotely appropriate.

How about: I've had some cross-dressed quail. That's where the bacon overlaps.

 

[rittert3]

http://www.feathersite.com/Poultry/BRKChange.html This page explains the sex change subject in pretty good detail. It's actually that only the left ovary is functional and if it fails the right ovary produces testosterone and causes a sort of natural sex change. I think it is one of the most interesting subject matters I've read about in the animal world, there are a few other natural mishaps that are very intersting to learn about too.

That's scientifically cool!

My thoughts exactly!​