button quail incubating in Mini advanced incubator???

[ShellyBear]

My girls just started laying about a month ago and the only incubator I have is a Mini advanced and I was wondering if I could incubate the eggs in there. I do not have the right size egg holder in the incubator but I have hatch small eggs in it. Please help and thank you so much!

 

[MagicPidge]

I have no idea about incubators but I've heard button quail can go broody on their own. Perhaps someone could help out and confirm/deny?

 

[ShellyBear]

Yes button quail do go broody but rarely.

 

[MagicPidge]

Thanks ShellyBear!

 

[DK newbie]

I got 4 buttons, 3 hens and a roo, about 3 months ago. All 3 hens have been broody now, the last one became broody about a week ago.
This far I've only had one chick which died before I knew I had it. The second hen to go broody is due within the next week, the third one had its eggs stolen by the second after a couple of days. So mine seem to go broody easily. I don't really know anything about their history though - whether they are incubator hatched themselves or not and so on. I guess there might be differences in the broodiness of the general populations from country to country though, so I don't know how well my Danish quail can be used to estimate the behavior of buttons in other countries..
Anyway, the first hen to go broody, did it as soon as she had 6 eggs, which was 9 days from when she laid her first egg. The other two have been more slow, dropping an egg here and there or just laying a bunch in a very exposed corner and never show any interest in them.

 

[ShellyBear]

You are so lucky to have broody button quail. What I have research is they were mad to be beautiful and not mothers. And it is possible for the girls to go broody, unlike mine they just sit and lay an egg in the water bowl! But I never let the girls have more than 2 eggs and then took them away because I wasn't ready to have chicks and they seam to just run them over. I have 2 girls and 4 boys. 1 girl with the two dominate males and the none dominate female with the 2 nominate males. I have heard that 2 males and 1 female is really bad because the males will breed and pester to death. The thing is my female is doing great and loves her 2 partner the same thing with the none dominate girl.


Here is the dominate trio.

My home for them. There is only the dominate ones I hear the others are in another one.
IT looks like the white is a female but hasn't layed yet.

 

[MagicPidge]

All I've been told is that button are *more likely* to go broody than Coturnix, but that really isn't saying much when you consider how often a Coturnix goes broody

 

[ShellyBear]

Never had coturnix, but from the sound of it they must go broody a lot.

 

[DK newbie]

I'm really amazed that 2 males for one female works! Don't the males fight? Have they been together since hatching or how did you introduce them to each other? Are they both mating with the female or just one of them?

Anyway, I think you might have more luck with getting your hens broody if you had just one hen with one roo, but you could always try leaving all eggs in the cage for a couple of weeks, to see it that makes a difference.
And I might have more luck with hatching chicks if I had just one hen, as they seem to ruin it for each other

But as you, I don't want to separate them - both because I only have one male, and because they live in an aviary and a cage just can't provide the same living conditions. I'm guessing the aviary thing might have something to do with their broodiness too, but I've heard that some buttons will go broody just fine in a cage a well, if provided with proper hiding places(I have spruce branches in one end of the aviary and every nest made behind those(and only nests made behind those) have resulted in a broody hen).

A picture of the first hen to go broody, on her nest - the one that's broody now is in the same place(not the best quality, sorry):


And a picture of the four of them and most of the aviary:

 

[ShellyBear]

Yes my female gets bread by bolth of the males and the males don't fight which I also was surprised by. They were raised with each other from day one. I need to get one of the nesting boxes that are like a small house for the girls. our aviary is so big, if I had the space I would give them more room.