Button Quail incubating own eggs?

[DK newbie]

Hi all!
I'm all new to quail, got 3 hens and a roo for the bottom of my budgie aviary about 2 months ago.
One of the hens started laying eggs 26th of March, I left them in her nest and on April 4th she started sitting on 6 eggs.
One of the other hens laid an egg in her nest about a week ago, so I decided to fence off (= place a small cage over the head of) the other hens and the roo so she didn't get too many eggs to cover them all.
2 days ago, an egg was lying outside the nest. I took it out and cracked it open - the contents were partly dried out, so I guess that one wasn't fertile - I hope it doesn't mean the eggs got to cold at an early stage and the chicks died. Anyway, it's day 17 now and as the eggs are supposed to hatch on day 16, I'm all nerves now..
Anyone have any experiences with button hens incubating their own eggs?
If they end up not hatching, what are the main possible causes? I think the hen has been very stable, I haven't seen her off the nest for more than 7-8 minutes at a time. She looks so cute when she sprints back to the nest after feeding, head held low so no one sees her(I assume that's the intention of her running style).
They have mainly been fed what the budgies get - millet seed and whatever is in that mix, but I have also given them hard boiled eggs, ants, worms, grass, broccoli and similar, though not following a specific schedule, just randomly when I had time and got the idea.
Where as they are in an aviary, it's in an old concrete stable, so they don't get sunlight. Might vitamin D be a problem?
Any advice from all you knowledgeable people is appreciated!

 

[poultry102]

Well, I've got to say I'm not an expert either but I do have some experience with quail. Beings the mother is a first timer it isn't unusual that her first batch does't do so good. Think of it kind of like humans we learn from trial and error, you are always a better second mom than a first. Hens always throw the egg out of the nest,crack, and eat the eggs they know won't hatch, this is because they don't want the egg to contaminate all the rest of the eggs. It seems as though the quail are spoiled which is a good thing, they get the nutrition they need. Have you ever considered that the male may not be very fertile? I would try to artificially incubate the other hen's eggs just to get an idea of how fertile your rooster may be. That is if you have an incubator. I would also like to throw in that quail need light because there is a gland behind the eyes of birds called a pituitary gland. When stimulated by light this produces a hormone that is carried via the bloodstream to the ovary which sets egg production in motion.

Hope this helped - Poultry102

 

[DK newbie]

Thank you for your reply!
I don't have an incubator, and seen as many quail(I guess it's not as bad with the buttons as with some other species?) seem to have lost their nesting instinct due to being hatched in an incubator for many generations, I prefer letting them do the job on their own, now that I seem to have at least one that does have the instinct.
My mother suggested something I didn't think about - the eggs might have been too cold before the hen started incubating them. We have had temperatures of 0-5 degrees Celsius several times at night for the past month. Where as the quail are in a building, it is not isolated so I assume that 0 degrees Celsius outside means just about 0 degrees Celsius inside. As it is not recommended to store eggs meant for hatching in a refrigerator, that might have been too cold? But then again, we did have a regular hen hatching chicks(6 of them. So cute!) yesterday in the same building, her eggs should have been exposed to the same temperatures.. But it might be they are less delicate than quail eggs?
Anyway, unless the egg she tossed out of the nest a few days ago, was the one the other hen laid, she still has that egg and she will have incubated that one since the 13th, so provided she stays on the nest long enough, there will be at least one chance of an egg from the other hen hatching - and that one hasn't been exposed to cold nights, as she was already incubating when she got it.

Glad you think they are getting what they need, I've been reading(a lot!) about quail recently, and in some places it was suggested that where as grown quail could survive on the small seeds given to budgies and other birds, they wouldn't compare to birds given a higher protein diet like game bird feed. I do think my quail look healthy, though - feathers sitting tight and all.

 

[DK newbie]

Thought I'd give an update.
Today, I got a chick. Unfortunately, it was in the cage with the male and two other hens when I found it - dead.
I must admit, I did think the bars in that cage were close enough to keep any babies out - they are 0.9 mm apart. But for my very tiny button baby, that was enough. Or maybe it found a place where the bars were a little further apart, it is a rather old cage that has been exposed to a few different things, so there are places like that.
The mother was on the nest when I found the chick, but I assume she has left it to be with the chick when it started moving about and then gone back at some point when it stopped peeping. If any other eggs are fertile, I hope she wasn't off the nest for too long.
She left the nest when I was feeding them, the shell of the hatched chick was still there but I didn't see any sign of the other eggs hatching(they are in a rather dark, unapproachable corner, I might have missed it). I'll keep as close a look as possible though, and go check on them as often as I can. I moved the cage with the other quail a little, hoping if it's not placed right by the edge of the aviary, there is a better chance any other chicks will stay out of it.
There were no signs of them having hurt the chick, but I did see them pecking a little at the carcass before I took it out. To me, it looked more like curiosity than malice, though. I suppose they did somehow cause it's death anyway.
I had actually prepared another cage for the hen and future babies, with some very small netting around the bottom. I intended to use this cage to enclose the other quail until the chicks came, but it was 0.5 mm too wide to get through the door of the aviary. How I wish it hadn't been!