Button quail touching!

[Glendy]

Hello im new to this site iam very impress with all the information here iam new to the quail/chicken workd and im fascinated by it i recently about 3 weeks ago i got 4 button quails i believe 3 of them are females and 1 male i notice they have been mating and today i found an egg in their nest i was wondering if it is ok for me to touch it or move it is the 1st egg so i dont want her to stop laying. Iam planning on letting her finish laying egg and have babys would me touching it cause her to stop wanting to lay or stop d egg from ever giving me a baby?
Thank you in advance

 

[The Quail Guru]

From experience, when my first buttons got their first egg I picked it up and disturbed them so they didn't lay another egg until about 3 weeks time. But then again, it may have been from another reason because how are you going to collect the eggs and eat them? But anyway, if you're hoping they'll hatch some chicks I wouldn't touch the egg, they might just abandon it. Don't disturb them unless necessary (such as to feed them or clean the cage) and let them do what they need to do. They'll lay 1 egg each day until they get around 7 eggs and then they'll form a clutch in their nest. The female or the male with sit on the eggs and care for the chicks or both of them will. It will take about 21 days (3 weeks) for the eggs to hatch. When the chicks hatch, let them get settled in for a day and then you can go see them/check on them.

 

[DK newbie]

Unless the egg is in a very inconvenient place, I would just leave it where it is.
As a correction of the above, most sources state that button quail incubation is 16 days. I have experienced both 18 and 21 though, but in the latter case I guess the hen wasn't sitting too tight the first few days - I wasn't staring at her all the time, I might just have caught her on the nest every time I was feeding, by coincidence.
One of my hens just hatched 10 chicks yesterday, I'm not exactly sure how long she incubated this time though, as I was on vacation when she began and my father(who was feeding the quail while I was gone) has deemed himself unable to determine whether they are lying eggs or incubating them when he sees them on the nest.

 

[The Quail Guru]

Oops, sorry for the wrong hatching times. Around 17 is correct, I guess I was thinking of another quail or something. And I have also had eggs hatch in 21 days so at least I wasn't not totally wrong, right?

 

[dc3085]

Button quail 16 days
Coturnix 17-18 days
Bobwhites 21-23 days

 

[Glendy]

Thank you guys sooo much for all the helpful information

hopefully i get more eggs soon

 

[serama girl]

I have heard that button quail incubation is 16 days as well.