I got a tentative okay to have some from my landlord. I'm hoping they'll open the gateway so that I may one day be allowed to have some bantam hens.
I'm mostly interested in keeping them for egg production.
1a. Where do I start? 1b. Are there any breeds that are easier or better egg producers? 1c. What do I need for quail?
2. Could they be kept in a "chicken tractor" provided the fencing used is small enough they can't escape?
TIA
(I've had chickens before, so all my experience is with them. I had to give them up when we moved here and I just didn't anticipate how much I'd miss them and the eggs.
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Starleigh, first, welcome to the Quail forum on BYC. To answer some of your questions, in reverse order:
2. Yes, they could be
kept in a tractor. Now that spring has finally arrived, I put my quail in a tractor for 2 or 3 hours a day to give them natural sunshine. My quail are kept in my garage as I want to keep the bio security that they currently have. My concern is if I keep them outside, other birds could come into contact with them and pass an unwanted infection.
1c. Here is a
link to a general info thread on quail. In the initial "article" written by Monarch, there will be loads of information about the different variety of Coturnix Quail, as well as their determining sex of quail, housing, food requirements, ratio etc. There is a book titled, "Coturnix Revolution" written by
Stellar, aka Alexandra Douglas that goes into more detail in raising quail. It is pricey, but the information contained in the book is great.
1b. Tammy's recommendation to get some A&M's from James Marie Farms is spot on. I purchased some A&Ms from another source (that I am close to revealing), and they never reached 9 oz, whereas the A&Ms from JMF reached 10 oz at 4 weeks of age. My JMF hens are kept in different cages, and the comparison of egg size is like comparing the size of a quarter to a dime. We hard boil the JMF eggs as the "other" A&M's would take forever to get enough for an egg salad sammich.
1a. You have found the right place to start. If you have any questions, BYC has a fantastic
Advanced Search function (just type in the question, and if you want only answers that were on the quail forum from Stellar, 2crows or DC3085). I have learned that 9 times out of 10, somebody else has had the same question, and it was answered many times (don't get me started on "
keeping chickens and quail" or "
can a bobwhite mate with a Coturnix"...).
You may change your mind about the "bantams" once you get quail. Quail mature at 8 - 12 weeks compared to (roughly) 5 months for Bantams.
James
Edited for spell check.
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