Can you get quail to hatch their own eggs?

[Nabiki]

Mine hatch their own eggs . they do go broody

You probably have an aviary setting with lots of little hiding places and not too crowded. They *can* go broody, but it's rare.

 

[Cool-breeze7]

I only raise coturnix. Consider life from the quail’s perspective. Does she have enough space, resources and relaxed enough to believe hatching chicks is worthwhile.

I have some very tall stringy grasses that grow naturally where I decided to place my aviary. There are probably a dozen or so little nests floating around.

I finally had a hen set up in one of the nest locations I deemed acceptable and she’s on day 6 now, counting day 0 from when I first saw her sitting. Lots of space, lots of hides, lots of tall grasses.

 

[KatDar]

I currently have 9 female coturnix and 3 boys (but I plan to buy a few more girls) and two bobwhite females (Its a long story- but they get along fine. The bobs are even laying now despite having awful conditions before and only being moved two weeks ago!) and have a few projects I want to undertake! One of which is trying to get one of my girls to hatch some eggs herself. They have an indoor part of their coop where their food and water is that has a wood floor, and a completely wire much bigger run area with mostly dead grass at the bottom, although some has been growing as of late. They like to lay in small ditches they have dug behind the door to enter the indoor part, and they also take dust baths there. They also lay behind their water in the very corner of the indoor part. I have heard that coturnix quail are almost impossible to get to hatch their own eggs, but I would like to try! They already really like to sit in the ditch, and I have seen some stay their for quite a long while, not taking a bath, not laying, just... sitting. Anyways, anyone have any ideas for a nest box/area? I have plenty of time and space and would like to hear some ideas! While we are at it, has anyone here ever managed this before, and if so what did you do? Not life or death for me to hatch some, just a fun project. Thanks! (Also I have heard a bit about bobwhite coturnix hybrids, and so far the eggs don't seem fertile- but can someone educate me about those?)

We are in North Carolina and our coturnix only go broody in the fall when the weather gets cooler. I'm not sure if it's the temperature, amount of daylight or some other trigger. I've had it happen four times and every time we had to remove the other quail because they were bothering the mother who was trying to incubate. If she was with a male she would leave the nest to chase him away. And one that was housed only with other females was incubating unfertilized eggs - 24 of them! We swapped them out for 12 fertilized eggs. We had to remove the other females because they stole one egg from her and pecked it open, killing the chick inside. Two of our hens were successful in hatching out chicks and they were excellent mothers. The other two were harassed by other quail and abandoned the nest.
We keep our quail on soil with cover and plenty of nesting materials. But like I said they only go broody in the fall.