Chicken to quail coop

[Chickenstw]

Hey everyone,
My chicken coop is soon to be vacant as we are giving our hens to some friends due to their noise. I have been reading up on quail as an alternative to chickens because of how much quieter they are and I want to use my coop to hold them. I read that a quail cage should not exceed 1-2 feet in height or else they could kill themselves. In the way my coop is built I can very easily lower the run to 2.5 feet. Is this too high?

 

[Kiki]

Can you post pictrues of your coop?
Are you aware that quail do best if there is ONLY one male in the group?

 

[Chickenstw]

Can you post pictrues of your coop?
Are you aware that quail do best if there is ONLY one male in the group?

Here is a picture of the run. I was thinking of putting a screen on top of that first horizontal beam that goes around. Also are male quail as loud as a hen doing her egg song?

 

[Kiki]

Male quail are loud...if they are upset.
One male quail in that area shouldn't be loud at all.

There is no need to put a screen on top of the bean. The height is not an issue for your set up.

 

[Kiki]

Here is a picture of the run. I was thinking of putting a screen on top of that first horizontal beam that goes around. Also are male quail as loud as a hen doing her egg song?

You could probably get away with keeping 2 or 3 males in this area IF you have enough females.

 

[Alpine Bobwhite]

It depends what sort of quail you want.

Coturnix are one of the most common to have, they usually don't ever fly, but might make small flap and hop off the ground. Males aren't that noisy, just a shrill call now and then, it isn't all that noisy, but some might consider it annoying, I don't.

Bobwhites are totally different. They need a lot of space (height-wise), they like high up places, some of them I call "roosters" because they roost up high, my bird, Alpine does a lot. They can be tame but ones that have never been tamed might fly to escape you, probably not though. About noise, bobwhites make tuneful noises and sound very nice.

 

[Alpine Bobwhite]

Here is a picture of the run. I was thinking of putting a screen on top of that first horizontal beam that goes around. Also are male quail as loud as a hen doing her egg song?

To me this looks big enough for Bobwhites and Coturnix.

 

[QuailQueen3]

Here is a picture of the run. I was thinking of putting a screen on top of that first horizontal beam that goes around. Also are male quail as loud as a hen doing her egg song?

For Jumbo Brown Coturnix (quail), the recommended cage height is either 1-2 feet or at least 6 feet. So, it looks like your cage height is 6 feet.

For Jumbo Brown Coturnix, a ratio of one male for every five females is recommended. Otherwise, the females are overbred. Slight decrease in fertility if 1:6. Females definitely more beat up if 1:4.

I have not raised mine in a “community setting.” Rather, mine are in separate cages with one male for every 4-6 females. I am still scaling up my flock, so sometimes I don’t have the optimal 1:5 ratio. When the males are in this setting, they are very quiet. (All of the noise that I have is for periods when I am raising excess males up to butchering weight or keeping a “Pinch Hitter” male in case a breeding male becomes too aggressive which has happened).

 

[CliftonQuail]

Hey everyone,
My chicken coop is soon to be vacant as we are giving our hens to some friends due to their noise. I have been reading up on quail as an alternative to chickens because of how much quieter they are and I want to use my coop to hold them. I read that a quail cage should not exceed 1-2 feet in height or else they could kill themselves. In the way my coop is built I can very easily lower the run to 2.5 feet. Is this too high?

If the space underneath the coop is accessible, I'd think you might want to block it off to keep the quail from getting underneath it. As @QuailQueen3 said, the recommendation is cage height of 1-2 feet, or less, or at least 6 feet for Coturnix. When they're startled, they have a tendency to pop straight up. The lower height is supposed to keep them from getting enough momentum to break their necks on the ceiling. If it's 6 feet, or more, they can't jump that high.
That said, I'm using cages from Wynola Ranch that are about 8" tall and I've still found birds with broken necks. Cortunix seem to delight in finding creative ways to off themselves.