Coturnix set up

[TigerLand]

This is my corurnix set. The cage on the side houses 4 males. The big cage is 5'x3', has a dust bath, box for hiding/nesting, plenty of good food and water. Oyster shell free choice. The main cage houses 15 females and 3 males. I'm soon going to build an 8'x2' 3 tier pen for them.

 

[TigerLand]

 

[TigerLand]

When I build the new pen, it will be about 70yds away from the chickens. I'm new to quail. I've had these for 2wks. They were laying when I brought them home. The first few days they layed great but it slowly dropped off. When I put them in this pen they stopped laying completely. These birds were packed into cages when I bought them. Most were bare backed from overcrowding and poor husbandry but their all looking better and better everyday. If by one has by kind I advice or tips I'd be most grateful. It may just be the change in that made them stop laying. I would say it was lack of light but they were laying fine before with the short winter days.

 

[DK newbie]

3 things typically cause quail to stop laying:
Lack of light (typical advice is ~14 hours a day) - they could have been on supplemental light where you got them?
Lack of proper nutrition (usually 25-30 % protein and 'oyster shell free choice' - make sure it's small enough for them to eat though).
And the most usual cause when moving them: Stress. Moving causes stress, it's more strange if they continue laying than if they stop. But one thing you might want to consider changing, is having multiple males in the cage. One male for 3-7 hens and only one male per cage is what I usually hear (I don't have coturnix). Multiple males per cage = fighting = stress. So I'd split the females up between the 3 males in different cages.

 

[TigerLand]

Ok. Well unfortunately the weather has cancelled out working today, so I have all day to work on the big pen I'm going to build.I've read that keeping multiple males in the same cage. Could cause fighting. I assumed since there were 5 females to each male they would be ok. I don't see any signs of fighting, I watch them a pretty good bit and they seem to get along fine. The lady I bought them from did indeed have her set up inside of a barn which has lights on 14hrs a day. I have conduit and pvc ready to go, just need to dig a trench out to the birds to install electrical receptacles and water lines. So my serama chickens will have heat and my quail have lights..... And so I don't have to run around between quail and 2 chicken runs replacing water every morning..lots of work. Thanks for the reply