Dandichook's Quail Growth Tracking thread

[BrandonsBirbs]

I apologize for the delay! I definitely forgot to reply. No excuses.

I did separate the boys from the girls early on at around week 5-ish, because we were seeing fighting. That settled things down...sort of...for a short time. Then they started up badly enough that we culled heavily at week 6 because of incessant fighting and crowing, leaving just our potential breeder males (and all the ones we couldn't sex. We are REAL bad at vent sexing. Also we had a few feather sexable ones who looked like girls but turned into boys.).

In fact, we sadly had to cull one this week because she turned out to be a he, and the two other (much more mature) males beat him up so bad we didn't feel trying to doctor him up would be humane since he was going to be a meat bird anyways. "She" was G011, and isn't going to be included here with a dress-out wright because we didn't process him for meat, as we were concerned for the safety of the meat (worried about infection--we probably could have eaten it safely, but didn't want to risk it). His final (live) weight was 171.3g.

So--yeah, violence has definitely been an issue, even though we have been stocking them at 1 to 2 sq ft per bird. Guess they're just ***holes. (We have an order in with Myshire for a shipment of eggs and will be very interested to see how the temperaments of those birds compare. If they are significantly less aggressive, we may just cull this entire batch and replace them with the Myshire birds. But that's a story for another time.)



Anyhow, sorry for being late with this. We had a very busy weekend and didn't get to weigh them until today ..though I don't think we missed any real growth. It's been over 100F here a few days this week and our feed consumption has dropped considerably, and the birds in the outdoor coop have basically not grown...at all, which is disappointing. The birds in the screened porch, meanwhile, are still growing just fine, so we're fairly sure it's the heat putting them off food. This week's data should be taken with a grain of salt--I look forward to seeing how the next batch compares.

Data for week 9:

ID	Sex	Color	Wk 9	Other
B006	F	Egypt	185.6
B008	F	Pharaoh	250.7
B018	F	R Tux	230.1
G001	F	Pharoah	189.4	**
G002	F	Pharoah	265.1
G003	F	Tux Pharaoh	329.2
G010	F	Red	258.8
G015	F	Pharoah	312
G019	M	Pharoah	230.3	#
G021	F	Pharoah	280.1
G024	F	Pharoah	296.6
G025	F	Pharoah	323.1
G026	F	Egypt	221.9
G030	F	Pharoah	266.2
G039	F	Pharoah	271.5
G045	M	Pharoah	233.6
G067	F	Falb Fee	313.4
G076	M	Falb Fee	230

** I don't know why she lost so much weight. She is in the outdoor group, and definitely feels too thin. I'm worried about her, especially since she is the only bird we have that happily comes over to investigate treats and eat out of our hands. Hoping she isn't ill. She seems okay other than being thin.

# This guy will probably be out breeder. The girls like him and he doesn't mind sharing girls with other males.

Our plan was originally to make final breeder selections and harvest all other birds this coming weekend. We have family who will be here then though so they may be a few days later than exactly week 10 in deference to that, but will update with final weights at that time.

Not a worry! Real life comes first!

Yep, quail are horrible to each other. I don't know if where you get them from will make much of a difference, our quails have always been like that no matter where we've sourced the eggs.

We've been suffering from the heat too, our birds reduced their consumption and instead have been absolutely guzzling their water. I really can't blame them honestly!

That's a massive weight loss, wonder if it is just to do with the weather? From what I've read birds can choose to unstore fat to help deal with increasing temperatures. Though it's never explicitly mentioned quail so maybe they can't. Hopefully she's okay.. our favourite little birdie died last week (super cuddly one), sucks!

 

[Dandichook]

Not a worry! Real life comes first!

Yep, quail are horrible to each other. I don't know if where you get them from will make much of a difference, our quails have always been like that no matter where we've sourced the eggs.

We've been suffering from the heat too, our birds reduced their consumption and instead have been absolutely guzzling their water. I really can't blame them honestly!

That's a massive weight loss, wonder if it is just to do with the weather? From what I've read birds can choose to unstore fat to help deal with increasing temperatures. Though it's never explicitly mentioned quail so maybe they can't. Hopefully she's okay.. our favourite little birdie died last week (super cuddly one), sucks!

Thanks for understanding!

Oh no. That's not what I wanted to hear! I have been really hoping we just have an unusually violent line. Well, we'll be culling heavily for aggression. After seeing how these males go at each other, that's become more important to us than size. You can't get along with your buddies, you get invited to dinner (new house motto!).

Sorry to hear you've been having the same issue. You're right though, can't blame them for not wanting to eat in the heat.

I didn't know that, will have to look into it! Thanks for the tip. I might shift her into the coop on the covered patio and see if it makes any difference for her.

Sorry you lost your favorite! That really sucks.

 

[BrandonsBirbs]

Thanks for understanding!

Oh no. That's not what I wanted to hear! I have been really hoping we just have an unusually violent line. Well, we'll be culling heavily for aggression. After seeing how these males go at each other, that's become more important to us than size. You can't get along with your buddies, you get invited to dinner (new house motto!).

Sorry to hear you've been having the same issue. You're right though, can't blame them for not wanting to eat in the heat.

I didn't know that, will have to look into it! Thanks for the tip. I might shift her into the coop on the covered patio and see if it makes any difference for her.

Sorry you lost your favorite! That really sucks.

You may have a more violent line than normal though, I couldn't compare as I separated our girls with their boys at 4 weeks and the other males stayed all together in a bachelor pad. They couldn't see the other girls so didn't seem to be so aggressive

That's a good motto to have! More food for us!

Is it possible you also weighed her before laying last time but this time after laying? Not sure how much an egg weighs though honestly lol

It's a part of life, not a great part but things happen and that's okay. That's why we have more and more chicks!

 

[Dandichook]

You may have a more violent line than normal though, I couldn't compare as I separated our girls with their boys at 4 weeks and the other males stayed all together in a bachelor pad. They couldn't see the other girls so didn't seem to be so aggressive

That's a good motto to have! More food for us!

Is it possible you also weighed her before laying last time but this time after laying? Not sure how much an egg weighs though honestly lol

It's a part of life, not a great part but things happen and that's okay. That's why we have more and more chicks!

I hope so! Our bachelor pad was out of sight of the girls, too. Fight club, all day.

Very possible! Ours have been averaging around 13 grams (lol i might be obsessed with measuring things, but my SO has agreed to getting some electronic calipers to measure leg diameter, so I'm just gonna lean into it), so it doesn't entirely make up the difference, but it would be significant.

Very true, and a good outlook to have!

 

[Dandichook]

ID	Sex	Color	10wk live	Dress weight	Dress %	Notes
B006	F	Egypt	217.7			Breeder
B008	F	Pharoah	241.7			Breeder
B018	F	R Tux	251.3	184.6	73.46%
G001	F	Pharoah	181			***
G002	F	Pharoah	257.2			Breeder
G003	F	Pharaoh tux	318.8			Breeder
G010	F	Red	268	190.3	71.0%
G015	F	Pharoah	305.2			Breeder
G019	M	Pharoah	232			Breeder
G021	F	Pharoah	268.7	167.1	62.19%
G024	F	Pharoah	281.5	210.8	74.89%
G025	F	Pharoah	317.6			Breeder
G026	F	Egypt	250	181.6	72.64%
G030	F	Pharoah	270.5			Breeder
G039	F	Pharoah	273.6	203.4	74.34%	Aggro cull
G045	M	Pharoah	239.4	191.5	79.99%
G067	F	Falb Fee	300.7			Breeder
G076	M	Falb Fee	225.4	168.7	74.84%
.	.	.	.	.	.	.
.	.	Group AVG	261.13	187.25	72.79%
.	.	Group AVG excluding G001*	265.84

Yikes my guys, this is so late. No excuses, I just procrastinated. All data was taken on the 10week mark, except for slaughter which technically occurred a few days later...blame helping family move house, which occupied us on what would have been slaughter day!

Not terrible final weights, though not as much as we hoped for. I noticed a big difference in dress out percentage between males and females at this stage, because each female had between 2 and 5 eggs in various states inside her, so her dress out weight was a little lower than you'd expect. (On the other hand, eggs!!)

As you can see, we have more females left alive than initially intended, including ***G001 who is a TINY gal, but she might win a spot with sheer personality. She has definitely put on some weight since her drastic loss, so whatever was going on seems to have worked itself out. G001 is the only bird we have who happily approaches for attention and allows herself to be held and handled docilely, and frankly that's worth breeding into a line, for us.

We may narrow down to 6 females pending our fertility rate, but for now the extra eggs have been nice.

Speaking of fertility, we know this 9:1 ratio may negatively effect it, and as such today we set 18 eggs from the group to see how fertility shakes out. We probably won't keep any of the resulting birds, as this is more a fertility test and to see how the group produces (in terms of size, weight gain, color, etc.).

We are also expecting a batch of 50 eggs from Myshire farms in the next few weeks, and will be tracking both groups closely. I may end up just making a Google Doc spreadsheet that will be easier to update. That will also make it easier to compare things like growth rate and dress out %.

Now for egg data!
We selected for egg size, excluding smaller and dirtier eggs. Of the 18 eggs, 6 are Celadon and weigh between 11.1 and 11.5 grams, and the remaining 12 are spotted and weigh between 11.6 and 13.6 grams. We did not get any larger eggs out of the entire batch that we saved, which totaled 30 eggs. Eventually we would like eggs to be closer to 14 grams, which is why we're selecting for larger sized eggs. (The smallest egg we collected over this period was 10.3 grams, and was not actually a Celadon egg.) Our collection window was about 4-5 days, and eggs were stored in the 76F house on a table, tilted twice daily while waiting.

Hope everyone is all good!!


Editing, same day as posted.

***G001-- I knew she had been gaining weight just because her body condition has seemed better, but she hadn't been weighed for a few weeks, so I just ran out and grabbed her. Happy to report she's at a solid 253.3 grams! She was displeased that I interrupted Her Majesty's Official Afternoon Dust Bath, but deigned to allow me to weigh her anyways. She got a pat in thanks. Pics (forgive the dirt encrusting her head, see above dust bath), also showing the type of plastic leg ring we use, because G001 is a Good Girl and poses for me. She even allowed me to mess with the tag until the lettering was visible for the photo. She deserves a treat.

The pic in hand is how she gets carried around. No fear of her flying off!

Ps don't mind her underbite. She injured her beak a while back--was not born with it like this. Hope it grows back

 

[Hourman]

I just discovered this thread and find it very interesting. I placed it on my watch list so I won't miss any updates. I'm interested to know what numbered bands you are using.

 

[Dandichook]

I just discovered this thread and find it very interesting. I placed it on my watch list so I won't miss any updates. I'm interested to know what numbered bands you are using.

I'm using some bands I found on amazon. The brand is iherdsman and they're called "multi-color bird leg bands numbered".

I buy the 8mm size, although if I could find them I'd buy 7mm instead (sadly not available unless I order like 10k of them to be custom made and shipped from China). They absolutely won't work for standard sized quail. They fall off too easily on smaller birds.

For chicks (or smaller birds) I use small colored rubber bands ranging in size from 1/8 inch (a little over 3mm) for baby-babies, then graduating to 3/16 inch (4.75 mm), then to 1/4 inch (6.3mm) as they age. I weigh the birds weekly, which affords plenty of handling time to ensure bands can be removed before they start outgrowing them, but I recommend against the 1/8" bands if you don't handle routinely, as they grow quickly.

 

[Adorae]

I love your thread! I am thinking about getting some quail when I get my chickens this coming spring. I think the information you're creating is awesome and I hope to do something similar.

 

[Dandichook]

Adore, thank you! Glad this helps you. Good luck on getting your flocks started!!

Quick updoot. Incubation went well until right around lockdown, when we had a temp spike on one shelf up to 106. Only one egg from that shelf hatched, which was disappointing. There were a few which would have hatched if it hadn't spiked, I think. Still not sure what caused the spike, will have to troubleshoot it.

Anyways, total hatch was 6 jumbo, 1 Celadon out of the batch of 12J & 6C. More than 50% were fertile, though I can't find the paper where I wrote it all down for exact #s. I expect without that spike we'd have closer to 10 chicks.

I didn't band them on removal from the incubator to avoid stress or injury to their tiny little legs, but hatch day weights were:
Jumbo: 8.3, 7.5, 8.2, 8.5, 7.5, 8.0 grams
Celadon: 7.7 grams

Weighed and tagged everybody the day before yesterday (at around 10 days--sorry, been busy!):

* 1 Jumbo was assist hatched and had curled toes. We treated it with a band aid shoe and now I can't tell who it was. I assume the smallest since it was the last out of the shell but

Also, one of the ones I marked Wild may in fact be Falb Fee. I'm not confident enough yet in IDing colors to say for sure, so will keep an eye on it as we go.

ID	Color	Weight (grams)
G004	Wild	73.2
G005	Wild	72.7
G006	Wild	60.1
G007	Wild	75.0
G008	Wild	74.1
G012	Wild	58.7
B001	Egyptian	51.9

Edit to add: Oh, and this time around I have been playing with their feed. I gave them 30% protein starter on days 1-3, but have since backed them down to 28%. This seems to have resulted in significantly less watery, constant poops, which is a vast improvement over the first batch. (Poop machines. Never seen anything poop so much in my entire life.) I will continue them on 28% and see if this continues to result in cleaner feet.

 

[artbykarenehaley]

Interested in this thread for sure!