Does anyone have a landscaped Aviary for Quail? What did you use?

[The Critter Place]

Hi,
I'm looking for ideas to landscape our aviary that the Coturnix Quail will be living in.
Does anyone have a planted aviary or flight? And if you do, what plants have you tried?

 

[TwoCrows]

I keep my quail in an aviary. However I have never landscaped it as I try to keep the place as dry as possible. Watering plants and such, or keeping an open roof all the time leads to too much moisture, molds and bacteria growth.

So I took some branches and such and made a giant brush pile for them to hang out under, nibble on branches and perch on them if they so desire. However, quail are grass eaters. So if you can offer them grasses to eat, they will love you forever!

What I do is in the spring, I go to the nursery and buy planted grasses in pots. The quail love to eat these grasses and when they get nibbled down to the nub, I remove them and allow them to grow back again. This way in the pots, I can water them easier then hosing a lot of plants down.

And if you do this, you will have to experiment with what types of grasses your quail like. Good luck with your aviary!

 

[The Critter Place]

Hi Twocrows,
I can understand wanting to keep it dry.

That's really not a problem with our Aviary. It will have a roof that alternates dark and clear fiberglass to let light in and shade some areas.

There is also a 4' square area that has no cover so the birds can get out and play in rain, or soak up sun. That is where I was hoping to put most of the plants. The yard drains well, so that's not really a problem. We did this years ago in this aviary, but I let it all go when we got rid of our birds. (our son being an infant, I gave them up for awhile.)

I have an ornamental grass, and Rosemary for starters, was going to plant a few patches of turf, and areas of bird seed. Starts out grass and then goes to seed, so they will have munchies.

The aviary has a mist system, and i've never had prblems with dampness, and I'm home all the time, so have the time needed for upkeep and cleaning.

I plan to aim and water carefully and am trying to find drought tolerant plants.

I'm thinking maybe a Guava bush would be nice. I can also set up water bottles with a pin hole to water just the base of the plant.

 

[Missi]

Ooooo good thread! I like the grass-in-pots idea! I'm gonna get some for my quailies!

 

[7L Farm]

Prickly & I mean prickly cactus. I planted those regular flat common cactus & they ate the whole plant.

 

[The Critter Place]

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No,
I don't want cactus. But thank you for the suggestion.

I will be in and out of the aviary, don't want to deal with cactus.

I do realize the birds will be rough on what ever I put in there.

 

[alrosenb]

I'm new to quail but I've been putting potted plants in my brooder and so far I've found that my quail love parsley, dill, and oregano. They also will eat the spearmint and they ate a marigold that I put in there to make it more homey. They've eaten all of the lettuce scraps I've put in and they also enjoyed the raw broccoli I put in. I haven't tried any other herbs yet but I'm guessing that they'll eat them all since they enjoy the ones I've tried so far. Oh and I do feed them-they just far prefer the fresh herbs to their feed.

 

[Stellar]

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[Missi]

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I toss spring greens & fresh herbs in my hutch as well...along with carrots & broccoli. Whatever I have really. It is fun to see them tear it up! They love new nommies

 

[Missi]

Oh...they don't like bananas, though