Fat Quail

[Silk Madness]

I have quail that are extremely portly. Especially the roosters. I have a rooster that was getting beat up by the other rooster in my group, so I moved him to another enclosure only to find that one of the quail in that group was in fact a rooster. He was beaten so badly that I had to separate him and put him in my "hospital" for injured birds. I put some triple antibiotic ointment on his head that was quite bald and bloody. This worked like a charm. But now he has gotten so fat on his own rations that he looks like a round ball (the size and shape of a softball) with a little head on top. He is crowing like he is his old self again. Now I have to find a place for him. He is now in an enclosure with a hen that had her wing caught in the bottom wires of her cage. Her wing is much better but I'm afraid my rooster is so fat that he doesn't seem at all interested in the female, which is fine by me. But the other quail are now looking as round and as fat as he is. I am still feeding game starter as the bag I bought was fifty pounds and it wasn't quite finished. If I buy a bag of maintenance or layer crumbles, there won't be any feed for the young quail that are hatching. I don't have room for 100 lbs of feed. I have two large livestock guardian dogs for which I must buy 50 lbs of food at one time as well, I also buy chick starter for my young chickens and chicken scratch and chicken layer crumbles for the mature chickens, not to mention the cat food, both canned and dry, I have six ducks that get Flock Raiser.The quail devour their food when I come in the morning to fill their feeders. They also get oyster shells, but I can't imagine that making them so fat. The feed is 30% protein, Purina Game Food Startena. If you have both young birds, chicks and mature adults, what is the best plan to feed them all? I'm thinking you'll all say to break down and buy 50 lbs of Startena and 50 lbs of layer crumbles, argh! That means I will have to build another shed just for feed, I am worried now about attracting rats.

 

[lomine]

You don't want to feed layer feed to any bird unless it is actually laying. Layer feed doesn't have enough protein for a quail anyway. Once they are grown you want to aim for around 24% protein. I think the easiest option for you would be to cut the protein in the game feed with some of your Flock Raiser.

Just a thought. To make life easier for yourself you might want to consider changing your chickens to the Flock Raiser as well. I feed mine Flock Raiser from chicks/ducklings to adulthood. It is the easiest way to feed a mixed flock and you only need to buy one type of feed. It's close enough in protein needs that you don't need to worry about how to get different feeds to chicks, laying hens, roosters, and for me ducks. I offer oyster shell on the side for those laying and also get scratch grains for the chickens. It also means that I get new bags of feed more often so it is fresher.

Here is a calculator to help you figure out how much of each feed is needed to get the protein level you want for the quail.
http://www.metzerfarms.com/FeedConversion.cfm