Friend's Californian Quails keep dying, trouble shooters please?

[Eika]

Hi all,

My Dad's friend called me for advice on his quails today, he's trying to breed Californian quails and managed to hatch out 30 with an incubator. However they all died between 10-14 days. He said the first symptom was that their droppings turned white and watery, then he noticed a clear fluid coming from their beaks, and they were all very thin. He tried taking them to a vet, who charged him $70 for an antibiotic that killed all birds treated with it within 3 days (they actually died faster than the untreated ones!) so as you can imagine he's not too happy. I know practically nothing of quails but checked the following:

They were all put into a brooder box after hatching
The brooder is about 1x2 metres and heated carefully
He's feeding them chick crumble (is the medication bad for quails like it is for ducks?)


After the chicks died he thought it was all over, but soon after the breeding adults started to display the same symptoms. White poo, losing weight, fluid from the mouth etc. He suspected it was a bacteria/virus from the soil so placed a wire grate below their cages, preventing them from touching the soil. Now 6 of his 10 adults have died. He has just bought another 2 very rare males online which were healthy when they arrived but within days they are displaying the same symptoms

I've done a bit of reading up on quails and initially thought the chicks may be starving if he isn't grinding the crumble first, but this wouldn't affect the adults would it? So I'm guessing it's a virus/bacteria issue, right?

Advice/trouble shooting would be very much appreciated!

Eika

 

[Habibs Hens]

could be the medicated as the ratio is designed for chicken so for tiny quails its could be too much and over dosing them

either remove the ACS feed or mix with non medicated

 

[TwoCrows]

Sounds like this is viral in origin to me, however this is just a guess. And because this is a severe outbreak, the best thing this person could do for himself and for any future birds, is the have a necropsy done of one of these adult birds and a baby as well. When the parent birds are dying from something that the offspring are also suffering from, this needs to be looked into and not taken lightly. I might suggest that the entire area, birds included be destroyed and completely fumigated. Move the entire operation to a different location.

The thing that comes to mind with these symptoms might be fowl cholera. Similar symptoms, and highly contagious, but not being able to look the birds over, this is only a guess on my part. I would have a professional vet do a necropsy to see just what you are dealing with.

 

[ylly]

Definitely find the cause of the problem, sounds like quail enteritis. I have seen this in my bobs never my valleys. I'm sorry for what you guys are going through I no how much it sucks!