Gambel Quail stages of life?

[FrankieAndJamie]

We are raising our first gambel quail right now and it's about a week and a half old. We've been doing a lot of research on what we need to do to keep it strong and healthy and so far so good, but we really don't know what to expect from the bird. What age will we know the sex? What age will it fly, need a bigger cage, need more/different food, when will it molt, how long will it live if we do it right, what kinds of things do we need to watch for to make sure it's healthy, how much should it weigh at each stage of life, will it need a mate once it reaches maturity...? Google can only tell me so much but I figure with so many of you guys on here having raised quail before I can get some good information. Anything you can tell me would be greatly appreciated!

 

[Advocat]

I have a Gambel -- Coco -- and he is a year old this month. My answers to some of your questions are based on my observations and experiences with him.

With Coco, I initially had him in a large glass aquarium with a screen top. He had a toy duck made of flannel (a dog toy) and I set it so that he could get under a wing of the toy if he wanted to. Heating pad set on medium was under one end of the aquarium with a towel between the pad and the glass, and I used an incandescent lightbulb in a goose-neck lamp aimed at the "warm end" of the aquarium to provide extra heat. That way he could move closer or farther from the heat source/s depending on what he wanted. I covered the aquarium with an inexpensive fleece throw blanket, leaving a bit of the screen top uncovered for fresh air.

He spent pretty much a month in that set-up, and I'd feed him several times a day, change his water, cuddle him and talk to him and so forth. He liked to climb up in my hand and nestle there and go to sleep. When he heard any noise or movement in the room, he would keep up a fairly constant soft peeping.

By the time he was about a month old, feathers had replaced the baby down/baby feathers. Like you, I wanted to know for sure what his gender was. All I can say is that at a month old he had 3 feathers in a topknot on his heat, dark brown and straight, which he could raise up or lay down at will, and the feathers over top of his head were a somewhat rusty brown -- but not so much that I felt I could be sure whether or not he was a male. He was roughly 6 or 7 inches long at that point.

At that time, I transferred him into a Sterilite tub (clear one), and cut most of one side out of it and attached hardware cloth there. Put in litter and a plastic box with sand for a dustbath, hung a water bottle instead of using a small dish. Kept him in the warmth for about another week and then moved his setup out to my computer area in another room.

He was able to fly at right about this time too. Normally he would run on the floor and follow me around, but he'd also fly short distances. He can't be always loose here because we have a dog and cat as well, so at night I crate them and have him out for a while. He learned very quickly to come to me when I called him, and in fact never gets very far from me. Have to be careful when he's on the floor that I know exactly where he is so he doesn't get stepped on or kicked accidentally. I keep a towel on my left shoulder, clipped to my shirt, so he has something he can get some grip on -- his feet aren't made for clutching cloth, and without the towel he slides off my shoulder and fusses about it

About flying -- his wings are more powerful than you would expect for a smallish bird. And he *can* fly fairly high actually. The livingroom ceiling here is about 14 feet and he flew up there once, brushed the ceiling but didn't crash into it. He's only done that once. We have a big picture window, and I am careful to never take him out when that curtain is open as I fear he'd fly into the window and hurt himself. Outdoors, we have a telephone pole and lately I have seen a Gambel male sitting clear at the top of that pole and calling -- that's the highest I've personally ever seen one go.

Also, at around this same time (he would have been a month to 5 weeks), he began calling with a ka-KAA-ka sound whenever I got up and walked out of his sight. As far as I know, only the male Gambels crow or call like that. Females might, but if so I don't know.

It was not until he was approaching 4 months old that I felt pretty sure he was a male -- this was from watching his head cap become more rusty colored, the little white feather lines and black feather lines fill in, etc.

So now, at a year old, he is of course fully grown. His topknot doesn't curve forward, I don't know if that comes with more age or if it just happens with some birds and not others. He recently (early this past month) went through his first molt.

He's somewhat aggressive -- he's prone to pecking me, which doesn't feel good, but I can easily distract him from that because he is curious about literally everything. I'm not sure if all male Gambels kept as pets are aggressive like that, but I'm not surprised he is. If I push him away, he runs back at me with his mouth open! His pecks are *very* sharp and they are truly painful if he goes after my face (which he sometimes does if he's on my shoulder and I am talking on the phone, he wants to grab a lip) or ear. He runs around on my computer desk pecking at the keyboard keys, pulling off notes that I have stuck to the side of my monitor screen and grabbing at anything else that catches his interest. We have a couple of games we play, one being tug-of-war (I have to be careful what I choose to let him grab, because if it is anything that can shred he will eat some of it if he can get threads worked loose). He'll also park himself on my knee or shoulder or arm and groom for a while. Doesn't like to be held but has no problem sitting on my arm, shoulder or wherever he can find a place.

Don't know the answer as to whether or not a mate should be considered. I have not planned to seek a mate for him because I'm not interested in eggs. If he'd been a female, he would have laid eggs anyhow, just not fertilized ones. I tend to think that as a pet, he will stay better bonded to me if there is not a female, but someone else with more experience might know better about that.

As for how long they live, I have read of some that have lived to be 10 and 12 years old. No idea if that is common or unusual.

Enjoy your bird! They are really cute and a lot of fun