House Quail - Good Idea or not?

[backyardcovey]

My goal was sustainable eggs and some meat in an urban enivironment.

I agree about remembering to take out the trash. Open the trash lid to put in the fourth day's daily changed newspapers and you are reminded it is time to compost them. (or if composting is not an option to remove the recylced newpapers to a second trash that gets picked up)

Droppings changed daily with limited numbers per cage and local smell is minimal even with 50 birds. Will be reducing the population by 16ish in 4 weeks should have no need for any of roos from last month hatch.

My Coturnix goal is to keep hens to produce 20 eggs a day and roos to sustain the population. Started with birds from 3 sources but in a few years will need to bring in external Roos.

Also have 6 butlers to do a meat comparison.

Really does seem to be an egg vending machine. Feed in then eggs out... and then the cleaning. As for smell clean daily and limited birds per square foot and there is no real problem.

This was a family approved message!

 

[backyardcovey]

.. you could reduce your cable bill as well. They are just fun to watch. The drama oh the drama...

 

[rittert3]

Also contemplating house quail, I am aquiring a plastic bottom rabbit/ guinea pig cage that should accomidate a quad of mixed coturnix. I want them mainly as pets to feed eggs to my hatching addiction when the urge strikes, also for some eggs to eat/ give away. No poultry ordnance, and the fact that I rent are also factors. I think I can pass the cots off as cage birds!

 

[Cynthia12]

I just got a cage today to keep a pair of buttons in. I'm excited to dress it up. To keep the mess from hitting the floor, my husband is going to put plexi glass..spelling...from the bottom up a ways. Quite a ways.

It has a pan in the bottom to catch droppings, but I want to put some shavings in there..going to put some smaller wire first as to catch what ever may want to fall. Going to give it a try. I hatched these cuties out, want to keep a couple. Going to post my cage and babies when all is done. They are still pretty small, but they grow pretty quick I guess.

 

[animal8]

Buttons are what I want to keep as well. Just had a question pop into my head. Does anyone know how many eggs button quail lay? I'm guessing it's going to be a lot less than Coturnix as they were bred for egg production, but just an idea of how many I can expect? In case I get a bator and want to set?

 

[Ksane]

I've got 2 males that are close to 3 mo old now still in a cage inside. They run around a lot, easily picked up and really sweet. I use wood pellets for bedding in their cage and it actually even smells good. Stephanie, that is NOT how my cats would react if they saw one of my Quail right next to them lol

 

[yinepu]

Quote:
Pretty much the way I do it.. mine are in the house in stack-able wire rabbit cages.. no smell so long as cages are cleaned on a regular basis
I don't let mine out for flight time.. I figured they really dont need it since coturnix arent much for flying anyway

Not sure how many "house quail" I will end up with since I still have eggs in the bator and want to keep the largest and best as breeders.. but probably around 30 to 50 will stay.. the rest will go to freezer camp

Im still debating on adding Butlers to my flock.. part of my brain really wants to.. the other part warns me that bobs are insane and asks if I really want to deal with them.. lol

 

[animal8]

I've been hearing some things about people keeping multiple (ie 3 or 4) button hens with one cock bird, so I wanted to know: which do you think is best? One male, one female; one male, two female; or more than 2 females per male? The reason I'm asking being that hens tend to have their feathers pulled by the male when he mates with her, so would it be best to have more females to, uh, share the love?

And how much space would I need for them if I had more than two birds in the same cage?

(Might post this as a separate thread as well, depending on how many responses I get)

 

[Whitehouse Quail]

cyberquail.com has a few good articles about how she has pet buttons roam the house... I'd definitely reccomend reading it!

 

[Stellar]

Quote:
Button quail should be 1 hen per 1 cock, the Coturnix have multiple hens per roo.