How did early farmers raise quail?

[polk county]

Coturnix quail have been around longer than incubators. How did people raise quail if the hens dont set on eggs? Also how to you think they raised them without galvanized hardware cloth?
An ideas
thanks

 

[Paaz1120]

I know my grandfather used chicken hens to hatch out Coturnix quail. I know he used Buff Orpingtons, Silkies and so on. . .

The only thing is, is that when baby quail are scared they run in all directions and NOT back to the mother like Chicken chicks! when with a Chicken Hen it drives her crazy trying to gather them all up and some to many sadly wouldnt make it!

I breed Coturnix Quail, and Button quail and they have learned that when they are scared or startled they will actually run to me if I am around. They will also go to our Silkie Aruacana Mix hen.

It is soo amazing to think how things worked before all these new inventions! Hens had to do ALL the work before incubators! They didnt have meds, shots, and so on for chickens, ducks, turkeys, etc. . . and they were just fine!

With many of the quail breeds now, humans have "ruined" them! From being bred in Captivity, they "know" they wont have to hatch out their own eggs, we will do it for them. People have Bred it out of them and it is SAD!! I always wonder How they did all of this in the wild and make it?? Its just when people intervene with animals we tend to mess up or change the way of things. Sometimes for the good and sometimes for the worst (sadly most of the time for the worst.)

We Breed a few breeds of chickens and we always laugh about how they have it made! lol Our quail are even spoiled.

 

[FenDruadin]

I don't know about quail, but for chickens and ducks there are many many ways of artificially incubating without electricity, and many of those ways have been around probably almost as long as domestication.

For instance, in India (and probably other hot countries), one traditional method of incubation is to have "hot houses" (not glass--just hot sheds) where they incubate eggs in bags stacked between bags of sun-heated rice. It's an all-day task to set the cool bags in the sun to heat, then to several times daily trade the freshly heated bags for those that have been among the eggs.

Many country journals from the 1800s in the U.S. carry plans for kerosene-heated incubators that can still be made today.

In very poor countries, women sometimes incubate eggs on their bodies. It's long and laborious but if when both eggs and chickens are an extremely precious commodity, it's worth the sacrifice to continue to get eggs from a hen while incubating.

This is actually a subject of great interest to me, and I'd like to write a book about it some day. I'm terribly curious about incubation methods around the world and in different cultures. It's amazing how hardy eggs are and how many different ways there are to get one to hatch. I don't know whether a book like that would have an audience, but I'd have a heck of a time writing it.

 

[polk county]

Thanks for the replies and write the book anyway. I write when Im in the mood and now I have 50 thousand words. Very few people would be interested in my book but I just want to get it printed and binded so that I have a book to my name. It will be a few more years before Its done.

 

[aprophet]

Quote:

 

[aprophet]

Quote:
I imagine hunter/trappers stood guard and killed the predators and kept the food alive

 

[Charles07]

I do not think that this will help, but Coturnix is Latin for Quail, if that gives you any indication of antiquity.

(Coturnix "Quail" is like saying "Quail-Quail")

They fed them sporadically, like the 19th century homesteaders did with chickens/ducks/etc, and harvested at will.