How long will they lay without artificial lighting?

[pringle]

Well it turns out at my farmers market people are very interested in quail eggs so I'd like to sell them there one question though...How long would jumbo brown coturnix quail lay without artificial lighting?Like when do they start in and when do they end.The market is only in summer so I wouldent like to overwork them.I live in MA by the way..

 

[pringle]

Sorry yet another question...I was set on ordering the jumbo brown coturnix from lake cumberlands but now im looking at the pharaoh quail.Are they good layer like the coturnix(start around 8-12 weeks or so?)do they get as big as them so then I can butcher exess males and the females after a few years.Thanks

 

[glewis121]

I am located in MA as well!

I Have JUMBO coturnix eggs if you were interested in buying some or could sell you chicks!

They will lay with 12-14 hours of light. That wont start until early-> midspring.

 

[pringle]

Yeah the problem with that is my mom wont let me be around strangers or anything a little to overpprotective much right?Thanks for the offer though,so how good are pharoahs at laying?

 

[Akane]

Pharoah is just a color/variety of coturnix. I think all the quail lay daily while they lay. They are egg machines while in season. Mine including the indoor buttons pretty much or completely stop come late fall until mid spring irregardless of artificial light.

 

[Boyd]

you give them 12-14 hours of light they will lay all season. You let nature take it's course you have a business that runs from the end of march through the end of october. As prolific and easy to hatch as coturnix are, I replace mine every year or every other.

PS, the retired layers end up great on the bbq. Just a thought.

 

[pringle]

Oh sweet that fits in the whole farmers market days.And I cant wait to try quail ill be butchering the exess males when I hatch them out then ill hopefully be replacing the laying ones every 2-3 years.So I guess il just stick with the jumbo brown coturnix.How many of them would you think you would have to have to lay about 20 dozen eggs a week?thanks

 

[_Randall_]

I don't have coturnix, but have BWs. As for the artificial light effect on egg laying, I had a 250w red heat lamp on my group 24/7 for a month until 3 days ago when I cut it off. Egg laying started about 3 weeks ago, and started strong .... and stayed strong until yesterday. I was getting 12-15 eggs a day. Yesterday, I had 6 eggs .... today I had 4. It's still winter here, and very cold nights for the South. The days are getting longer, and the birds are singin' their butts off. So, already being convinced artificial lighting makes a difference, I now have seen it for fact. Just FYI.......

 

[Boyd]

Quote:
20 dozen is 20x12 so figure about 240 quail at a minimum? If you want them fertile then gotta keep some roo's... Figure on lots of feed tho lil bub. my 60 jumbos went through a bag of feed every other week...

 

[UmbraVulpis]

Quote:
20 dozen is 20x12 so figure about 240 quail at a minimum? If you want them fertile then gotta keep some roo's... Figure on lots of feed tho lil bub. my 60 jumbos went through a bag of feed every other week...

Divide by 7 since they have a week to lay 240 eggs.

That makes it a 35 hen minimum.