Ideas for taking care of "extra" coturnix males?

[vixie-daisy]

I currently have 3 fully grown quail that I haven't yet determined the sex of, and am soon going to be incubating my first ever batch of eggs. For me they're strictly pets, with getting eggs being a nice bonus.

Based on all the research I've done over the last few weeks, I've come across everything from 1-2/3, 1-4/5, 1 to 7/8 etc. as being recommended male to female ratios. In any case it appears I'm going to inevitably end up with too many males.

I have absolutely no desire to kill or eat them, so I'm wondering if anyone has any ideas about how I can viably take care of the extra males and provide them a good life.

Is it any more likely that a small group of bachelors can get along if they were raised together from chicks?

Will a coturnix kept separate from other quail become terribly depressed even if I take special care to hand tame him and provide plenty of enrichment?

Would it be viable to 'rotate' males? Say male 1 gets to stay with the girls for a week, then he gets switched out for male 2 for the next week, and so on.

My apologies in advance if these are dumb questions, I've just been brainstorming and would love the input of more experienced quail keepers.

One more thing I'll add is that I've heard incubating at a temperature that's a half degree lower than normally recommended will supposedly decrease the chances of the male chicks in the bunch hatching. I have no idea if this is really true, and if it is I know it would over all lower my hatch rate, but I'm more than fine with that as I'd have less extra males to worry about in the first place. Does anyone have any experience with this?

Thanks in advance!

 

[le_bwah]

Quail need a flock; a single bird won't do. Bachelor flocks are possible, but you have to keep them in a location where they can't hear or see any hens (or else their normal tussles will turn into bloody fighting). I have no idea if rotating males is viable.

As far as I know, the change in temperature doesn't change the sex of a chick, it's just more likely to kill males than females (thus affecting the hatch ratio). There's been some research on this in chickens, less so in quail. The temperature affect in quail seems to be very weak, if it's there at all.

 

[Erkenstein]

If you have a bachelor pad away from the main flock there will still be crowing, and they will mate each other. Depending on how you tolerate and manage that, it could work, but things can also escalate to fighting so you need to be ready to remove aggressors or victims to separate cages. You can sometimes sell extras to people online (not sure where you're at, but in the US is Craigslist), but most people want hens so it's hard to unload males.

I've sold males to hunters, who use them to train their dogs: they put the birds out in a field and let their dogs practice locating them and flushing them, and then they collect them all and bring them back home. Other people may want to buy them to butcher.

I usually end up not able to sell males and butchering them myself once they are crowing and fighting; I'm basically a vegetarian except for fish and "backyard meat," but for me that's the solution that makes sense.

All of these options have ethical considerations. If you are not okay with it, I'd suggest you don't incubate and simply purchase some more hens.

Rotating in males could end up being disastrous because the females will protect their territory and aren't automatically submissive to any old male who comes along (good for them!). And quail fights are extremely vicious and go way beyond establishing a pecking order.

 

[bhaugh]

I've tried keeping males in "male only pens" I have yet to be successful and end up eating them. Hens can live together for the most part but males just don't seem to. If you only have them as pets, I'd sell off the males for a couple of dollars each.

 

[le_bwah]

I could only build one enclosure, so I chose to keep hens and a couple roos. When I tried getting rid of my extra boys through Craigslist, I ran into a couple of scenarios. First was someone looking to feed them to their pets (raw dog food). Next were the people who offered to buy them live for butchering. Last were a couple of folks keeping birds in less-than-ideal conditions: cramped, dirty cages on wire.

I didn't want them fed to dogs, I didn't want them killed by a stranger, and I didn't want them to wind up stuck in a sad, tiny cage for the rest of their lives. The only way for me to make sure they didn't suffer was to take control of their deaths myself. I killed my extra roos, and I don't regret it (still felt awful, though).

Just wanted to offer you my perspective if you decide to try re-homing them; when it comes down to it, it may be kinder to kill an animal quickly than to send it off to an uncertain fate.