Integrating Gambel's Quail Juveniles

[eveliens]

Well I gave it a few more days and I'm going to remove her once the new pen is constructed and secure - she'll still be able to see and "hang" with them but there will be wire between them. Yesterday she was cooking because she wouldn't go down to earth to cool off. She spends all her time either up on the 2nd level or wedged in the corner hiding if the others are up on the roost. The other quail aren't really bothering her that much anymore but she's clearly petrified of them and integration seems slim. Bummer.

 

[eveliens]

Update: work went down the toilet and the weather cooled off, so I ended up leaving her in the aviary to do her best. Apparently the dumb young hawk returned and was hassling them out of frustration until he was chased off by my housemate (I was at work). This seems to have opened some doors to integration - she's been partially accepted into the flock by the less dominant birds I guess 1 more is always better when there's a hawk around LOL. The smallest hen in particular seems to like to hang out with her. Still being hassled by the dominant hen and a few roosters but it looks like it might work out after all

 

[QuailTail]

Update: work went down the toilet and the weather cooled off, so I ended up leaving her in the aviary to do her best. Apparently the dumb young hawk returned and was hassling them out of frustration until he was chased off by my housemate (I was at work). This seems to have opened some doors to integration - she's been partially accepted into the flock by the less dominant birds I guess 1 more is always better when there's a hawk around LOL. The smallest hen in particular seems to like to hang out with her. Still being hassled by the dominant hen and a few roosters but it looks like it might work out after all

Great news! I don't have experience introducing new quail into an established flock, but I wonder if maybe introducing the existing quail to the new quail one by one rather than introducing the newbie into the full gang that might help everyone acclimatise? So keeping one of the existing quail in with the newbie, letting them spend some time and then adding in another existing quail, etc etc until everyone is together. I suppose space permitting?

 

[007Sean]

Great news! I don't have experience introducing new quail into an established flock, but I wonder if maybe introducing the existing quail to the new quail one by one rather than introducing the newbie into the full gang that might help everyone acclimatise? So keeping one of the existing quail in with the newbie, letting them spend some time and then adding in another existing quail, etc etc until everyone is together. I suppose space permitting?

It might work or it might not! The way I introduce a 'new' bird to an established flock, is to relocate them all to a new pen or a new pen to them....I make my transfer at night, that way, come morning light they are all on the same footing, so to speak....most of the time this works but there is always some quirks that get thrown into mix that it might not work either. In that case, I have seperate pens to seperate them and hopefully they will get along with whatever birds get seperated into the two different pens.

Introducing one at a time is definitely a recipe for disaster, IMHO.

Wishing you the best of luck!

 

[eveliens]

Great news! I don't have experience introducing new quail into an established flock, but I wonder if maybe introducing the existing quail to the new quail one by one rather than introducing the newbie into the full gang that might help everyone acclimatize? So keeping one of the existing quail in with the newbie, letting them spend some time and then adding in another existing quail, etc etc until everyone is together. I suppose space permitting?

Thanks for the suggestion! In this case, I agree with 007Sean. That was how I originally did the introduction, and how I would normally do introductions with individual(s) into a larger group [rats, fish, etc]. Mix up the territory, move them at a time when they're sleeping/sedate/distracted and unbalance the social order so the newbie(s) get a foothold. In most cases it works.

I could see the 1 by 1 thing work pretty well with chickens, especially if you have 1 coop and can't mix up the territories, but I don't think it'd work out with quail due to the social structure, just from my observations. The quail remind me more of doves than chickens. They do hang together and some individuals are more dominant but I can already see them breaking apart into smaller groups during the day (loner joins the group without the bullies). They only seem to come together at night to roost and when there's food/danger LOL.

I hadn't plan on having two groups or a loner. If this doesn't work out or escalates to food/water guarding or physical violence, she'll go back in with the button quail, now that I finally finished their new and improved security on the enclosure. But I think at this point it is a matter of how bored/tired the few bullies get the longer she's in the group now that she has some buddies (and has stopped acting like an absolute raving nutcase anytime one of them looks at her). I've already seen one of the bully roosters be inconsistent about chasing, so I suspect it is growing old.

 

[007Sean]

I just moved some Tennessee Reds into a pen next to 2 male Bobwhites, the ones who hatched and raised a brood, last year (for 8 weeks) the last chick passed away at that time. Anyway I hadn't put any HC along the bottom of the base board between the two pens. The male Bob that actually hatched the chicks (the final week of incubation, because the hen died) crawled under the base board and was chasing the Reds around their pen. Solved the issue by putting the HC along the crawl spaces.
I had tried before with a 8 week old female, which he nor the other male bothered...in fact the chick tried snuggling under the male but he didn't want anything to do with her...didn't peck her hard but just let her know that he didn't like it! I didn't notice a small gap in the perimeter wire and the hen went through it and haven't seen her since...although, I think she became dinner for some predator? but I didn't expect that behavior from either one of them, the male or the female.
It's just really a 'toss up' when it comes to integrating birds....sometimes it works, other times....not so much!

 

[007Sean]

Thanks for the suggestion! In this case, I agree with 007Sean. That was how I originally did the introduction, and how I would normally do introductions with individual(s) into a larger group [rats, fish, etc]. Mix up the territory, move them at a time when they're sleeping/sedate/distracted and unbalance the social order so the newbie(s) get a foothold. In most cases it works.

I could see the 1 by 1 thing work pretty well with chickens, especially if you have 1 coop and can't mix up the territories, but I don't think it'd work out with quail due to the social structure, just from my observations. The quail remind me more of doves than chickens. They do hang together and some individuals are more dominant but I can already see them breaking apart into smaller groups during the day (loner joins the group without the bullies). They only seem to come together at night to roost and when there's food/danger LOL.

I hadn't plan on having two groups or a loner. If this doesn't work out or escalates to food/water guarding or physical violence, she'll go back in with the button quail, now that I finally finished their new and improved security on the enclosure. But I think at this point it is a matter of how bored/tired the few bullies get the longer she's in the group now that she has some buddies (and has stopped acting like an absolute raving nutcase anytime one of them looks at her). I've already seen one of the bully roosters be inconsistent about chasing, so I suspect it is growing old.

I've never witnessed food/water guarding, not saying it doesn't happen but I've never seen it happen in 50+ years of raising birds.

 

[QuailTail]

They're such complicated little creatures!

 

[eveliens]

They're such complicated little creatures!

So very true. You just never know with these little guys.