Introducing new quail - how to do it right?

[lehouseofdog]

Is there a best way to introduce new quail? I hatched some quail and kept 3. A grayish tuxedo female and a light red and gray male in wild pattern. I don't know the names of the colors but that's what they look like. He has pinkish/red and gray/silver feathers down his back. Since he came from a pen with cinnamon, white and supposedly silver birds, he's just a hybrid of something.

I thought I had 1 male and two female but turned out 2 males so one of them went away. I got a couple of older females (a really light creamy white tuxedo and an red tuxedo (looks like an orangy brown calico pattern) from a friend because she said the male would over breed the female and she would get hurt.

So I put the two females in yesterday and ended up taking out my young female because she was acting nasty so she's in solitary. Left the others to do their business and came in this morning to find the creamy female hiding with a raw back of her head. So I put some blue kote on her and removed the young male and put him in solitary today.

Clearly I'm not doing this right. Any suggestions on how I can do this better? The pen is 2 feet by 3 feet and I know I need to expand it but thought it would be Ok temporarily. The young ones are 6 weeks old and the two older females are about 2 years old maybe.

 

[weirdones]

Best thing to do is to move them all to a new cage. We have a Rosetta male that no one likes and we had a pen of all females who wouldn't accept a new male even after moving to a new cage. We decided it was time for them to go and start a new line. It sucks but we just didn't have cages to separate everyone. I found younger birds are more accepting of new birds. These were over a year old.

 

[DK newbie]

There are a lot of posts on here about that, but to sum it up:
House them next to each other for a couple of weeks. That will allow them to get used to each others presence. And it will allow the two young ones to get a little bigger - it doesn't sound like they are the ones in trouble right now, but that's probably only because they are the ones that are used to living there and thus are defending their territory. It'll also allow the one that's hurt to get better.
When introducing them, do so in a cage that's new to all, as weirdones suggested. That way, neither will feel it's their territory. Heavily rearranging the old cage might also help.
It has also been suggested that you give them something to keep them entertained while they get used the the presence of each other in the same cage - a treat (bugs, seed, some fruit or veggie they like), a dust bath, a pile of hay or grass clippings..
A bigger cage with lots of hiding places might also help, but no matter how you do it, there is no guarantee it'll work.

 

[mogollon]

After combining a few quail I throw in a group dirt bath, they love it and together enjoy the day and their new living space.