- May 24, 2014
- 11
- 28
- 109
I keep King Quail as pets, and it has been 18 months since my oldest male quail had 2 boys. Since that time there have been many eggs laid by successive females, but no sittings. Finally, one Sunday as we were experiencing an Indian summer here in Melbourne, the drought broke three weeks ago. The oldest male's new partner of 10 weeks (Shy Girl) decided to sit on 6 eggs. I have a huge learning curve with the current cage design and layout. I have been using a large flight cage with bars, and had to hastily attach flush panels of very small gauge mesh around their existing home. When 5 chicks were finally born (3 dark and 2 straw coloured) one of the darker ones had an obvious deformity with one leg that made it just lie in the sand, with the mother choosing to spend all of her time chasing the more agile chicks. I removed the chick to give it warmth and contact, but it died within 6 hours. So that put an end to entertaining the idea of fixing one splayed leg by taping, which I would have asked a vet how to do.
1 night later, after turning the light out in their room, I woke to find that a light chick had managed to wriggle it's way into a tray underneath the main run of the cage and must have died of dehydration or cold, or both. Devastated, and down to three chicks I am now nervous as hell, but will be leaving that light on and getting up for any sound at all. The mother cries out occasionally, but didn't appear to make any different noises the night she lost her last chick. So sad. But I am determined that no more will be lost. I feed them specialized all in one egg and biscuit mix, as well as cos lettuce and mealworms which they love.
this is the link to a video of the one day olds, sorry it is not HD, it was cheeky putting the camera inside their cage that day, so I didn't stick around to change focus. Turn your volume down for the first lot of music it is way too loud. I will have to wait to see if the darker birds turn out to be male and the lighter one female. Thats a guess.
Well, thank you for your interest, I am happy to be able to talk about the journey.
I only buy my quails from the Pet supplies/Vet down the road. Young female quails have been a premium this year in Melbourne,
with demand causing prices to be as high as $25 per female from private breeders. This vet and pet supplies business has kept their prices to $15 so far which I am very grateful for. I would love love love to have an outside run and proper enclosure for my birds, but as I am renting, I am forced to keep just a few that I can manage inside my laundry. King Quail have excellent hearing, so you can look forward to being notified in advance of sirens, motorbikes or planes in the distance. Fortunately they crow less loudly than regular roosters, but it is often the females who let out warning calls, so having males hasn't increased the noise at all. During the times that I have been without female quails, the males wail constantly. It took a while earlier this year to get more females due to the shortage.
Whenever there is a sunny day I take them outside or at least open the main door with a wire door up because of the neighbours cats. I regularly release them to run and fly around in the room where they are kept, so they keep up their strength. There are only large birds in the suburbs out here and they pounce on anything left unprotected. 18 months ago there was a mouse plague in the area. I was warned that it was happening 2 months before I saw signs of it. Once you see the signs it is already too late, and my rental had a hole at the front door which I couldn't stop the vermin getting in. Some negotiations saw the landlord fix that door and the problem halted overnight. Had the birds been outdoors during that time, they would have been highly stressed by the mice. Over time I have had a rabbit and zebra finches as well. The zebra finches co-existed well with the quail. When the zebra finches and the quails all reproduced 2 years ago, they all had male babies, no females.
When I first began keeping pets, I started with the bigger coturnix Japanese quails I bought from a market I worked at.
They were great for eggs, with only 2 females at a time laying up to 2 eggs each a day and no male birds, as I was told they would crow too loudly and annoy the neighbours. It took me a few months to get used to the idea, but just before I sold them again (during the mouse plague before the door hole was fixed) I was happily having 8 eggs as a snack or up to 22 as a meal. They were very appetizing eggs and tasted great. There was obviously alot more clean up, mess and smell with the larger birds as well as the rabbit. So now I ony have the King Quail which are perfect when there is not so much room. They also eat finch seed mix as well as the other food mentioned. Have a great day, everyone.
1 night later, after turning the light out in their room, I woke to find that a light chick had managed to wriggle it's way into a tray underneath the main run of the cage and must have died of dehydration or cold, or both. Devastated, and down to three chicks I am now nervous as hell, but will be leaving that light on and getting up for any sound at all. The mother cries out occasionally, but didn't appear to make any different noises the night she lost her last chick. So sad. But I am determined that no more will be lost. I feed them specialized all in one egg and biscuit mix, as well as cos lettuce and mealworms which they love.
Well, thank you for your interest, I am happy to be able to talk about the journey.
I only buy my quails from the Pet supplies/Vet down the road. Young female quails have been a premium this year in Melbourne,
with demand causing prices to be as high as $25 per female from private breeders. This vet and pet supplies business has kept their prices to $15 so far which I am very grateful for. I would love love love to have an outside run and proper enclosure for my birds, but as I am renting, I am forced to keep just a few that I can manage inside my laundry. King Quail have excellent hearing, so you can look forward to being notified in advance of sirens, motorbikes or planes in the distance. Fortunately they crow less loudly than regular roosters, but it is often the females who let out warning calls, so having males hasn't increased the noise at all. During the times that I have been without female quails, the males wail constantly. It took a while earlier this year to get more females due to the shortage.
Whenever there is a sunny day I take them outside or at least open the main door with a wire door up because of the neighbours cats. I regularly release them to run and fly around in the room where they are kept, so they keep up their strength. There are only large birds in the suburbs out here and they pounce on anything left unprotected. 18 months ago there was a mouse plague in the area. I was warned that it was happening 2 months before I saw signs of it. Once you see the signs it is already too late, and my rental had a hole at the front door which I couldn't stop the vermin getting in. Some negotiations saw the landlord fix that door and the problem halted overnight. Had the birds been outdoors during that time, they would have been highly stressed by the mice. Over time I have had a rabbit and zebra finches as well. The zebra finches co-existed well with the quail. When the zebra finches and the quails all reproduced 2 years ago, they all had male babies, no females.
When I first began keeping pets, I started with the bigger coturnix Japanese quails I bought from a market I worked at.
They were great for eggs, with only 2 females at a time laying up to 2 eggs each a day and no male birds, as I was told they would crow too loudly and annoy the neighbours. It took me a few months to get used to the idea, but just before I sold them again (during the mouse plague before the door hole was fixed) I was happily having 8 eggs as a snack or up to 22 as a meal. They were very appetizing eggs and tasted great. There was obviously alot more clean up, mess and smell with the larger birds as well as the rabbit. So now I ony have the King Quail which are perfect when there is not so much room. They also eat finch seed mix as well as the other food mentioned. Have a great day, everyone.
and Welcome To BYC!
