My button Quail (HELP!)

[CrazyBirdChick]

They could be a pair, and they might not be. If you feel their hip bones you should be able to tell. The hens will be wider. if they feel the same check their vent. The males will stick out farther and if you pull down on the bottom lip gently you will have somethin pop out. i think you know what that is - haha. if that happens on both then they are both males. if something red and squishy pops out (if it does then an egg is forming). If that pops out then massage her vent area until it goes back in. Also, simple observation could help too. The females usually do that high pitched woo woo woo sound you mentioned and the males whoosh. but i have had hens whoosh before and males do the woo woo woo. The males, however, are the only ones that will spread their wings to do a "mating dance". Their wings out to the side and crouch down and go in a circle around their subject of interest.

I hope i helped

 

[CrazyBirdChick]

Also now that i saw the vents the one with no bib is a hen. Whoever it was that said hens don't get red vents is lying. I do have every color of button quail, and quite a few colors I have made for myself. I have gotten red vents on about 1/2 of my female silvers, so that isn't a reliable method.

 

[nothingbutbirds]

Also now that i saw the vents the one with no bib is a hen. Whoever it was that said hens don't get red vents is lying. I do have every color of button quail, and quite a few colors I have made for myself. I have gotten red vents on about 1/2 of my female silvers, so that isn't a reliable method.

i think she ment the pure colors. ive seen females with red and pink also they werent on the pure colors and those dont look like pure silver to me as i have some and they are much different.

 

[kbgh]

I've kept button quails since 1972 and have never seen this vent sexing method before. In normal colored, harlequin, pied and silver birds we have always relied on the bib. Never seen a males without the bib. Whites we use best judgement based on calls.

There is actually only one color of button quail and the rest are mutations of the original color. It is true that the colored birds may breed true to color, you'll also get recessive gene birds that for all appearance are a given color but will throw offspring of normal color or if too much inbreeding you may get any of the colors.

Our original birds we obtained from a breeder in Colona, Illinois who had been keeping them since the late 1960's. She had normals, whites, silver and a few pieds that she would no sell. All here birds were excellent colors and bred prolifically.