My first experience with coturnix quail!

[Graphite91]

Oh my gosh I love these little birds. They are so CUTE and they crack me up. ...I think I may be addicted too...

 

[Graphite91]

Well I had 25 eggs in the 'bator, three were infertile,and I just had seven hatch over the last couple hours!!! One pipped but died in the egg, it was about ready to hatch, but the yolk wasn't absorbed all the way. Geeze once they start zipping it takes like five to ten minutes for them to get all the way out! I have 14 left, only one or two have pipped, do quail usually hatch in waves like this? The ones that hatched all did at almost the same time. I hope the others hatch, but I am shocked I hatched this many!!!

 

[subhanalah]

Midori is green in japanese right?
They are cuties i am pickin up mine tomorrow. Good luck on the incubator.

it means "melon liqueur" in English, lol

 

[Graphite91]

it means "melon liqueur" in English, lol

yum

 

[davedavey]

Well I had 25 eggs in the 'bator, three were infertile,and I just had seven hatch over the last couple hours!!! One pipped but died in the egg, it was about ready to hatch, but the yolk wasn't absorbed all the way. Geeze once they start zipping it takes like five to ten minutes for them to get all the way out! I have 14 left, only one or two have pipped, do quail usually hatch in waves like this? The ones that hatched all did at almost the same time. I hope the others hatch, but I am shocked I hatched this many!!!

My 12 had a hatch of 6 in first set, 12 hours later had 3 within 5 minutes then one 10 minutes later. Then 2 that wanted to hatch alone.
0

 

[Graphite91]

Ok, I had another good hatch this morning, and one that had pipped last night didn't zip right and flipped around in the egg so it's bum was coming out the fat end of the egg! It kicked and kicked the egg apart until the shell was all smashed up, but it managed to hatch out! O.O That's one way to do it I guess... It's navel was bald but 99% healed. I put it in a little paper cup lined with hot wrung-out paper towels to finish healing up. It seems ok, but it is completely silent! The other chick in the incubator is a loud one, but the one in the cup hasn't made a peep! What's the deal??

 

[subhanalah]

Ok, I had another good hatch this morning, and one that had pipped last night didn't zip right and flipped around in the egg so it's bum was coming out the fat end of the egg! It kicked and kicked the egg apart until the shell was all smashed up, but it managed to hatch out! O.O That's one way to do it I guess... It's navel was bald but 99% healed. I put it in a little paper cup lined with hot wrung-out paper towels to finish healing up. It seems ok, but it is completely silent! The other chick in the incubator is a loud one, but the one in the cup hasn't made a peep! What's the deal??

he's resting. Hatching is hard work!

 

[nayeli]

Wow! I'm jealous, did you build or buy that? (Hutch & Incubator)

 

[nayeli]

Let me amend having read more! How? Especially for so cheap!! I would think it would cost $30 just for the hardware wire.

 

[Graphite91]

I built both of them by myself! The main body of the hutch was free, It was some (surprisingly good quality) wood shelving used in the garden center of Walmart to hold flower bulbs. They put it out back with the pallets to be hauled away, and my hubby works in the warehouse there, so he saw them and brought them home. The $30 went to 2 $8 rolls of hardware cloth, some hinges, latches, and staples from the habitat for humanity re-store, and the poop-trays were plywood off-cuts from the local hardware store, only $10 for both! I already had all the screws, tools, extra lumber, metal roofing panels, and other miscellaneous stuff.

The cooler-bator was $8 to make, I literally had every piece to make it already except for the thermostat. It worked, and I got 9 little coturnix chickies, but my hatch rate wasn't very good, and I am already designing a better incubator with a bigger cooler and other improvements so next time will be better.

In the end, only 9 of 25 eggs hatched. 2 seemed to be infertile, 1 had hairline cracks, 1 pipped too early and didn't absorb the yolk, 6 died really early, four died mid-way, and 2 were malpositioned and must have just gotten stuck and died during the night. So yeah, pretty awful. I blame it mostly on my incubator being so tiny with such a large lid, and the thermostat. Every time I had to open the lid to turn the eggs, the temp and humidity would drop way too much. My eggs were shipped from Florida to Colorado, and even though they were packaged well and shipped quickly, I wonder how much the USPS tossed them around, and if that affected it at all.

However, I will think of this as a learning experience, it was my first time incubating anything and I will learn from my mistakes and do much better next time!