new to Quail - indoor outdoor or not at all ?

[nicoble]

Hello forum,

The kids and I are hatching quail as a summer project. I have 19 eggs in a brinsea mini advance and they all look fertile. We used to have chickens and I remember quail from my childhood: cute and little and not terribly hard to care for ;-)
I breed parrot species - cockatiels and budgies mostly so I have plenty of cages of all kinds, shapes and forms and I have an indoor bird room.
The plan is to find most of our chicks ( if there are any) a new home and the person I got the eggs from is more than willing to take chicks back if we can't sell them quickly. But from past experience I know we will fall in love and some will stay with us.
I am trying to figure out where to put the chicks after the brooder ( I already have a huge Rubbermaid tote which will work great as a brooder and to house youngsters for a while).
I wonder if a few quail - like 3 or 4- would do well in a cage in my birdroom - or do they get too smelly or messy? I have flight cages I can make quail friendly with dust boxes.
Or should I invest in a rabbit hutch and put them outside and let them brave the Colorado winter? We have dogs so Quail would need to be off the ground and the weather here gets cold so something enclosed is a must - I have a rabbit heating pad that I could use and I can install extra wiring and Plexiglas against those snow storms ( and lately the rain!). Our issue with the chickens were that they attracted a lot of mice and rats - no matter how hard we tried we ended up with so many rodents that we caught up to 25 mice a day - in our very residential neighborhood and an only 6000 sf property ! - We had to abandon the chicken project out of respect for our neighbors.

Does anyone here have house quail? How often do you have to clean a say 2ftx3ft cage with wire bottom and 3 quail ? Or is it more realistic to keep them in a Rubbermaid tote with bedding with more floor space?

 

[nchls school]

What kind of quail? Button quail would do well in your bird room or aviary, but they would not be able to handle cold weather outside.

 

[nicoble]

most are coturnix - 6 eggs are a bit of a quail barnyard mix as the lady I got them from ordered a mix ...

 

[nchls school]

most are coturnix  - 6 eggs are a bit of a quail barnyard mix as the lady I got them from ordered a mix ... 

Coturnix are migratory birds in nature. They would not handle cold weather like what you have in Colorado. They would do better in your bird room in cages.

 

[JaeG]

We keep our coturnix inside. Do ferment their food as otherwise they are very smelly. I use oat chaff as their bedding as it's a lot easier to vacuum up than pine shavings and they do make a mess if you have wire sides (even if the plastic base is quite deep). The only issue is them kicking chaff into their food and water so I've got those things up on a platform and given them a step to get up to it.

I have 6 birds in one cage and I clean them out about once a week. I have one female who lives on her own as she does not like my gold male (she is Tibetan coloured). I've tried putting one or another of my other females with her but they always end up yelling for the male (and boy, they can be very loud). My daughter will often put a female up there to visit her but she seems happy enough on her own most of the time.

The coturnix are sweet little things and they are so patient with my children picking them up. The ones we have bred ourselves are very tame but I think it's also their genetics. We got a different lot from someone else at two weeks old and they have grown up to be smaller, more wild (despite handling), and the males are a lot noisier and aggressive. They are living as bachelors!

 

[kingmt]

I've not tried the fermented feed yet but what I've read it sounds good.

The quail I've raised stink to bad to keep inside. I still don't think I'd keep them inside with fermented feed since I have raised them on wet feed & they throw that stuff about 30 feet. I don't know how cold it gets there but if you keep them covered with a little heat pass they should be fine. They do OK with the wind blocked down to about 20F.

 

[nicoble]

I have to do some research what I can feed quail besides the regular bagged stuff from the feed store - i find that all premade chicken feed makes the poo stink- maybe there is an alternative-I am sure i could mix fresh grains and enrich with greens,sprouts and dry bugs- maybe that would help with the smell ??. It gets way below 20f around here so maybe outside only in the summer! ...

 

[Halloweengirl13]

We keep our quail in our sun room/ storage room. I haven't noticed a particularly bad smell but they have sand to dust bathe in and everything in the room including their cages end up covered in it. They also kick out their bedding everywhere . I have to sweep the room every day . I still won't put them outside tho. I have a bunch of kitties and they love to eat the quail that make escape attempts.lost my first breeding pair of buttons that way and my only white coturnix quail. My Lilith is a naughty kitty, but I don't blame her. She's just doing what cats do and there's a reason bird-brained means stupid Lol

 

[kingmt]

I haven't tried it yet but I've read that fermented feed will cut down on the smell. I'm thinking of trying it. You might want to look into it yourself.