Pharoah quail question...

[Jaboyd2u]

I just bought some 7 week old quail and am hooked already! I have 10 hens 7 roos is that a good ratio or to many roos? I wanted to make sure that the hens give me fertile eggs for hatching. Also are the pharoah ( Coturnix) quail white or dark meat? Thanks

 

[monarc23]

They are considered dark meat...however from what dove hunters have told me coturnix meat is "white" compaired to how dark dove dark meat is. So I guess to each their own. However A & Ms and English white coturnix (same species just different color variety) were bred for white meat however but I can't attest for this either, I have culled 2 A & Ms but fed them to my critters their meat really didn't look any different to me compaired to pharoah and jumbo coturnix meat in the raw state be it a little bit brighter pink?

As for your ratio, well the maximum number of hens ONE roo can breed is 5 hens.. so you COULD, omit many of those roos keep your two best and put them in with those ten hens.

Or you could if you really wanted to, 1 roo 2 hens, 1 roo 2 hens, 1 roo 2 hens, 1 roo 2 hens, 1 roo 2 hens lol but that only makes room for 5 of your roos and the 2 hens per roo could get very much so over bred because when doing it that way you will more than likely only have no bloodshed if you split them up into breeding trios which CAN be done, but some roos get frusterated iwth only two hens a nd will over breed them to the point of torn backs and even scalped heads. So I'd say your best bet is 1 roo to 5 hens but that's your decision and all coturnix are different just like people... some are snotty to eachother others aren't

Edited to add.... WELCOME TO THE OTHER DARK SIDE

 

[Jaboyd2u]

They are considered dark meat...however from what dove hunters have told me coturnix meat is "white" compaired to how dark dove dark meat is. So I guess to each their own. However A & Ms and English white coturnix (same species just different color variety) were bred for white meat however but I can't attest for this either, I have culled 2 A & Ms but fed them to my critters their meat really didn't look any different to me compaired to pharoah and jumbo coturnix meat in the raw state be it a little bit brighter pink?

As for your ratio, well the maximum number of hens ONE roo can breed is 5 hens.. so you COULD, omit many of those roos keep your two best and put them in with those ten hens.

Or you could if you really wanted to, 1 roo 2 hens, 1 roo 2 hens, 1 roo 2 hens, 1 roo 2 hens, 1 roo 2 hens lol but that only makes room for 5 of your roos and the 2 hens per roo could get very much so over bred because when doing it that way you will more than likely only have no bloodshed if you split them up into breeding trios which CAN be done, but some roos get frusterated iwth only two hens a nd will over breed them to the point of torn backs and even scalped heads. So I'd say your best bet is 1 roo to 5 hens but that's your decision and all coturnix are different just like people... some are snotty to eachother others aren't

Thank you I had just about came up with the same answer for the meat I tried to explain it to someone that had asked me and I said it was kind of a mixture? As far as the ratio I may try to seperate them I will cull out the smallest of the roos.​

 

[Jaboyd2u]

I have one more question has anyone bought quail eggs off of ebay? I found several peoople selling them just was wondering what you guys thought of that.

 

[monarc23]

Quote:
shelleyb2008 sells her coturnix eggies on ebay (and her buttons too i assume)? Theres several BYCers that do. I say if you do buy just make sure you really take a gander at their feedback just incase they may be scammers as there are a lot of ebay peeps like that but none that I know of.

 

[bkvail]

Quote:
I bought my quail eggs off ebay. I have eight 7 week olds from the first batch (my first hatch, didn't do so great), and I have 39 from the second hatch that are almost 2 weeks old

I spend about $35 each time on eggs including shipping, so I have well over $2 invested in each bird not including feed.........they'd better taste good. I am going to keep all the hens and one roo from the first batch - and then all the tux and tibetan from the second batch until I can figure out what is what sex. Wish you could color sex the tibetans and tux!

 

[Jaboyd2u]

Jaboyd2u wrote:
I have one more question has anyone bought quail eggs off of ebay? I found several peoople selling them just was wondering what you guys thought of that.

I bought my quail eggs off ebay. I have eight 7 week olds from the first batch (my first hatch, didn't do so great), and I have 39 from the second hatch that are almost 2 weeks old I spend about $35 each time on eggs including shipping, so I have well over $2 invested in each bird not including feed.........they'd better taste good. I am going to keep all the hens and one roo from the first batch - and then all the tux and tibetan from the second batch until I can figure out what is what sex. Wish you could color sex the tibetans and tux!

Cool I am going to place a bid on some soon waiting on the quail rails for my incubator Hopefully they will be here real quick. I may get some more breeds of quail but for now I am going to stay with the Pharoah. I may get the Texas A&M later. I have to talk the wife into it​

 

[monarc23]

Quote:
Cool I am going to place a bid on some soon waiting on the quail rails for my incubator Hopefully they will be here real quick. I may get some more breeds of quail but for now I am going to stay with the Pharoah. I may get the Texas A&M later. I have to talk the wife into it

if you're wanting for meat I wouldnt go with pharoah i'd go with jumbo brown (pharoahs only get to around 6 oz in weight where as jumbos are noromally 13+)