Protein

[puyuhsegar]

How about housefly maggot? I put all broken eggs and dead quail into a bucket, hang it and put bigger bucket under it. Lay/splash some flour into big bucket to prevent maggot from climbing out. Harvest it every day and stop on 10th day. After that destroy/bury all the remaining of small bucket. I destroy it because I afraid any remaining maggot which developed into cocoon become flies.

I gave it to all my quail ages 4 days and above, they loved it.

In my place no feedmill produce gamebird pellet, at most they have is chicken starter 22% protein

 

[Quailsong]

House fly maggots could def work. I've watched some methods online & they seem pretty straight-forward. There's two reasons why I haven't done it yet for my own flock.

One is the smell; hanging a dead critter(s) or leaving a bucket somewhere would attract who knows what to the area.

The second reason is if I miss a couple days & end up letting loose a bunch of flies to the area. We've got nasty black flies in Ontario, ones that leave 1" bruises near-instantly. You don't feel them till an hour later! I'd hate to contribute to that population!

Puyuhsegar, do you let your maggots rest a day & gutt-load them with something else? I def wouldn't want my quail eating possible disease nearly-direct from a dead quail. I'd be worried it'd cycle back into the live flock.

 

[ylly]

They eat mostly vegetarian food in the wild only a small amount of insects.

 

[Julbrod]

How about housefly maggot? I put all broken eggs and dead quail into a bucket, hang it and put bigger bucket under it. Lay/splash some flour into big bucket to prevent maggot from climbing out. Harvest it every day and stop on 10th day. After that destroy/bury all the remaining of small bucket. I destroy it because I afraid any remaining maggot which developed into cocoon become flies.

I gave it to all my quail ages 4 days and above, they loved it.

In my place no feedmill produce gamebird pellet, at most they have is chicken starter 22% protein

How about Black Soldier Fly Larvae as an addition.

Here are some benefits:
* They don't carry disease like houseflies can.
* They are proven to increase egg size.
*They also make a chemical that keeps other flies away.
*They can decompose most soft food very quickly.
*They eat bird droppings and dog droppings, horse, cow... for that matter and turn them into compost.
They can be bought under the name phoenix flies also.

This video is quite interesting!

 

[puyuhsegar]

BSF larvae have a thick skin and my 4days old quail won't eat it, I did try before, only matured quail will eat it. If the larvae turn into cocoon the skin will be harder and even my matured quail won't eat it. That is why I am using houseflies instead of BSF.

I have been feeding my quail with maggot for few months and until now there is no noticeable disease happened. They getting bigger and healthier than 100% pellet feeding quail

 

[Quailsong]

How about Black Soldier Fly Larvae as an addition.

Here are some benefits:
* They don't carry disease like houseflies can.
* They are proven to increase egg size.
*They also make a chemical that keeps other flies away.
*They can decompose most soft food very quickly.
*They eat bird droppings and dog droppings, horse, cow... for that matter and turn them into compost.
They can be bought under the name phoenix flies also.

This video is quite interesting!

Bolded for emphasis. That's the #1 reason why I want to start up a culture next spring. The blackflies here are atrocious & if I could find another way to discourage them (such as via BSF cultures) I'll do it!

 

[USAmma]

http://www.thatquailplace.com/quail/coturnix/coturn5.htm

Here's a really good article about quail nutrition

 

[jsawler]

THANK YOU for this thread! i'm new to quail as well. I was told to feed mine turkey starter, and have done so. any common foods to be added as well? not really into growing maggots really...

 

[zbraswell92]

You can use high protein cat food, but just like feather, blood, or fish meal, you really don't know what type of 'chicken, turkey, beef, or meat' they use.
It could have been sitting in a wear house for 3 weeks and then put into the food.
Feathers take a long time to decompose, so I got organic chicken feather meal to add.
It's 80% protein, so a little goes a long way.
It's fairly cheap too.