Quail attacked! Pretty bad.

[spencerbaillie]

Hey all. Hoping for some help here. My quail, my very dumb quail, were attacked through the chicken wire of their pen. They had a million other sheltered places to go in there but it seems they just took to standing still right next to the chicken wire while a raccoon put its dirty little mits in there.

Only one of ten died, one is probably going to die and the rest look pretty rough. It seems only their heads were attacked. Most of them seem fine, bouncing around and what not, but they are scalped. Literally right to the bone. I can see their skulls. Some them seem a little warm.

Should I cull them? Will these wounds heal over time? Let me know your thoughts. Thanks.

 

[Oreo quail]

That sounds awful. I don't know how they heal. No doubt the predator will keep coming back so priority one is securing their pen. Time to reinforce the cage. I have read elsewhere hardware cloth is better protection than poultry netting. Maybe some well place mousetraps would discourage a family of coons? Good luck on night 2!

 

[DK newbie]

They can heal from pretty bad injuries. If they eat on their own, they stand a pretty good chance, as long as they don't get any infections. I'd apply some antibiotic ointment and/or feed them some antibiotics and make sure to keep them warm. If they are pecking at each others wounds, separate them. Make sure they get enough vitamins, protein and minerals in their feed so they have something to heal their wounds with.

On the 'standing still right next to the wire'-thing, it might actually be even worse than that. I remember a post where someone had set up surveillance to see how predators got to their birds - and saw that the quail even walked over to the fence to check out the raccoon!
They could also have been scalped from boinking into the top of the cage in panic when the raccoon got hold of the first one.

 

[donut314]

Quails are masters at suicide. Right when I think I made everything safe, one of them always manage to find a way to get their head stuck somewhere or squeeze their way into their food container or fall asleep in the water, etc. I wouldn't be surprise if they line up to see a predator.

 

[VictoriaP]

My quail was recently attacked by a cat. He likes to sit right by the wire of his hutch, too, so he was too easy a target. His entire abdomen and leg were open, and his head was also scalped. We sutured him up with a home sewing kit and gave him Clavamox, an oral antibiotic, twice a day for 6 days. We also cleaned his wounds daily and applied some triple antibiotic ointment, which really did the trick. These birds are a lot stronger than they look Wish you the best of luck!