Quail Coop/Housing Questions

[Northwest_Wannabe]

Back years ago I had one male to 4 hens, and when we added 2 more he seemed much happier with his little harem this particular male wasn't very aggressive about breeding but we had another who I honestly believe wouldn't have been okay even if he was the only male quail in the whole world haha!

 

[orloffer]

My male coturnix isn't exactly aggressive about breeding, but the condition the backs of the females are in is not the best right now.

 

[Trisseh]

Love that you’re planning way ahead!
I don’t have answers for you about substrate with worms.
I do believe that you’d be wasting your time with diatomaceous earth in your substrate as it’s rendered useless when it gets wet. It’s also a drying agent so may cause problems with their feet over time.
As for plants and height, well...
Now, take all of what I’m saying with a grain of salt because I’ve only had quail for a month, lol, so this still may wind up being no good. xD

I have a small wooden house that I built for them to keep their food and water in, and a cage that was originally meant as a rabbit run. It’s 8’ long, 24” wide, and 27” tall. Gasp! Lol. So far, all my quail have done when out in the run portion, is hop and flap and get maybe 12” off the ground - and those suckers can fly if they want to. They constantly were flying out of their brooder and flying up to places that made them hard to retrieve. Now,the location I placed the cage and their house in is beside my house, with electric netting around the duck house, chicken coop, their runs, and this corner where I tucked the quail cage. No one has tried to flush as of yet, probably because they have 2 shrubs in there and a couple fabric plant pots to go hide in. They get startled, they scurry under the shrubs or into the plant pots. To be on the safe side, though, I did put up bird netting as a false ceiling to lessen the impact if they do flush, and covered the back and top of the entire thing with a tarp to provide shade and protection from wind. It doubles as a blind so they don’t necessarily see the ravens etc flying over. They’re just on bare ground, I have sandy soil that drains fast so it’s not a quagmire. I’ll probably wind up putting down leaf litter in the fall and doing some version of deep litter through the winter to help them stay warm and insulated from the ground. you won’t have that issue if you have them inside a building though!

 

[Northwest_Wannabe]

Love that you’re planning way ahead!
I don’t have answers for you about substrate with worms.
I do believe that you’d be wasting your time with diatomaceous earth in your substrate as it’s rendered useless when it gets wet. It’s also a drying agent so may cause problems with their feet over time.
As for plants and height, well...
Now, take all of what I’m saying with a grain of salt because I’ve only had quail for a month, lol, so this still may wind up being no good. xD

I have a small wooden house that I built for them to keep their food and water in, and a cage that was originally meant as a rabbit run. It’s 8’ long, 24” wide, and 27” tall. Gasp! Lol. So far, all my quail have done when out in the run portion, is hop and flap and get maybe 12” off the ground - and those suckers can fly if they want to. They constantly were flying out of their brooder and flying up to places that made them hard to retrieve. Now,the location I placed the cage and their house in is beside my house, with electric netting around the duck house, chicken coop, their runs, and this corner where I tucked the quail cage. No one has tried to flush as of yet, probably because they have 2 shrubs in there and a couple fabric plant pots to go hide in. They get startled, they scurry under the shrubs or into the plant pots. To be on the safe side, though, I did put up bird netting as a false ceiling to lessen the impact if they do flush, and covered the back and top of the entire thing with a tarp to provide shade and protection from wind. It doubles as a blind so they don’t necessarily see the ravens etc flying over. They’re just on bare ground, I have sandy soil that drains fast so it’s not a quagmire. I’ll probably wind up putting down leaf litter in the fall and doing some version of deep litter through the winter to help them stay warm and insulated from the ground. you won’t have that issue if you have them inside a building though!

It gets super rainy here in my area of Washington through spring, so I gotta keep that in mind too, as well as the heat, with decently chilly Winters but Very little snow which is good and bad I guess haha, good for the birds, bad for snowmen!

I'm hoping hand raising the babies will help with them flushing but I'd love to reduce the chances of them getting hurt nonetheless mine never flushed when I kept them years ago (in a rabbit hutch and in my 5' pigeon aviary for a summer) but they were Very much pets, one in particular was such a sweet hand tame darling <3 I don't expect my future quail to be all sweet like her but not crazy wild things would be preffered haha!

Your hutch sounds great, and super long! What plants do you have in there? Do they eat your shrubs? I'd love to have some plants or maybe fake foliage that they don't eat just to have as cover

I'm hoping to have a tractor or a maybe a few, or maybe one of those large dog kennel type things made of chain link, set up with netting roof to serve as an outdoor grazing time (and put them away at night into their hutch) or maybe give a try at growing trays of grasses and edible plants for them which I could add into their cage if I can't give them outside time every once in a while, (if this hutch thing is built in a shed or barn or such) I want happy quails that won't destroy the bank, it's difficult when my friends don't really keep quails so I can't see or ask about their hutches and methods but I'm glad this forum exists <3

 

[Trisseh]

It gets super rainy here in my area of Washington through spring, so I gotta keep that in mind too, as well as the heat, with decently chilly Winters but Very little snow which is good and bad I guess haha, good for the birds, bad for snowmen!

I'm hoping hand raising the babies will help with them flushing but I'd love to reduce the chances of them getting hurt nonetheless mine never flushed when I kept them years ago (in a rabbit hutch and in my 5' pigeon aviary for a summer) but they were Very much pets, one in particular was such a sweet hand tame darling <3 I don't expect my future quail to be all sweet like her but not crazy wild things would be preffered haha!

Your hutch sounds great, and super long! What plants do you have in there? Do they eat your shrubs? I'd love to have some plants or maybe fake foliage that they don't eat just to have as cover

I'm hoping to have a tractor or a maybe a few, or maybe one of those large dog kennel type things made of chain link, set up with netting roof to serve as an outdoor grazing time (and put them away at night into their hutch) or maybe give a try at growing trays of grasses and edible plants for them which I could add into their cage if I can't give them outside time every once in a while, (if this hutch thing is built in a shed or barn or such) I want happy quails that won't destroy the bank, it's difficult when my friends don't really keep quails so I can't see or ask about their hutches and methods but I'm glad this forum exists <3

Mine are all a batch I hatched too, which is probably why they’re not as flighty as a group, like yours were. They’re so little and cute. Lol.
so for your climate, you might be better having them up off the ground, and possibly inside for inclement weather/pred protection overnight. They seem to be pretty forgiving all the way around though. Much nicer to deal with than the chickens.

I’ve got a cinquefoil/potentilla and a dwarf goats beard in there for them. The potentilla was there before I got the quail so I placed their cage over it, it bushes out nicely and they can sit under it easily. I purchased the dwarf goats beard specifically for them because it gets nice flower stalks which wind up having lots of seeds on them when they go to seed, and it stays nice and small and compact. They love that thing. Lol. There’s 10 quail in there and they all somehow force themselves under it. xD

a lot of people use fake plants with no problems too, the quail don’t really care so long as it’s something to go huddle under.

 

[Northwest_Wannabe]

Thank you! General question for anyone, do you grow plants for your quail? Or know of plants quail would enjoy eating? Herbs, vegetables, greens etc? thank you guys!

 

[Kiki]

You can kinda see how one of my cages is set up here:

 

[orloffer]

You can kinda see how one of my cages is set up here:

That looks nice! I want a dirt bathing area for my quail!

 

[Kiki]

That looks nice! I want a dirt bathing area for my quail!

All of my cages are half inch hardware cloth as flooring but the entire floor is pretty much covered with the start boxes.

The only area that I do not have are covered with a dirt box is where I put the waterer.

 

[Northwest_Wannabe]

Your set up looks great! I somehow never thought of wire floor with boxes of dirt everywhere else! That's certainly an idea I'm gonna write down and play with, thank you! Your quail are gorgeous, where did you get them? they look like the colors I was looking at from Myshire Farms! (Haven't looked into the company besides just quail pictures haha xD)