Quail stopped laying, can't figure it out?

[JurassicBawk]

Quail need 16 hours of light a day to produce eggs. If you want them to lay year round, you'll have to give them artificial supplemental light. Mine are outside with natural light and will stop around Thanksgiving because the daylight is so much shorter then.

 

[dianneS]

Quail need 16 hours of light a day to produce eggs. If you want them to lay year round, you'll have to give them artificial supplemental light. Mine are outside with natural light and will stop around Thanksgiving because the daylight is so much shorter then.

16 hours of daylight! First I heard 13, then I heard 14. So it's 16?

Light was the problem with my birds earlier this year. They were mature enough to be laying, but I wasn't getting eggs. I added a light and not only did I get eggs, but the young males finally started crowing. I think I'm going to try the light thing and see what happens. They're certainly getting enough protein right now. Thanks!

 

[JurassicBawk]

I've always heard 16 hours and the first thing I saw when I searched earlier said 16, but I just got to thinking that on the longest summer days here we have sunlight from about 6:00 AM to 10 PM, so that's barely 16 hours on our longest days. So I just looked some more, and the recommended is "from 14-16," with 16 being the max so they have 8 hours to sleep and recuperate. Too much light and they're going to be exhausted.

If you are hitting 14 hours, I'd say that would be fine. The days here in TN now are about 7 AM - 9 PM, so we're getting 14 natural hours.

 

[dianneS]

I think light was the issue. I have some chicks in a small section of the run and a heat lamp on them at night. I got three eggs yesterday and five today!

I do think they might be molting too, there have been feathers all over the place.