Questions about raising quail indoors

[urbanstormwater]

Hi all!

I recently learned about raising quail indoors as livestock, and have even heard some anecdotes that they're compatible with apartment living. I'm considering doing this myself, but I have some questions. (FYI, I don't have any experience raising animals besides cats and dogs, but would fancy having a fully operational egg/poultry set-up at some point if I can manage it.)

First, what is your opinion about the ethics of raising quail in an indoor cage? Are they prone to depression without open sky and grass under their feet? Do you have an opinion about woodchip bedding vs. hardware cloth? What do you do to keep your quails reasonably happy?

Also, let's say I have about a dozen quail in my living room. If maintained correctly, about how bad should I expect the noise and smell to be? Should I be worried about disturbing my downstairs neighbors with cock crows? Or guests with the smell?


Thanks for your thoughts all, I really appreciate it!!

 

[JaeG]

Coturnix quail are quite happy to be in a smaller cage but give them at least 1sq/ft per bird and have only one male per pen. They are quite smelly so you will need to clean out that many birds every few days. Fermenting their food does help in reducing the smell as does ensuring the bedding stays dry.

Males will crow a lot if they aren't happy but a settled male who is happy with his girls should only crow once or twice at dawn and dusk. Occasionally you get a trouble maker but if the birds have grown up together they should get on. Any new birds need to be introduced properly with a divider between the two groups for at least a week and preferably mixing them in neutral territory after that. They are highly territorial which can make integrating new members a challenge, especially if the new birds are a different colour than those they are used to seeing.

 

[mdees88]

I had 30 in a brooder in my house for the last 3 weeks. The first week they did not smell much at all and I turned all the shavings over about every 3rd day. The second week they started to stink pretty good. I ended up putting a wire floor in the brooder with shavings under the wire. Well I still had to move them out of the brooder to turn all the poop into the shavings because it was just piing up on top of them. I had to do this daily. Week 3 I removed the wire floor and put them back on shavings. Every day I added a fresh layer of shavings over the poop. They still smelled pretty bad. Now keep in mind I was keeping 30 birds in an 8 square foot area so things got gunked up very quickly. I just moved them outside into cages the other day. My outside cage compartments are 3ftx2.5ft and I keep 6 birds in each.

I prefer keeping them outside on wire for the following reasons:
1) The poop falls on the ground and I can go an entire year without removing it if I want.
2) It is healthier for them to not be in contact with their poop
3) They do not stink up the house
4) The roll out egg catchers allow me to collect eggs without going inside the cage (can't have that keeping them on pine shavings)

The smell is going to be directly related to how often you change the bedding. If you keep them on shavings they will turn some of the shavings over which will mix the poop in. If you keep them on wire the poop will pile up and will most likely stink faster. If you keep 12 quail in a 12 sq ft enclosure I would GUESS that you would need to change/add/mix the bedding every 2 or 3 days to keep the smell minimal.

You can always buy a dog crate off craigslist for $20 and get 4-5 quail and see how it goes. If you can handle the smell then you can build a bigger cage and get some more. But as mentioned your best bet is buying all the quail at once and make sure they were raised together.

Hopefully some more people who keep them indoors will chime in and give you some insight. If you have a balcony or back porch I would recommend keeping them out there.

 

[tinyomelette]

I just want to chime in on the smell issue... I've had a lot of other caged birds indoors before and I never had as much bird smell keeping 20+ animals as I have right now just keeping a measly 8 spare coturnix males indoors until they're ready for the freezer. I keep them in a very well ventilated spare room and clean every day at this point but the smell still seeps through the door to the rest of my apt. Their poop is pretty potent. I don't mind since I'm used to animal smells and I know it's temporary but yeah. Noise level on the other hand seems pretty ok. Nowhere near the noise you get from an equally big group of budgies hehe

 

[Fishkeeper]

IMO, you don't want to keep coturnix in minimal-requirement cages. You can without them dying, but they'll be happier in something a bit more like an aviary or the bird version of a well-decorated aquarium. Give them things to jump on, sandboxes to scratch in, straw to burrow into, and aim for 2 square feet per bird or more. If they have light overhead and things to interact with, they'll be happy birds. Coturnix quail are a domesticated species, it's not like you're netting them out of a forest or something.

 

[Floof]

I had 3 that were getting bullied in my outdoor set up and had to bring them inside into a cage in my living room until I could rehome them. I changed their litter daily and they still stunk up the whole house. I would avoid indoor quail if possible.