Tatanka Breeders Club: Meat Quail project with history, discussion, pictures and videos

[MobyQuail]

a 44 day old, 370 gram, james marie AM I will be crossing into the brown tatanka line (started here on byc),
and back out to my brown "splits" and white "buffalo" tatankas.



traveled to GQF this past week and picked up a new breeder set up for the "tatankas" all breeder birds hit 280g by 42 days and hens must lay uniform 14+g eggs


some of my split "tatankas"



some uniform single yolk eggs from the past week, the carton weighs 56g, the 30 eggs avg. 15 grams



birds that dont make the grade around here





and yes, you should have rabbits if you have Tatankas

 

[MobyQuail]

These are some of eggs that I put in incubator today.....35 eggs between 13g and 16g.


Sorry for the blurry picture. These eggs are from my 2nd generation large birds. I have pulled all the large birds from the first hatching and put them in one cage, sorry I haven't been able to weigh them yet...will do shortly. From eggs hatched from this group I have the largest birds in the second cage, these are their eggs. Cage one eggs average 13g (average of 10 eggs), cage two eggs are averaging 14.5g (average of 10 eggs). I don't know if you consider these Tatanka's but they are very large to me. I will be butchering all the culls.


keep up the nice work!

 

[MobyQuail]

I received a 21 gr. egg yesterday! I have this one hen that is noticeably larger then all the rest and her and her brood mates have recently started laying. I've received a lot of double yolks too. Anyway, this one hen lays extremely large eggs,her egg 3 days ago was egg was 18.9 grams and then the 21 gr egg yesterday. I candled the 21 gr egg and only see one yolk. What are your thoughts on incubating it?
They're 8 weeks now, I'll try to weight that hen tomorrow and post info here... She's freakishly large.. lol..

Nice Egg Big! How you liking these birds?

 

[7quails3chicken]

My 2 week old baby's are 4oz now

 

[Bigdtc]

Nice Egg Big! How you liking these birds?

I think they are fantastic animals. I already have 4 asian food places buying eggs and two on the hook. I've not yet been to any of the local health food stores yet...
.I sold off the older hens I started with and they are replaced with the ones from 2 hatches ag, they just turned 8 weeks and have been laying for 2 weeks..go figure. . I frequently get 14+ oz. eggs and often get over sized double-yolks as well. I have 4 that came from the last hatch, they are 3-1/2 weeks now. I also have 2 sets of eggs from the current hens in the incubator (along with the 21 ounce egg..just in case..)and some from the older hens as well.. to keep us in meat. I culled 14 males last week and had some on the grill over the weekend..Fantastic!!.. Anyway, thanks for asking. I'm keeping up here but don't post very much anymore because the site is too slow. It's not me either, just too much ads,etc.. I still like the place and appreciate your posts.. It actually took me nearly 20 minutes for this post.. lol

 

[MobyQuail]

gave my birds a spa day, warm water and pine shaving to help remove any poo-balls off their toenails.

Then we re-arranged pens.



checking out the door on the new GQF pens. smart that it swings up and in.


little issue with the Tatanka eggs not rolling under the feed tray. larger quail eggs...maybe its a good problem to have?

 

[MobyQuail]

My 2 week old baby's are 4oz now

 

[heritagehabitatfarms]

i think I'm about ready to get a start... i am hatching my red Golden's and fawn's now and would like to hatch some of these as well... i plan on crossing the Tatankas in to both of my lines and start to improve the size again and keep the colors... i also would like to keep a few pure Tatanka brown's and whites... might have cross them in to the coloreds a second time later on...

i am thinking of using the whites to cross with the red Golden's should give me red Golden tuxedos and then breed them back together i should get 25% pure red Golden's and 25% whites and 50% red golden tuxedos...

i will use the brown's to cross with the fawn's the baby's will be split to fawn breed them together i should get about 25% fawns and 25% pure brown's and 50% splits...

i have also just gotten a gram scale so i can weigh them proper... and i just got 4 more Quail cages from my mom that she is no longer using...

So if any one has any available please let me know... i have not posted much but have been subscribed and kept up with this thread and the old one buttercup had from day 1...

Thanks Elias

 

[MobyQuail]

i think I'm about ready to get a start... i am hatching my red Golden's and fawn's now and would like to hatch some of these as well... i plan on crossing the Tatankas in to both of my lines and start to improve the size again and keep the colors... i also would like to keep a few pure Tatanka brown's and whites... might have cross them in to the coloreds a second time later on...

i am thinking of using the whites to cross with the red Golden's should give me red Golden tuxedos and then breed them back together i should get 25% pure red Golden's and 25% whites and 50% red golden tuxedos...

i will use the brown's to cross with the fawn's the baby's will be split to fawn breed them together i should get about 25% fawns and 25% pure brown's and 50% splits...

i have also just gotten a gram scale so i can weigh them proper... and i just got 4 more Quail cages from my mom that she is no longer using...

So if any one has any available please let me know... i have not posted much but have been subscribed and kept up with this thread and the old one buttercup had from day 1...

Thanks Elias

you are in Elias. I owe some second settings to a few stewards, I fell behind after hurting my flipping shoulder. I will send ya a PM see what we can figure out. thanks for hanging in there with us.

 

[Tokajein]

Wow I have really enjoyed reading through your thread(though I should probably have been looking at my new biology textbook instead to prepare for classes next week haha) I am just starting out with quail, I have often hatched eggs for other people, but this was my first year doing it for myself. Starting out with 12 coturnix( there were 13, but one passed away unfortunately, they are almost a week old) I am not going to try and do what you are doing right now, since I still have A LOT to learn. Anyways, I just wanted to say keep up the good work, and I look forward to following your progression

I have actually learned a little bit from your thread (got to love learning

)