What is the average rate of lay for A&Ms? Dose anybody know of anyone who sells sexed breeding stock within reasonable shipping distance of eastern kansas? I'm looking at starting a small commercial opperation maintaining around 120 quads. Also if anybody has any info on how restaurant contracts work I'm kind of puzzled on where the processing takes place if the breeder dosn't have an inspected processing facility.
a coturnix is a coturnix is a coturnix and they all lay the same. (A & M is NOT a breed it is a size/bloodline of coturnix basically.) starting at 6 - 8 weeks each hen lays an egg a day for the first year or 2. You need to give them a rest from laying for at least 1 month out of a year unless you replace at that point with new layers . If you disrupt their schedule by moving them around they may stop laying for a couple day up to a couple weeks. Your best bet is NOT to buy breeders but to hatch your own . They mature quick and you would know what you were working with age wise for sure. The eggs aren't expensive and for a 150.00 you could purchase an incubator that would keep you in all the chicks you needed. Shipping cost for breeding stock wouldn't be pretty i suspect and you cannot safely ship day old coturnix like you can chickens etc.
Hey rittert3, Like mhwc56 said, once ya pull the pajamas off, there is no difference in the the whites and any other color. The egg production is the same too. Now if its just your color of choice cuz thats what ya like, I understand that... But it sounds like your do'n a "for profit" deal here and you'd be no better off with the whites than anything else. I'm not far from Topeka and Lawrence, got a few good brown chicks. I'll give ya a few to get ya started if your close and wanted them. I hatch a lot of birds... Again mhwc56 is right, IMHO, for the operation you describe, your gonna need a bator. Plus its just too much fun hatchin the little spuds if nuthin else... I may have a egg roll'n around here somewhere too... Good luck with your project, Bill
I will keep you in mind Fat Daddy I live just north of manhattan. I do have a hovabator that needs a new wafer and thermostat but I want to upgrade to a sportsman so I can rotate through it, setting a cluch a week.
If I can't market to restaurants I lots of local swaps and acutions, will just have to downsize and give the a break from sept. to feb. I dont want to process commercialy either, so I'd rather market live birds and take a profit cut.
Quote:Don't downsize...up-size. Screw the...this color this, that color that. I wasted a whole year not propagating my jumbo whites. A&M's or what ever you like to call them. If you want egg production, then get some little browns. A coturnix is a coturnix is a coturnix, but picking the right strain will serve you well. 99.99% of all people raising coturnix can't market to restaurants for meat and 89.376% can't even market eggs for eating, so that leaves a lot of eggs that one needs to eat/sell/barter and the like. That's one huge omelet that needs to be eaten.
a friend of mine has a sizable working farm that she sells meat & produce to restraunts,farmers markets and etc . She has the WORST time selling quail to anyone b/c they don't want to pay diddly for butchered PLUCKED birds. She sells 5.00 a bird and they aren't willing to pay over 3.00. it's ridiculous . Eggs don't seem to be selling at all lately.
Well my Ideal would be to sell as many as there is a market for at $4 a bird grown and ready for the buyer to take home and butcher. Part of my thinking on the A&M is i like them better than other varieties but I've also heard they grow a little faster and bigger and have a higher meat to waste ratio, not sure it's true but that would make them a little better meat bird in my book. Also not wanting to know their rate of lay for egg production just so I know how many I can produce per week setting.
