To turn a Coturnix egg or not

[pxtyson]

I am starting to raise quail and will be incubating soon.
With the people I talk too they say they never turn a coturnix egg in the incubator.

Who here turns and who does not turn?

 

[TwoCrows]

As the embryo grows inside the egg, it feeds on the nutrients suspended in the yolk where the growing chick stems from. What turning does is move those nutrients around and offers up a new spot in the yolk for the growing baby and fresh nutrition several times a day throughout the incubation process. Not turning the eggs can cause birth defects, unhealthy tiny chicks that many times don't make it. Eggs need to be turned.

 

[satay]

Agree 100%

 

[pxtyson]

Everything I have read agrees. I talk with people about quail, and from more than I thought say you do not need to turn a coturnix.

I am just seeing on a large scale forum if there are people who don't turn their coturnix eggs.

 

[TwoCrows]

Why would a Coturnix egg not need to be turned, but other poultry eggs do?

 

[James Marie]

agree also 100%...
Eggs NEED to be turned for proper development....during incubation....

Now...some people do not turn eggs while in storage BEFORE incubation....
that may be the case and somebody may have misunderstood....

 

[gingerly1983]

Ya know, this has me curious as well. I have always heard that you must turn them for them to develop properly, and I certainly do it. But does the hen in the nest turn the eggs routinely or does she just sit on them?

 

[TwoCrows]

Nature has that all figured out and turning the eggs is built into the motherly instincts of the hen.

 

[underground chickenman]

Now...some people do not turn eggs while in storage BEFORE incubation....
that may be the case and somebody may have misunderstood....

I think you are on to something. I have never, ever heard anybody say that quail eggs, or any eggs, don't need to be turned. I bet somebody, not necessarily the op, but somebody up the communication chain, got their wires crossed when they were told to let shipped eggs rest a day before putting them in the incubator. Kinda like the old party game where you sit in a large circle and a whispered message is passed from person to person, and the last person hears something not even close to the original message.