Wanting to Raise Quail

[sunshinecanines]

I’ll apologize in advance for what will probably be some very stupid questions. I’ve been wanting to get quail for months, I think the time is nearing for me to be able to so I’m working on getting all of my researching done. I plan to use a rabbit hutch, I mostly want eggs for my dogs and we’ll probably scramble up a few for breakfast every once in a while. I figured I’d get a 2 story hutch like I used to have rabbits in, about 48” long and 24” wide with an attached nest box to get away from the sun, wind, and rain. Should I get a hutch where the levels are completely separate, or would they do well with a ramp connecting the two levels? If the levels were separate, I figured we could have 5-6 quail per cage. Would that be right? If I get a hutch with a ramp connecting the two levels, would I still put 10-12 in there?
Also, do you have to have any males? I might eventually want to breed them so I don’t have to purchase more, but I’d rather not have to deal with learning how to care for the eggs and hatchlings at first. I’d much rather just have females for now.
I know that quail are very sensitive. I have 2 dogs with high prey drive (one of them being a bird dog breed). If the dogs are interested in the hutch at first, could they cause the quail to have a heart attack or anything like that? Or would they be safe as long as the dogs can’t physically get them?
I’m sure I’ll be making more posts with questions before we make the purchase, but this is stuff that I couldn’t find answers for!

 

[vall]

They will use a ramp (staple hardware cloth to it for traction) but I'd rather keep two separate groups myself. In case you have any that don't get along, and for ideal breeding ratios. 10-12 birds split or together should be fine.
You don't need males unless you want to breed, so hold off for now.
I have had birds die from heart attacks yes, but it's rare, and I suspect it's the weak ones I don't want to breed anyway.

 

[Cool-breeze7]

Quail will lay eggs with or without a male. It’s very unlikely a hen would go broody and sit on any eggs in a hutch style enclosure.

Quail don’t typically use ramps though a few ppl claim to have been able to teach theirs to use one. If your going to have a split level hutch you might as well keep them separate for managing waste. Also it’s helpful to be able to separate birds in case someone has an attitude issue.

Minimum of 1sqft/bird. More is always better. If you try to stick to the 1sqft guideline you’re much more likely to have conflict. Just like people, sometimes animals need a little space.

 

[Dandichook]

Re: dogs, I think it depends a little bit on how old your birds are when you get them and how you introduce them to the dogs. In our case we hatched all our quail ourselves and the brooder was on the floor in the living room where the chicks were exposed to our dog, us, sounds, vacuum cleaner, etc from day one. We supervised our dog with them very closely, but she remains very interested in them even now and spent a lot of time gently nosing at them as chicks.

They're actually calmer about the dog approaching them than we humans, because she never picks them up and messes with them, lol.

Anyways, I would judge that as long as your dogs can't/don't cause them any harm, and they're introduced early, in my experience the quail have been fine with everything from the dog following them around to us mowing the lawn right up to their coop.

Granted, this is just my experience, but it has held true for all 44 chicks we hatched. Hopefully yours will be fine with your dogs!!

 

[neo71665]

quails are ground birds by nature. They do not like ramps.

A bird no matter the breed will lay an egg without a male. A human female don't need a male human to have her monthly cycle. Same thing but a bird does it once a day give or take.

If you want quail to go broody (good luck) and hatch babies you need a rooster. Hens will lay eggs without a male but if you want eggs that hatch it takes a rooster that mounts them. Even then the rooster has to be fertile just like the gals.

Quail are flighty birds and will take off in a cage to the point they will injure them self to death. You have dogs best is to keep them away.

 

[Nabiki]

You might want to start with the articles here:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/articles/categories/quail.32/

 

[NinjaGamer2022]

You should make sure the height from floor to ceiling is no higher than 12 (10?) inches (or a low point of 5?-7 ft) or when they fly up they can brake their necks.

 

[QuailTail]

I have two dogs and they definitely stress the birds out when they have access to the outside of the coop (which they only have under supervision). Because the quail are flighty and shoot up/ run in sudden bursts it really triggers my dogs, who are usually fairly docile, into lunging towards the coop - and a fun cycle is started. Dogs can also get hyper fixated which can stress them out as well, not just the quail. Best for all to keep the dogs away if you want them all to be happy, that would be my advice.

I also second the whole 'quail don't like ramps' thing. Mine don't have any, but they don't even climb on any of the logs in their coop, unless they're desperate to get away from something, so I would seperate into two hutches. As everyone's already said as well, it's great to be able to have the extra hutch for isolating particular birds or just giving them all space.

Make sure they have plenty (like.. a lot) of places to hide, that's my number one tip. They need to be able to get away from each other, hide from things that frighten them outside the hutch, and just feel safe. And in my experience they need more than you think because they ignore half and only use the other half