Weird quail hens?

[RoosterHuggerLiz]

I have a pair of 10 week old quail hens in a three square foot rabbit cage that I keep in my garage, one of the hens has been weak since she was a chick but recently she's been displaying strange behaviors towards my stronger hen- the weaker hen (who is in fact laying eggs) keeps mounting the stronger hen as if the weaker hen was a rooster! My stronger hen is now a missing feathers on the back of her head and on her back from the weaker hen mounting her! I have no males, just these two ladies who are both laying!! What can I do? I really don't want to separate them because they scream until I put them back together.. (the dark hen is the stronger one)

 

[Yorkshire Coop]

Can you give them more room? That’s quite a small cage so squabbles could be happening. Also it looks like over breeding so are you sure one isn’t male? Have you checked your eggs too see if they are fertile?

 

[RoosterHuggerLiz]

Can you give them more room? That’s quite a small cage so squabbles could be happening. Also it looks like over breeding so are you sure one isn’t male? Have you checked your eggs too see if they are fertile?

Yep! They're both females, they're both laying! I've candled eggs just in case because I thought that too at first - is a 3 sqft (rabbit) cage I only own these two ladies no other birds so I find it strange, I'm currently in the process of building them a 4 ft long, 2 ft wide, 1 ft tall cage in hopes that it will give them more space, I was also recommended to get an actual male cuz it could just be sexual frustration and fighting over dominance, I will be waiting till the cage is built to do that though

 

[RoosterHuggerLiz]

Can you give them more room? That’s quite a small cage so squabbles could be happening. Also it looks like over breeding so are you sure one isn’t male? Have you checked your eggs too see if they are fertile?

So I ended up getting kind of anxious and taking her to the vet, found out that she was just molting early due to the Florida heatwave, I only noticed when it came out on her head

 

[nao57]

With some avian species this can be a dominance game, rather than a sex thing. If it were duck hens as long as they don't beat each other up its fine... as long as its not a drake doing it.

Wouldn't hurt to check for injuries.