Woke up to a scalped quail!?

[Jrose]

This is my first quail keeping adventure. I have 7 coturnix, about 7 weeks old. I've had them since they were 4 weeks old. They live outside in a 150sq ft fully enclosed pen under a weeping willow and have very long, lush grass and natural terrain. I'm feeding a milled pea, corn, and barley mix (17%) with free-choice whole sesame, poppy, and flax seeds for extra protein, plus they eat bugs and grass galore. They are plump and feathered nicely. They've been outside full time for almost a week. They covey up every night in the enclosed, straw-insulated 'hide out' I made for them. I check on them every morning and night, as well as throughout the day.
Last night everyone was just fine! This morning one quail was hunched and shaking. I inspected her and she's been scalped! The skin appears to be ripped from the back of her head, you can see the thin muscle and the skull. It looks like more than just the feathers ripped out. There's some matted blood and the damage appears to go down the back of her neck a bit. The neck/shoulder area looks featherless, though the skin is not broken there. I've dabbed water on it and put her under heat in the brooder room where she can also hear the week-old quail chicks. I doubt she'll make it, I'll probably have to put her down if she doesn't let go soon. I'm going to be gone for the weekend...
( I'm pretty sure it's a female- she's the classic white-breasted and has no copper buffing. Many of them are solid hawk-brown, but a few are the white and brown. )

I can think of nothing besides quail aggression that could've done this. Any predator would have killed her (and the others). Would it be a breeding/hormone issue? Maybe i've got a few males in the group and they're maturing? I'd like to understand so I can keep it from happening again

 

[Jrose]

okay, I'm combing over Google trying to understand quail aggression. Looks like scalping is actually a (horrifyingly) common problem. Sounds like I need to make sure I only have 1 male.

But, I have NOT IDEA which are male and female. I think I have 4 white breasted/brown-backed and 3 hawk-brown birds. 2 of the 4 white breasted have copper buffing, so I think they're males, right? 1 of the 2 hawk-brown birds is flighty, jumpy, calls, and acts like a cockerel would, so I think he might be a boy. But I'm just not sure! I figured I'd wait it out until they started breeding/laying (like turkeys), but I probably have to just make a guess. Would photos help?

--- I also read some folks swear that no matter how bad a hen is scalped, she'll be okay. My hen is definitely in pain, she thrashes a bit when she moves a certain way. But she's drinking a lot and trying to stay comfortable.

 

[DK newbie]

I've seen some pretty nasty looking pictures of scalped(as in visible scull) quail on this forum, that has made it, so you never know.
However, usually it seems that this happens when the quail 'boink' into something. How high is that enclosure of yours? If it is very high (2 meters or so), she probably didn't boink into the enclosure itself, but perhaps into the roof of this hideout you made for them?
I'm not saying it definitely wasn't the others that did it to her, but you might want to consider other possibilities. With such a large enclosure, I would consider it strange that they hurt her so bad - she should have room to get away from them.
I guess it's hard to estimate the protein content of their diet, but it should be 25-30 %, it sounds like yours might be lower. If the others did indeed hurt her, lack of protein might have something to do with it.

With regards to sexing, I know nothing of coturnix, apart from what I've read on this forum, and that appears to be something about spots or no spots on the chest. Don't know how old they have to be to determine sex that way, but some of the hardcore coturnix people might be able to help if you post pics of them.

 

[Lozuufy]

I've had a male get very badly scalped and he was fine and grew back his feathers in a couple weeks. Pictures would help for sexing the others, try to get a photo of their chests. Also there are some colors of coturnix that cannot be sexed by feather color.
Good luck with the injured one!

 

[Sill]

They can and will heal some horrific injuries and go on to live long normal lives so don't discount her. These types of injuries can happen when other quail, usually a male, yank their scalp and pull the skin off. It can also happen if they flush up and boink their heads on the enclosure ceiling, but much more common for it to be caused by aggression. You will need to find the offending quail and cull him. Never keep a roo that is mean to the hens. Attempt to sex the quail you have, and you should be able to at 7 weeks. If nothing else wait to hear crowing and mark or band them somehow. Only keep one rooster with your hens or more of this can happen. If you see the roo abuse the hens replace him.

 

[Jrose]

Thanks for the input. Sadly she died. It was pretty bad, at least 20% of the skin was gone from the back of her skull and some down her neck. One half the enclose is 4 1/2' tall and topped with wire fencing, so it's not solid. The other half is 5-6' tall and covered in a fine bird netting, so definitely not that. I thought about her having injured herself somehow, and I just don't see how she could have done it in there, not to that extent! The only solid 'roof' surface in the pen is a 1' wide strip of particle board (for hiding/shade/etc) but it's only 5" off the ground.

I have no clue who did this. They were all fine before bed and I spotted this first thing in the morning, though it was a little dry, not fresh and bleeding. I assume it happened in the night. They all covey up together at night, but usually spend their days split into two groups on opposite ends of the pen.

Tips on sexing them? I don't want to lose another hen Down to 6 sub-adults and 4 chicks!

Edit: I'm totally fine with culling. The plan is to build breeding stock for supplemental food.

 

[Jrose]

Will get some photos this evening (if I can). I usually sex my chicken chicks with about 85% accuracy just based on behavior and pinion length. If behavior it's anything to go by in quail, that would help. The ones I suspect are hens are so much more docile, some even come to me when I enter the pen. The super jumpy ones that run from me, stand tall, and let out their 'twee - twee - twee - twee - TWEE' call when I'm around seem like boys.

 

[Jrose]

Well, today there were only 5 quail in the run. NO IDEA how the other one got out. I'm going to transfer these guys into a hutch til I get things sorted, I'm frustrated with losing birds!

So here are the photos of the 5 left. The other one missing was another white breasted quail. I feel like 3, 4, and 5 are males. They're super jumpy and can't sit still. The first two birds are way chill and like to come up to me. Otherwise, I have no idea.

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[Dustystrail]

The call you are hearing is the males crow. I mark mine with a colored rubber band when they start crowing so I know who to cull. Mine have started crowing at about 5 weeks.

 

[Jrose]

The call you are hearing is the males crow. I mark mine with a colored rubber band when they start crowing so I know who to cull. Mine have started crowing at about 5 weeks.

Hm, okay. I thought that maybe at first, but *most* of the do it, so I thought it'd be more likely that they all called, vs they are mostly males. Well shoot.