Having just done this myself I'll recount my adventure....
I bought 18 eggs on ebay, incubated carefully, and hatched 6, now I used to breed red list endangered reptiles and some of the hardest to incubate lizards on the planet so this baffled me a little. Nothing like chicken and duck success rates either! Very disappointing.
These six however proved healthy and strong and I later learned that water is recommended to be added at the last few days. I can't speak on whether this works or not, but it couldn't do much harm!
These six were 5 boys and one girl, they were fed on chick crumbs from day one and put out doors in late September at 8 weeks old, female separate, at 10 weeks I killed and ate four of the males, keeping the biggest for breeding. The last two have gone back in the brood box in 12/12 light cycles and I received my first three eggs day after day the last three days.
My quail did not like being outside, they refused to come out of the hut until dark, and disappeared by morning.
Despite this terrible start I have order 60 eggs and plan to start again, lessons learned with a group of all females kept in a secluded part of the garage, and a breeding group of. 1.5 in a separate cage to keep steadily adding to these birds. I will replace the breeding stock every year ideally, if all goes to plan.
I have kept mine on chick crumbs and layers pellets (crumbled smaller) and held above "dust bath" level.
They are very messy, be prepared to clean up a LOT of poop, however,also be prepared to indulge in the most glutinous dinner that is a bowl full of quail wrapped in bacon and roasted.
I plucked mine instead of skinning as I'm used to plucking and it wasn't a bother, and they are MUCH better this way, but they can also be steadily skinned for a leaner faster meal. Though tbh, if you have nothing better to do, there's not much wrong with sitting down with a bucket in front of the telly and going at it.
Remember to save all the scraps for dogs and compost!
I highly recommend, the end product is work, but incredibly satisfying, and cheap to maintain.
Topic: Quails Anyone? (Read 12958 times)
