On our way back from Enchanted Rock last Friday we picked up 14 quail chicks from a breeder in Dripping Springs.
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| 14 1-2 week old Coturix quail. Coturix are predominantly brown but occasionally you’ll get a white one. Texas A&M has bred an all white variety. |
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| They’re pretty tiny but well on their way to getting their feathers |
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| We put them directly into the quail tractor and quickly realized a fault in our design. The feeding holes are too big for young birds. A couple of over eager chicks crawled right into the food hopper and couldn’t figure out how to get back out again. |
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| After extricating the wayward chicks we taped up the feeding holes until we could come up with a better solution or the quail grew into them. |
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| Quail moved into the tractor. |
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| Testing out the watering system. |
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| You fill up the blue coffee can with water. When the birds want to drink they tap the metal nipple and it dispenses a few drops of water. |
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| Until the quail don’t need a heat lamp anymore (5-7 weeks) we’ll keep them on our balcony. I’ve installed the watering system but left the old water trough as a back up until the birds get used to using the watering nipples. I also rigged up a stand to hold the heat lamp. |
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| I installed a small incandescent bulb (colored red with a marker) to provide a little warmth during the day. Our solution to the overlarge feeding holes was to cut small holes into small scraps of cardboard and pin the cardboard over the feeding holes. |
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| Birds using the watering nipples. |
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| We put some trays of dirt into the tractor that the quail seem to enjoy wallowing around in. |
Are they still at your apartment? When are they moving to the burbs?