Quail anyone???

[jtmaze]

I just got back from my in-laws in Michigan and my FIL has started raising quail. He had a bunch he was going to slaughter and gave me a cock and 3 hens to get started. He started with a few eggs(8-10) and an incubator, and now has a freezer full. This is very low financial input and seems to be very easy. takes up very little space minimal input. That is if I can keep the wofe from playing with them. What are y'alls thoughts on this.

[Wiljo05]

Quail and dove are the filet minõn of birds! Bacon wrapped, tossed on the grill with just salt and pepper is tough to beat!

You are talking about raising for eating right? Prob should have asked that first...

[Peace]

along these lines, how much effort (TWRA or other), if any, has been put into maintaining or re-introducing quail populations here in TN?

 

With your FIL's "techniques", is repopulating something a grass roots organization could champion?

[daveW]

Tagging for interest...this is something I want to get into if my house ever sales/I move. My understanding is that their eggs are more nutritious by weight than chicken eggs and I think that -if you only let half of them out at a time, they come back. This means that they will feed themselves???

[Luke E.]

 My Grandfather took to raising Quail about 5-6yrs ago and now has chickens, turkeys and guineas. Aside from start up costs and labor to build enclosures and what not, it has been a good deal. Now when I say he has all those different kinds, I don't mean just a few of each because last time I was down he had 50 or more turkeys 30-40 chickens and I don't know how many quail. They always have eggs and enough to supply everyone in the family near about and always have plenty of poultry in the freezer. Even with all that he has he only spends about a hour per day feeding, watering, moving pens and anything else needed and he moves pretty slow, I think I could knock it out in 20-30 minutes tops. Not to mention the stuff just taste 100x better when you raise or grow it yourself vs. buying in a grocery store. I've also gone down to their place in Florida and brought back several cartons of eggs and was still eating them 3 months later and were still good.. I mention that because if these eggs stay good for that long and even longer maybe, how long have those "fresh" store bought eggs been hanging around before you buy them? dlm37015 (David) told me one time that WalMart brought eggs in from China or somewhere overseas.

[JWC]

I love quail! best bird there is to eat imo.

I too have wondered how old store eggs are. I've heard eggs will stay good for 6 months or more refrigerated if you don't wash them.

We've been wanting chickens but there's a farm like a mile away that sells them and we've been getting them there. They have 500+ chickens. Lady that lives there said they started out and grew to that much demand over time. Heck everyone in my family buys from them now. Convenient too, just pull up to the house and the eggs are in cartons in a fridge in the garage with a bucket to leave money and a bucket with change if you need it. Wife went today and picked up 3 dozen. My kids eat a lot of eggs. I don't really like em.

[Oh Shoot]

....I've heard eggs will stay good for 6 months or more refrigerated if you don't wash them....

 

Yeah, I usually buy 6 dozen or more at a time, often don't use the last ones till three months or so, never a dud.

 

So I doubt they've been at the store very long before I got them, including at Walmart (which doesn't get them from China, btw. the producer is on the packages in all cases regardless of where you get them).

 

My understanding of the quail situation is that we simply just don't have the habitat for them any more in general. Takes open but yet overgrown fallow land that stays that way for more than a year or two. Everything is either neatly farmed or residential or concrete any more. Just a case of too many humanoids vs unused land.

 

- OS

Edited October 1, 2013 by Oh Shoot

[Luke E.]

I love quail! best bird there is to eat imo.

I too have wondered how old store eggs are. I've heard eggs will stay good for 6 months or more refrigerated if you don't wash them.

We've been wanting chickens but there's a farm like a mile away that sells them and we've been getting them there. They have 500+ chickens. Lady that lives there said they started out and grew to that much demand over time. Heck everyone in my family buys from them now. Convenient too, just pull up to the house and the eggs are in cartons in a fridge in the garage with a bucket to leave money and a bucket with change if you need it. Wife went today and picked up 3 dozen. My kids eat a lot of eggs. I don't really like em.

Yea I forget what it is on the outside of the shells but it is really interesting how much difference it makes in shelf life.
Funny chicken egg story, back just before my wife and I got married I had gone to visit my grandparents and brought back 4 cartons of eggs. My future bride was at my place to cook stuff for a gathering we were going to later but I wasn't home yet. When I walked in the door she was getting ready to go somewhere and when I asked where she was going she replied, to go buy more eggs. I said what for, she said she kept cracking eggs and they were all bad so she tossed them. Now my wife grew up in Brentwood and had never cracked a non store bought egg so when the yolk was a darker yellow she thought they were bad. She was a bit embarrassed when I told her that's how they were supposed to be.

[jtmaze]

My FIL has 12 chickens and we collected 18 eggs in 2 days. If I am successful in breeding the quail, I might try chickens later. And yes I plan on eating them. My wife and I talked about building a flight cage if this adventure becomes successful to release into the wild. After reading several online studies, they said that there is no long term advantage to releasing. and yes farm raised eggs are 10 times better than store bought eggs.