Sunday, October 28, 2012

Winter Project Phase 2

It's getting cold!
And every time it rained, water got inside the quail green house which made the floor damp. This wasn't ideal!! We can't have damp quail house! 

So we got a big sheet of plastic and covered the whole floor. We then put a couple of polystyrene boards on top of it for extra insulation, and covered it with a generous amount of saw dust and straw. There is NO WAY the water should get in. 

 

The qrazy quail have 2  polystyrene boxes as houses, which they seem to use for egg laying. 

We got them an early Christmas tree and other shrubs. Hopefully this will improve the "micro climate" inside the house. (As long as they don't trash the plants!).

After we put the polystyrene houses in, I started hearing a loud hammering noise. I assumed it was our neighbour working in the garden or something. One day I spotted Zebedee pecking on the wall of the polystyrene houses!!!! She even looked like she was EATING the polystyrene!!!!!!!!!!!
NOT GOOD!

So far everyone seems quite happy, and I haven't seen any abnormal droppings, so I'm hoping it's all ok. To prevent this, I strapped some cuttlefish bones onto the wall. They always had them in the house but they never took any interest in pecking them, but now, they LOVE IT!!! I now hear the hammering noise, and that's the quail, pecking on the cuttlefish bones. Problem solved. 

Warm & dry house = happy quail. 

Even though the days are getting shorter, we are getting 4 eggs a day. We would like them to stop laying soon, so they can have a rest and live longer....


Tuesday, September 25, 2012

Winter Project Phase 1

Side of the greenhouse is now covered up with a sheet of plastic. Now the house is completely wind-proof.
We also put a polystyrene box inside of their hutch to make it cosier. They weren't sure about this white block to begin with, but they quickly got used to it and now most of them lay eggs in it. Hope they can suss out that it's warm inside too.


Another thing we added to the house, is STRAW. Why didn't we give this magical bedding material to them earlier......THEY LOVE IT!!!!!!

They spend ages digging and foraging. We scatter mealworms in this, and they LOVE IT! 

Hope this gives them extra warmth. They certainly look very happy in there. I suppose it's not TOO cold yet. See how we get on when it's frosty / snowy...We got a couple more polystyrene boxes, just in case...


Thursday, September 13, 2012

All fine and lovely

Hello Qrazy Quail fans. Sorry I haven't been very active in blogging lately. The thing is......all the quail are getting on very well and it's ever so peaceful. So this post is all about how well they are doing in their semi-greenhouse mansion.

Even though there is no fighting going on, they have 2 of everything, in case one doesn't feel comfortable around the others, etc. 2 food bowls, 2 water bowls, and 2 sand-bath areas.
They love swimming in the dry sand. They have it everyday, often around mid-day.


Another thing they love, is pots of plants. Every time I go to a garden centre, I see a nice plant and think "oh, the quail would love that!!".....They like to dig and dig, until roots are exposed. They also like to peck all the leaves until it's only a pot of soil, which they like to then dig. I have to rescue the plants and give them recovery time sometimes. Our cat, Rebel likes to rub herself on to those pots for some reason, so everyone is happy. 

This is Rebel and parsleys that are recovering. Next to those is a black currant bush, also on the recovery programme.

The qrazy quail like the big pot of lavender too. They go up the ramp to the top of their "hutch" and dive bomb into the middle of lavender!! SUCH a funny thing to watch! As a result, the nice bushy lavender has a big hole in the middle. I moved it away from the hutch, so now the quail just hop onto it. I saw one of them fly from the big lavender to the small lavender (the one with purple pot...next to Stevie). 

Find Zebedee!

One quail lays one egg. Sometimes all 4 in a plant pot. Sometimes one in the hutch and 3 everywhere else....When we go in to the house to collect eggs, we shake a bottle of mealworm as we go in. They always gather around to the front when they see us and tap on the glass qrazily. They are so tame but that means they won't move away from our feet. The bottle of mealworm is like a "quail magnet". We can move them to wherever we want them to go. 

Some people ask me how I can tell who is who. I carefully chose the following photos which show their different faces very well. 
Ermentrude. Easy-going quail. The line on her head is missing in the middle.

Dougal. Slick quail. She really is "slick" and beautiful.

Rusty. The boss quail. She's bigger than everyone else. One of her toes is missing too. 

Zebedee! The smallest quail, with permanently sticking out hair. Compared with others (especially Dougal) you can tell how different she looks.....can't you???

Anyway, all is well. We are now thinking about how we can keep them warm during winter. Bringing them in to the house is an option, but this might make them "soft" which can't be a good thing. They are wild birds, after all.....

We'll keep you posted with this Winter Project!

Tuesday, August 7, 2012

The judgement day

So Rusty was released into the main house, so did Stevie the decoy quail.

Keeping her peaceful eyes on the others....

I didn't think at the time I was making Stevie, but she's a lot smaller than the others...

Zebedee and Newbie Stevie



Well there was a little bit of pecking - Zebedee pecking Rusty, but not as nasty as before, and Rusty didn't run away like she did before...in fact, she was casually fighting back. No screaming or flapping, just some peck occasionally. 

Stevie, what a saviour! (I'M SURE SHE'S THE KEY TO THIS PEACE). 


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Dougal had a bit of accident today, and she fell into a gap between the house and the hutch - she might have been stuck there for good 30mins or so!! Poor Dougal....She's a bit traumatised, I think. She laid an egg immediately after being rescued, and now her bum looks sore. She still runs for mealworms etc, but something is still not quite right. She's a bit puffed up and keeps sitting down. Hope nothing was damaged....I should have thought about the risk and I feel really bad. Now the gap is sealed.......

Sunday, August 5, 2012

Decoy Mission!

The new greenhouse was built (with some windows changed to wire net) for all four quail to live happily. 

Zebedee was being picked on by Dougal and Rusty before. When we put all of them back into the new house, Zebedee decided to get her own back and started attacking Dougal and Rusty really nastily! The  two were running and flying everywhere in the house, trying to get away from Zebedee's vicious peck! (Meanwhile Ermantrude was busy chasing a fly). 

This just didn't look good. We put 2 bowls of food and 2 bowls of water, but no use. Zebedee went out of her way to get those ex-bullies! 

Oh...... dear.............

So the cage had to be used again. Zebedee was kept in the cage, inside of the greenhouse! 
The house was peaceful once Zebedee was in the cage. They can still see each other so HOPEFULLY no pecking will go on after a week or so.



Zebedee was released into the main house after a week. She didn't attack anyone. Dougal didn't seem bothered about Zebedee. 

Peace, finally! 




....Oh no, Rusty didn't like her return, so decided to peck her!

WHY QUAIL WHY! 
This is the crazy world of quail (maybe other birds too?). Maybe we should let them peck on each other and decide who is the boss in this very very small flock.  But one thing we don't want is them killing each other! 
Let's try once more - Rusty, we have to keep you in the cage this time!

AND THIS TIME....... I have a new plan. 
A lump of air-dry clay

Shape it into a quail shape


Paint it like a quail!

This is my Qrazy Quail Decoy Mission!!! 
When we release Rusty into the main house, I'm going to release this Decoy Quail, Stevie. 
I hope that my artistic skill is good enough for quail's eyes too. They can peck this newbie Stevie as much as they want! Please, just not each other!!!!!!

Let's see what happens. 
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Friday, August 3, 2012

Pecking order!

Zebedee's wound got better after a few days so we popped her back in the run... We were warned by our friend who has experience with chickens, that other quail might pick on Zebedee after being out of their sight. 

Ok, as soon as she went back in, Dougal and Rusty went for Zebedee! It was horrible to watch as those two were darting around the run to get her. Zebedee looked really worried and she kept hiding behind and on top of pots. She also started flapping (jumping vertically, like quail do), which made us think that this was maybe already happening and she ended up banging her lump on the ceiling. 

Ermentrude didn't seem bothered either way. She gets on with everyone. What a good natured quail!

So.............................Dougal and Rusty ended up in a cage. 
Not impressed!

The cage was placed right by the run, so they could still see each other.

Meanwhile, we ordered a small greenhouse. Not for vegetables, but for those qrazy quail. 
A new house, a new start, everyone will be happy. 

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After a few weeks, the greenhouse arrived. 
Firstly we moved Zebedee and Ermantrude out of the run. Then we quickly half dismantled and moved the run and hutch onto other area. Everyone was then put into the run while we constructed the greenhouse. 


Everyone seemed pretty excited to be in a different environment with a red currant bush in the middle of their run. They went mad!!! Ate the leaves, run between the twigs......they were happy in there!
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Guess what though.


Tuesday, July 31, 2012

The beginning

 In our garden there is a space which cannot be used for anything. The house had an extension in the past and designed it decided to leave a 130x130cm of open area. 

We always wanted (still do) some chickens but we need a lot bigger garden for them to have a good mooch etc....and this is what we thought;

"Quail are smaller than chickens....a LOT smaller, in fact. Let's get some quail!!!"


So we got an old hutch from our friendly rabbit, Bruce, and built a run. 

We've done a bit of research on how to keep quail - apparently they don't like damp. 



Well the UK weather has been awful this summer, so we had to postpone getting the quail and somehow waterproof the run and the hutch. 
We got a huge piece of plastic sheet which got pinned onto the old wooden window frame to the wall on the other side. Gaffertaped the bits that leaked... We collected BUCKETS and BUCKETS of rainwater too. 

Anyway, we went to a quail supplier in Leicestershire, and here they are!

 
Dougal

 
Mr Rusty

 
Zebedee

 
Ermentrude

We got them when they were 6-7 weeks old, but Zebedee seemed a lot smaller than the rest of the crew. This kind of became an issue later on...........


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The more you interact with them the quicker they get used to you...

This is Zebedee. I noticed that she always had a feather sticking out on her head. 

And then noticed that some of them have a lump on their nostril (you can see one in the photo above)....... A few days later, Zebedee's lump got bigger and started bleeding a bit. We put "quail nose lump" type of words on google and didn't find anything about it. Found some photos of quail which had lumps on the nose, but the owner of those quail didn't seem to ever find the cause or solutions. 

So we took Zebedee to the vet which has one of the best avian specialists in the country. The first thing he did was to rip the scab off Zebedee's nose!!!!!!!!!!! Blood was everywhere and I nearly fainted. His suggestion was this.....

When quail are pecking on the food off this kind of feeder, their nose might be banging on the ledge of the plastic! Zebedee did spend a long time eating compared to the others...
As for the wound on her nose, the vet suggested that we put Savlon on her twice a day. 

We kept Zebedee in the separate box while her wound was healing. I even went to buy a hot water bottle for her, in the middle of cold/wet summer!

The real problem started then....................

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