Raising quail

[eman]

If you are doing stock to hunt you might make it but if you are stocking to try togrow coveys ,It's tough. You will have a big problem w/ fire ants .

[specktator]

Originally Posted by southern151

Not too sure I buy into that surrogator. Predators, disease and natural selection take a lot of birds out. Also, when these birds are released, they no longer have those walls to protect them.

On average, if you buy 5 week old birds that have already been in a flight pen, 2 of 5 will not survive the first night. That's because they've never been exposed to "real" elements. Those that survive the first night have a good chance of making it on the predator aspect anyway.

If you want to get and keep a quail population, more of it has to do with weather and land management than anything. I.E., extremely wet springs are hard on the broods.

Well what they say is that a bird is most vunerable to predation in the first 5 weeks of its life. so it will be in the surragator all that time. when u open it they fly out. and they say wherever a quail grew up (inside surragator) they usually stay pretty close to that area. but i dont know. i just love eating those little bastids. i might just raise some in my back yard.

[southern151]

When I was raising birds, we were tied in with Quail Unlimited. They actually donated a 500 egg incubator to us. Go check out their website and see if they have anything to offer in this field. I don't know if they do or not.

They shared a great deal of study material with us. One of the biggest things that was hurting us up there was the way the land was farmed and harvested. They had pointed out that harvesting isn't an issue but leaving a strip of 75 ft or so on the outer edges is tremendous help...Normally along fence or tree lines. They have a lot to offer and may be of great assistance to you.

[BananaTom]

Originally Posted by Suthrngntlmn

Pharoah quail produce well and give a fair amount of meat and eggs and you don't need any wildlife permits for them. They're really not that hard to raise, just got to keep a light on them at night when they are small so they don't bunch up and smother.

A good friend of mine is doing just that, as she posted on the below link.

http://www.gulfcoastfishingconnectio...-Pharaoh-Quail

[Gerald]

Originally Posted by southern151

When I was raising birds, we were tied in with Quail Unlimited. They actually donated a 500 egg incubator to us. Go check out their website and see if they have anything to offer in this field. I don't know if they do or not.

They shared a great deal of study material with us. One of the biggest things that was hurting us up there was the way the land was farmed and harvested. They had pointed out that harvesting isn't an issue but leaving a strip of 75 ft or so on the outer edges is tremendous help...Normally along fence or tree lines. They have a lot to offer and may be of great assistance to you.

My Grand Dad did this on his "cattle/sheep" farm in Missouri. He always had Quail. One year he had a covey of about 60 birds. It was a really cool site to drive the dirt road and jump up those birds.

Burning the under brush in the woods is also a big help to the Quail population.

The extra stip of "cover" was good for the rabbits too. I could always walk the fence lines and find a few rabbits out in the edge of the pastures. When they ran back for the cover......they usually made the mistake of stopping at the fence.

[Wag]

Originally Posted by specktator

Well what they say is that a bird is most vunerable to predation in the first 5 weeks of its life. so it will be in the surragator all that time. when u open it they fly out. and they say wherever a quail grew up (inside surragator) they usually stay pretty close to that area. but i dont know. i just love eating those little bastids. i might just raise some in my back yard.

I think it will work specktator...I use to have bird dogs and hunted quail alot, and I think the surragator is the new way to go to try and establish coveys on your land.....the most important part for the quail after release is food, water, cover.....without those elements it won't work...provide it and your changes are better....

[Shawn Braquet]

confused...how would burning underbrush help? kill ants?

[Gerald]

Originally Posted by Shawn Braquet

confused...how would burning underbrush help? kill ants?

Burning has nothing to do with killing ants.....that I know of. If burning helped.....my yard would have a bunch of "black" spots to kill the ants.

Burning helps to promote new growth and keeps the land/ground more "open" so the Quail can feed easier on bugs and seeds.

I have heard that when the "Forest companies" stopped burning the woods [~ 20+ years ago], this was the start of decline of the Quail population in Louisiana.

[Wag]

Originally Posted by Shawn Braquet

confused...how would burning underbrush help? kill ants?

Prescribed burning is the best and cheapest tool in quail management....it doesn't kill ants, but it allows dormant seeds to germinate and produce food for game birds