Quail? Anyone?

We have discussed ducks and chickens. Have we discussed quail?

Does anyone on here raise them for eggs and meat? 

They look interesting. They also look like they might be less work and take up less space than chickens. 

Thoughts?

ShawnG used to keep quail and posted about it a little bit in his farmstead thread. https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/off-topic-discussion/pulling-the-ripcord-major-life-change/195115/page11/

I haven't gone much farther than looking at them. I do have a spare coop on the property, but I'm not sure if the tiny eggs would be worth it versus bigger birds.

In reply to RevRico :

The eggs are apparently 3-1 quail to chickens. 

These are suppose to help with cracking them. 

It's really hard to beat the egg laying power of a few Rhode Island Reds or Leghorns, +300 XL eggs a year per bird.  If I had to start over on my flock I'd just get 5 or 6 Rhode Island Reds and not worry about chasing the pretty blue and green eggs. 

Toyman! said:

In reply to RevRico :

The eggs are apparently 3-1 quail to chickens. 

...

That means you have to buy/own/feed/ house 3 Quail Hens to every 1 Chicken Hen.  Or More.

As RT Ron pointed out, the above (3 to 1) ratio only works out IF the quail hens lay as frequently as the chickens.  I doubt it.

In reply to Indy - Guy :

From what I've read quail average 300 eggs a year and chickens average 250. 

They also start laying at 6 to 8 weeks old where chicken start at 18 weeks. 

I also have a space consideration.  A dozen quail don't take up much space. 

We have many quail on our property. We don't eat them, we just enjoy watching them forget they're birds and walking everywhere with their funny hats. 

This thread isn't about the decoy drone I wanted.

I have one quail left. He's in with the chickens.

Can't convince anyone out here to eat quail eggs. They are actually dumber than chickens which is pretty incredible. 

You can free range them. Once.

I won't bother with them again.

We have purebred Barred Rock chickens now. Good dual purpose birds that lay nice big brown eggs.

Even the roosters are docile. I only had one that tried to attack me and a size 13 attitude adjustment put a stop to that.

My wife was very interested in them but after looking into it, we didn't get them.

Quail eggs are very tasty 

And here I thought this was going to be a thread asking who all would be attending The Quail, a Motorsports Gathering at Monterey this year.

Since we're talking about birds with funny hats, how about a bird with cool eyebrows and a funny call, the Willow Ptarmigan:

(My apologies for the temporary thread derailment)

I personally love quail eggs. They are great for small snacks with cheese and crackers. Plus, I recently tried a cocktail that had quail egg foam instead of regular egg foam, and it had a really nice texture and while it had a slightly different taste than regular eggs, in my opinion, it was better.