We started with quail adults at the end of December. It’s now the end of February – and 2 months exactly since we got our first birds.
These little Coturnix Quail are amazing creatures that we love raising, and I am glad we have chosen to do so. We are graced with an abundance of these little creatures’ eggs and have been hatching more so we can harvest the meat and have enough eggs and quail for meals for not just our family, but those of our older kids when we have enough birds in their cages. Come mid April we’ll have a decent population going to freezer camp and to do that we have to incubate them now.
This is the output of our Govee thermometer/hygrometer. We have another batch of eggs in the incubator and we decided this time to insulate the bottom of the cage with a thick layer of folded microfiber blanket and then the reclaimed denim we put on top as usual. I might have stacked stuff on top of it, but thanks to the Govee I can check on the eggs without disturbing anything. Thanks to the added insulation around the incubator I am actually far more comfortable now than before with just not disturbing the eggs as we have a consistent temp and humidity level.
We will raise the humidity to 65% when it’s time to go to lockdown – and 2 weekends from now we’ll have a bunch of new fluffy chicks that will be going into a brooder box. I’m fortunate – Gary has the skills and knowledge to build this for me, and I expect we’ll have an over 50% hatch rate due to this.
While the Quail cages will leave our greenhouse, I don’t expect that the brooder will, and it will be joining the fray in my greenhouse as soon as we get closer to the last day of frost… That’s when the quail move outside (if not before then) to their actual place they’ll be at permanently and I’ll be moving plants started in the green house over into the raised bed gardens we’ll be building this week.
So much going on in that greenhouse. So many happy, and healthy little birds. A whole lot of seeds to be starting in there this week during what we called when I lived in New England “Winter Summer.”
I’d like to think I make my grandparents happy. I know I amuse my Aunts, Uncles and older generation cousins.
Annie is a semi-retired homebirth midwife, the Director and head doula trainer for the MattieMarie Traditional Birth Studies program, and a Farmer’s granddaughter. It all ties into her mad plan to be as self-sufficient as she can while returning to her roots.