Silkie with quail?

[quail gggggggggg]

I am wondering If I can introduce a female silkie into the coturnix quail flock. I have 10 quail in an 8x8 pen on the ground, and want to add a female silkie to hatch out quail eggs. Can I do this? Thanks!

 

[JaeG]

Silkie are not suitable for hatching quail because of their feathers. Quail chicks will push and climb right up into her feathers under her wings, become entangled and potentially strangle themselves in those long, fluffy feathers. Chickens also don't recognise quail eggs as eggs so you have to trick them by adding chicken eggs as well (I have used an Old English Game Bantam to hatch quail before). I've read of people using Serama Bantams as quail hatchers as well. You need a hen that's small with hard feathering that quail can't tangle themselves up in.

It's generally not a good idea to mix chickens and quail because of certain diseases, especially Coryza (I'm lucky enough not to have that in my country). Chickens can carry diseases that they have a certain amount of immunity to but quail, being less domesticated, do not. So it's just a risk you need to weigh up for yourself.

Hatching them around the adult quail may not be a good idea either as the adult quail will not understand what they are and could attack them. Quail chicks are best brooded by humans too because they are high maintenance and a chicken hen wants to get up and scratch around often which is fine for chicken chicks, but for the first week, quail babies just want to eat and cuddle. A hen also doesn't understand that they need to go and find a quail chick that's too cold to make it back to her. In a natural setting the male and female quail work together to keep their babies safe (I've watched many Button quail families raising little ones). The hen keeps the majority of the chicks warm while the father will go and find stragglers, warming them up before returning them to the group.

Quail are very easy to hatch in incubators. My incubator is just a cheap one but I've had many successful quail hatches.