Keeping Quail as indoor pets??

[cornsmack]

Hello all, first post here, so sorry if this question has been asked.

I am a first time quail owner, previously i have raised chickens, ducks, geese, pheasants, as pets so familiar with "poultry"

However, I have a question trying to raise quails indoors, specifically in an apartment.

I am an American living in Beijing, China, on the 25th floor of an apt complex. Four days ago, I was getting out of the subway and there was a man with a bucket, and a group of kids, and i could hear "screeching" and I noticed he was selling newly hatched baby quails (most likely Japanese quails) as toys for kids. Essentially, parents buy the quail chicks, they play with them for a few days and the quails die. (China is not famous for animal rights) The man even told me if I bought one I shouldn't bother to feed them because they "weren't meant to live"

I bought two of the quails to keep them from being tortured to death, and assumed they would die, but using my experience raising chicken chicks, managed to bring them a healthy state.

I have been handling the chicks everyday. One is very friendly and loves being held and patted, the other is skittish and probably will never be tame enough to handle. Though my goal is hopefully will be tame enough to be not afraid of me. One of the quails also has slightly curled outer toes (though no problem walking) which I am hoping to heal through vitamin B2 increase but appears to be genetic

Now my question is this, assuming both of these quails survive (they were in bad state when i got them but seem to be doing better) what can I do to help them be happy in my apartment?

Specially any suggestions about cages, housing, food, other things to help quail happiness

As I live in Beijing China, letting them out will never be an option. (They will literally die) and I limited in the supplies i can get. Even finding chicken feed has been difficult and mostly I have been using online research to create homemade "quail feed" Most people here raise poultry on bread and hope for the best

Also any other suggestion for raising quail will be super helpful, especially in trying to maintain there happiness and health. These birds will be raised as pets and hopefully live a long time.

As i mentioned before I have experience raising many breeds of chickens as pets (including bantams, americanas, phoenixes, naked necks, brahmas) ducks (mallards and pekins) and pheasants (Golden and Lady Amherst's) but I understand raising quails is different (also this was in the USA and I had a yard and aviary) I also have a background in ornithology and love birds in general

Thank your for reading all this and looking for any suggestions, experiences, that will help me heal and recover these two chicks and help them live long and healthy lives

 

[Poultrybreeder]

What you could do is get a very large dog kennel, and use that is your cage, you could put cardboard down so that they don't have to walk on the wire, you could let them out of the cage when you are home, to run around in your apartment if possible. And for fun, you could hang little treats from the roof of the cage for them to peck at and play with.

 

[Tony K T]

It's never good to raise birds inside your house.Bird dander is very harmful to humans,along with chit odors and feed spilage.Plus they always seems to kick their bedding around.You would constantly be vacuuming up their messes.Raise them outside where they are healthier and it's healthier for you also.
In N.H.,Tony.

 

[Floof]

Hi! Good job rescuing those chicks and trying to do the right thing. I don't have any suggestions for feed because I've always bought a crumble and never tried my hand at home made but I have a suggestion for keeping them indoors. I've been hatching and rotating birds into a converted dresser cage when they're ready to come out of the brooder but not yet ready to go outside. I got a dresser for free from someone moving and removed the drawers, lined it with adhesive shelf liner (for easy cleaning), and added a piece of wood at the bottom to create a ledge to keep their shavings from falling out of the cage. I had a hard time with creating a door so that I could see them but they couldn't escape. I originally tried glass but found that it held to much humidity in their enclosure and I switched to a decorative metal screen I got from the hardware store. If you could find someone giving away a small cabinet with glass doors you could remove the glass panels and staple screen (like for windows) and that would work really well. I've also heard of people just keeping them in a Guinea pig or rabbit cage.

As far as dander goes, I find my quail produce much less dust than my chickens.

 

[Floof]

It's never good to raise birds inside your house.Bird dander is very harmful to humans,along with chit odors and feed spilage.Plus they always seems to kick their bedding around.You would constantly be vacuuming up their messes.Raise them outside where they are healthier and it's healthier for you also.
In N.H.,Tony.

It sounds like OP doesn't have an outside space available as they live in an apartment. In this case, it will be sort of like keeping a finch or parakeet. People keep those as indoor pets with no problems.

 

[cornsmack]

It's never good to raise birds inside your house.Bird dander is very harmful to humans,along with chit odors and feed spilage.Plus they always seems to kick their bedding around.You would constantly be vacuuming up their messes.Raise them outside where they are healthier and it's healthier for you also.
In N.H.,Tony.

Hi I agree with you. Unfortunately, I dont have a choice and I do have to keep them in doors. Like I said I live in the 25th floor of an apt in Beijing, China. That being said. I do try to keep their are super clean and always vacuum after everything

 

[cornsmack]

Hi! Good job rescuing those chicks and trying to do the right thing. I don't have any suggestions for feed because I've always bought a crumble and never tried my hand at home made but I have a suggestion for keeping them indoors. I've been hatching and rotating birds into a converted dresser cage when they're ready to come out of the brooder but not yet ready to go outside. I got a dresser for free from someone moving and removed the drawers, lined it with adhesive shelf liner (for easy cleaning), and added a piece of wood at the bottom to create a ledge to keep their shavings from falling out of the cage. I had a hard time with creating a door so that I could see them but they couldn't escape. I originally tried glass but found that it held to much humidity in their enclosure and I switched to a decorative metal screen I got from the hardware store. If you could find someone giving away a small cabinet with glass doors you could remove the glass panels and staple screen (like for windows) and that would work really well. I've also heard of people just keeping them in a Guinea pig or rabbit cage.

As far as dander goes, I find my quail produce much less dust than my chickens.

Thank you for your suggestion, old furniture is actually pretty easy to find, considering that everything is "Made in China" I think converting something might actually give them more space

 

[Binki]

Hello, here are some pics of my indoor quail (one is setup in the garage) - that's so terribly cruel... I have seen pictures of the brightly dyed chicken chicks that are put into bags and sold for kids to play with until they die -_- like really - who raised these people to be okay with torturing a fragile tiny animal. Disgusting.

Anyways, I have a group of three pet quail indoors, you can use soft hay (not the hard sharp ends kind), wood shavings or sand as substrate. You could even get some dried glass clippings from a lawnmower if they didn't use pesticides.

When they flap or bathe in their substrate or sand box (they LOVE flapping around in sand!) it will make the room more dusty and yes you will have to vacuum/dust more often

If you have a balcony you can house them out there, someone did that over the winter even in Montreal, Canada, I think he had a heated spot for them out there but apparently they hardly used it.

I use a rabbit cage, Living World XL to be exact I put overlapping newspaper at the bottom and use wood shavings, can get a huge bag of them for only several dollars at the Tractor Supply Store. I don't know what the equivalent would be for where you are? Can you buy bales of hay for a few dollars? Maybe a big tote box to store it in?

I would recommend finding local quail breeders and asking them what they feed their birds - maybe they know how you can source some proper game bird feed with a protein percentage of at least 25 percent for growing quail chicks - they must use something??

In their sandbox, you can hide some seed like finch seed mix in it and put their grit and crushed oystershell grit in there to give them somethings to do - quail are a pleasure to have around - see if the snuggly one will slip it's head up into your loose sleeve.... All they want to do is snuggle in more, straining on their tippy toes xD!

 

[Binki]

Oh another idea for protein supplementation is growing your own mealworms

 

[cornsmack]

Oh another idea for protein supplementation is growing your own mealworms

THANK YOU SO MUCH for your pictures. Your quails look so happy and friendly. I love the picture of the one in my sleeve. That seems like a such a great idea to bond wiht them, and play with them.

Unfortunately, like I said I asked all my neighborhood "quail sellers" who really don't give a shit about the animals, and they said feed them bread and a type of Chinese bun called a "mantou" I asked if that is what feed the parents and they said yes.
Currently, I am feeling them a diet of "15-20% protein chicken feed", freeze dried mealworms, millet, corn scratch, finch food, and B2 because one of the quails had slightly curved toes when i got it. I mix it all together and grind it all up in to like a powder. Do you think that is an appropriate diet? Any suggestions to add would be helpful

I am currently keeping my quails in a fish tank. It calms them down a lot more than being in a cardboard box. They would cry in a lot in the box even though the box was double the size of fish tank. I think being able to see me really helps them

Got a few more questions if you (or anyone) could help, you seem to have a lot experience
Once again, I stress I dont know what breed they are but I assume Japanese quail due this being China

1. I know now they need sand as they get older, but should i give them sand now while they are still chicks? They dig around in the sawdust a little, but it looks more like nesting behavior as opposed to cleaning behavior
2. I dont have a heat lamp now because Beijing is 95-100 C everyday, but do you think its needed during winter? Because they are indoors its always around 70-80 C inside. By then they will also (hopefully) be fully grown so is a heat lamp necessary. They are currently inside my spare bedroom and will stay there. I am just curious how tolerant they are to cold
3. Should i be worried about flying? I have read mixed messages about domesticated quail flying and to be honest I have no idea if they birds are of a domesticated or wild stock though like I said they appear friendly so probably domesticated (?) This is china, so there is also possibility of someone going to the woods and just capturing a ton of quails . If they can fly should/can I have their wings clipped?
4. Also as a follow up question, I am getting mixed messages on fast they mature. Chinese websites tell me a month, where as English websites tell me about 6-8 weeks. I am curious because I need to know how long before I should start preparing a bigger cage for them
5. As for hay, all I can get here is timothy and alfalfa hay for feeding rabbits, it comes in bags for about 5 USD each, I assume both of those hays are not a problem?

Thank you once again for all your help. Like I said in my first post, this is my first experience with quails, and the first time raising poultry indoors. I also feel that they seem so much harder to raise than chickens or pheasants

I have upload a few pictures below, I feel like they seem very healthy. But if anyone sees anything I should worried about please let me know