If you follow me over on Instagram, you’ll know Gareth and I recently took our first venture in to hatching and raising button quail chicks. (And if you don’t follow me, do so and please make sure to say hi so I know to follow you back! I’m @yasminedaisy)
I have never hatched a bird in an incubator before, although as I keep a large quantity of birds I have experience of my own birds hatching out chicks. For the most part though, you just leave them to it – asides from providing them a nest, some material and maybe some egg crumb, they’ll do the rest.
Anyway, we have a very broody button quail (Sugarpuff) – her and her partner (Popcorn) were adamant on having chicks. Sugarpuff was so dedicated to the cause that she sat on a nest for months. Alas she was only ever able to hatch one chick and it died soon after birth. So we thought we’d step in and give hatching chicks a go ourselves. Here’s how we did it and what we discovered along the way…
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