#no one wants to eat or pamper sickly livestock | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

sassyhazelowl · 8 months

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Sometimes, on the quail groups, I wonder what exact people do with their quail to get such poor results. Coturnix are not that hard to hatch and raise. They are literally the easiest bird I have on my property. If you have a decent incubator and take basic steps to ensure you have good eggs and good brooder practices, you shouldn't have low hatch rats/high chick mortality. 85-100% hatch rates are fairly easy to obtain with mature hens, good breeding ratios and proper nutrition for the breeders (aka not chicken feed). You shouldn't be having issues with DIS or failure to thrive or wryneck or clubfoot/splayed leg or crossbeak if you put any effort at all into picking and maintaining your breeders well. You shouldn't have to do a lot of hard culling after a few generations let alone 3/4ths of your hatches. Your hatch rates shouldn't be 25-30% from your own eggs.

This is not survival of the fittest - this is negligence and poor husbandry.

#look #sometimes it IS genetics and poor original breeding stock #especially in terms of aggression #but most of the time its the human #you are the problem #you're cutting corners of feed and/or hygiene #you're keeping roosters that are pretty but weak or mean #you don't understand spiral/clan breeding but also don't bother to crossbreed in new blood so your inbreeding levels are too high #your stock is too young or too old #frankly I'd bet the primary reason people have shit hatches is they feed chicken feed #which is too low on protein and too high on calcium and doesn't have the right % of amino acids #like with canaries it is super easy to get poor breeding stock with no immune system and bad genetics #they're bred to be pretty #quail should be hardy #and be bred for function #no one wants to eat or pamper sickly livestock

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