Jayburd wrote:Buzzard-1 wrote:mr.fox wrote:Is it possible to hand rear button chicks? Very fiddly I imagine
No they are easy,just a brooder or hospital cage kept at 37.5deg chicken mash and a coccidia treatment until about 3 weeks of age they raise themselves. and a very,very shallow water dish.
Can I quote 'Aviculture in Australia' by Mark Shepard ? .." the male bill feeds the young, that is, food is taken directly from the father's beak"..."Hand rearing any button quail chick is generally a difficult task, as mentioned earlier. However, #### successfully reared 2 Painted buttton quail which were kept in a brooder with a young silver King quail of similar age. In the first few days of rearing, the Painted chicks had to be forcibly fed by placing food down their beaks. Small mealworms were also given using a pair of tweazers After day 4 the young King quail appeared to be assisting the Painted chicks in teaching them to feed from the floor of the brooder. The button quail seemed to have adopted the King quail as their parent and would try to pick at its beak"
I can't say that I have tried it, but I beleive it would be a challenge getting those tiny little bubs to take food, even from tweezers and such. But there are some very clever and dedicated people out there I quess....much more clever and dedicated ( and Patient!) than myself ;)