California Quail

[Jayburd]

in the walk in aviary where I work it is not uncommon to find a few californian chicks walking around after the king quail and their chicks - the californians have become parasitic there.

[Tintola]

Many Cali's don't go clucky or even make a nest as too many generations have been artificially incubated, therefore unintentionally selecting a population that don't parent rear. The same thing has happened with some Japanese quail strains and many other species mass produced in incubators. The instinct to sit and brood can sometimes be rekindled by providing a more natural environment with plenty of long grass clumps and low bushes for the hen to select a private site to lay.
The young ones are very insectivorous in the first few weeks after hatching.
Hope this helps.

[Myzomela]

So true Tintola,

I recently posed this question on a poultry website regarding peafowl, calies and others and was met with derision.
After explaining further that for common species breeding large numbers of offspring may not be as important as breeding for natural behaviours, some reluctantly agreed ie wouldn't it be nice to have a peahen lay, brood and rear her own chicks? How much more enjoyable than just setting eggs into an incubator- I swear they thought I was mad.

If we breed the interesting behaviours out of our birds, then why bother keeping them at all???

[Buzzard-1]

To many people are driven by the mighty $$. I Incubate and set my ornamentals, no one has ever asked me if the pheasant were parent raised. The fist eggs go in the Incubator and the later eggs are dated and left sometimes they will go broody with mixed success most the time they just don't.

[jusdeb]

Maybe instead of shooting the California Quail on King Island they should be catching them and using them to breed ...no worries about them not raising their young , they are prolific breeders there.

[E Orix]

Wild caught Bul Buls will breed quite well in captivity.The problem is that a number of the birds that are trapped are fed seed.
They eat it but most of it goes through them as they have no crop(softbill) If they are fed on seed and do survive their digestive system is US.
If caught fed properly and calmed down they will breed but prepared for a huge requirement for livefood and the soft type fruits.
They were once referred to as the poor mans Cardinal. The you are quite cute sitting in a line with their tiny crests

[toothlessjaws]

do many members keep californians?

i have a pair. i bought them at a bird sale almost a year ago for a friend and he never picked them up. i figured i'd keep them so long as they don't stress the finches or stop them breeding. they are surprisingly docile birds. they never to show aggression and the finches have lost any fear of them. they are flighty however and like plenty of cover. i'd really bugs me when the cock takes flight around the aviary, if i unwillingly block him into a corner when i'm feeding seed etc.i have been concerned about the roosting and damaging finch nests but they seem to prefer cover over being high in the roost. with the current setup they seem to be sleeping in a nest they have constructed in a large clump of foxtail grass thats growing in one corner. no eggs yet as far as i can tell.

anyhow, i'd love to know others thoughts on keeping them in a breeding avairy.

overall i'm probably 50/50 on them. the cock is a beautiful bird. but they are comparatively messy and the flightyness bugs me.

[Trilobite]

G'day All,
I have now kept Cals for 2 years after getting two young pair of an old fella that said that they were naturally bred. They did indeed turn out to be two pairs and within the year they went down and made a nest and laid heaps of eggs in 2 separate batches. Sadly this female had a prolapse as a result of this (amongst other things) and died, nothing the vet could do apart from surgery - no garantee. Anyway the male who had pair bonded with her sang out for days and went off his food and subsequently died. The remaining pair laid a nest in one of the brush columns for finch breeding and deposited 17 eggs, which she subsequently sat on and incubated. Unfortunately she scrapped away the material so much she had the eggs on the wire bottom and I think they chilled. I removed them and inspected the contents - all clear except for 4 which had matured and pipped but had died. So not to give up she went back to laying within 10 days ish and then laid another 13 eggs and I removed them and placed November grass on the bottom and made a depression into which I replaced the eggs. She sat again and after a while hatched 10 chicks (one got sqaushed) and the other 9 followed mum and leaped out and survived the plumit. After two days the chicks were very mobile and stable on thier feet at which point mum's instinct took over and she became very protective. At this point anything that was ground dwelling was dispatched by her and the dad with extreme precission. So after removing all ground stock (king quails cowerng up on the branches in an effort to get away, finches however were ignored when feeding on the ground) she proceeded to raise 9 chick to semi adulthood. I removed the matured chick hoping she may have gone back on the nest but suspect the cool weather prevented this. The semi matured young were raised separately. All doing well.
So I despite this I think this is a sucess given people's propensity to incubate them to get a return quickly. Our aviary is planted, earthen floors, and covered by 1/3 roof. Each pair has 25 square meters of floor space.
I hope this encourages people to source naturally breed birds and give them suitable conditions to do what I think is still in their insticts and only needs to be stimulated by giving them the right conditions.
Either way they are a striking birds and an assest to any large aviary.
Cheers
Trilobite

[thehammer]

I kept Californian Quail about 10 or 12 years ago. They were the flightiest quail I have ever kept. Mine wouldn’t incubate the eggs. Aviary size was 6 x 1.5 metres. I don’t think I would keep them again as I can think of better species to keep if I had the space.

You can still pick them up at a good price of $60 for a young pair…$120 plus seems silly to me which is what they seem to commonly go for.

[Trilobite]

In relation to the flightiness of the birds they are when cornered, as per any other bird. As the aviaries I have are on the larger side and well planted most of the time they scurry away without taking flight. As to comments on the crushing of nests they will do that again if not given suitable places to roost. I have a few very sparsely made brush columns made of ring lock fencing wire and put a layer of mesh at every second layer. They will happily roost in the sparely made brush columns rather then the heavily brushed columns. As they are a largish bird and are good flyers, they are more for a larger aviary rather then smaller ones commonly used for finches. However the joy of watching the parents raise young so efficiently as well as havingthe male in the avairyis worth it. Apart from the weavers (when in color) they are the second most bird upon which I am asked what is ( male of course). Worth having in a big aviary, but if you have a smallish avairy (900mm-1.2m wide) you may well be disappointed as they need space to get around you.
Cheers
Trilobite