In 2020 our family introduced quail to our homestead for the first time. Jeff was the one who was interested in raising quail, mentioning it from time to time over the years. It was an idea I didn’t give much thought to. We had always raised chickens here and I wondered why we’d want to raise quail that lay such tiny eggs when we could just raise chickens instead. Later a few friends told me about how much they loved raising quail, which made me curious to learn more about the little birds. Jeff was glad to hear I was becoming open minded to the idea. We started watching every video we could find about quail, became inspired, and definitely felt we wanted to give it a go so we decided to order some quail eggs to hatch.

I wrote a blog post last summer about our experience hatching out quail eggs. (Where I also mentioned the breeds we ordered.) Quail quickly found their way into our hearts and we were hooked. From the moment we opened the package of quail eggs we would be putting in the incubator and marveled over each perfect, tiny egg… to the the first quail chick hatched out… the feeling of a bundle of soft feathers in our hands… the amazement at how quickly those little birds grew each day… the excitement over finding the very first egg laid and cradling it carefully in our hands… to the absolute delight of getting to know the quirky personalities of each of our little bird friends. Simply put, we love raising quail. For me, from the very beginning quail gave me the feeling of “where have you been all my life?”

When I’m feeling stressed or overwhelmed, finding myself needing to decompress from a long to-do list, a hurried pace in town running errands, or from listening to the news… I head to the backyard to do my daily quail chores and I can instantly feel my stress melting away and my worries lifting. What starts out as needing to “do a chore” and get a task crossed off my list, turns into a quiet, nourishing time for my spirit. I make sure all the birds have water, visit them, and talk to them. Every time I give them fresh bedding, I just love watching them nestle into the wood shavings. They sing to us when they see us nearby, and every single time they sing to me when I go to feed them it just makes me smile and delights me to no end. It never grows old. (The girls have a gentle cooing, that is the most soothing sound. I love the sound the boys make too, but wouldn’t describe it as soothing, more of a trilling sound.)

I’m not the only one who adores the quail, Jeff and B adore them too. The three of us always want to have quail on our homestead now. I wanted to share some of our favorite quail friends with you. I have many adorable, blurry pictures of the quail we adore… I picked out a few of the best, clear photos to share with you.

This is Grandmother. She is such a love. She is very curious and likes to come look at us when we visit her. I love when she tilts her head to one side to look up at us. There is something sweet and wise about her presence, which inspired us to name her Grandmother. (She is my favorite.) I love her coloring, she blends right in with the forest. Sometimes, if we’re lucky, she lets us pet her and we gently stroke her back until she moves away.

This is our very handsome, and favorite boy, Berbachan. B named him, the sound he makes sounds like he is saying “Berbachan!” Golden body, brown speckled head, his feathers are so beautiful. He watches over his ladies. We tried raising a few quail in the greenhouse for awhile (it didn’t work out, but was a fun experiment) and Jeff fed Berbachan treats and got him pretty tame, he would come over to us to get something good to eat.

This is Trooper. This is B’s special bird because he saved her when she was a chick. If you look it up, everywhere says not to interfere if a bird doesn’t hatch out of their shell properly or all the way. Well, Trooper had mostly hatched out and we waited for her to finish, but it didn’t happen. B carefully removed the rest of the shell from her legs. She didn’t walk right in the beginning and didn’t look like the other birds, but slowly over time she caught up with the rest and her legs healed and she was able to walk normally. Jeff had the idea to name her Trooper, she just kept getting up and going no matter how hard it was to get around. B says her coloring is one of his favorites of all the quail. Also, she is Berbachan’s main lady.

This is Princess Frou Frou. She has quite a hilarious personality. She lived with Berbachan and Trooper for awhile, and then we tried having her live with another group of quail. She didn’t get along with anyone. She was very territorial, very fussy, and would spend all day chasing everyone away. She was very high maintenance and somehow the name Princess Frou Frou came to us and just seemed to fit her perfectly. In the picture above, with B holding her with his gardening gloves, she is full size (I wanted to give you a reference for how big they are.)

One day we had a quail get injured and had to separate her from the rest. Her beak was hurt and we ended up calling her Beaky. We decided to try putting Beaky and Frou Frou in a pen together. They ended up being best friends and they still live peacefully together. Beaky is the only other quail Princess Frou Frou has ever liked. It was really amazing to suddenly see her become calm, and not in a state of high strung frenzy. Since then, we’ve tried moving around other quail to find well suited matches for roommates as well.

There are many other quail friends we love who are not pictured here, and I told B I would dedicate this post to them all. So here are a few others to mention: Sugar Maple (with the most beautiful, warm coloring with a reddish hue), Obsidian (with the most soulful, deep colored eyes), Owl and Hawk (the boys whose coloring reminded us of an owl and a hawk), Ms. Beak (not to be confused with Beaky, Ms. Beak had a super long beak that we had to carefully trim, which can happen sometimes), Sunflower and Marigold (sisters, both golden in color), Killer (the quail who made Princess Frou Frou look laid back in comparison), Brownie and Spot (two sweet girls who are buddies), and last but not least- Speckles (who looks like Frou Frou’s twin sister, and lives with Grandmother and Sunflower.)

I’ve been asked so often about raising quail, and feel inspired to share my love of quail with you all. I hope you enjoyed today’s introduction to our feathered friends. Next up- health benefits of quail eggs, and the pros and cons of raising quail.