The three most important things for quail chicks are warmth, feed, and water. For warmth, you need to make a "brooder box", heated with a light bulb, which should warm the area directly below the bulb from 90 F to 80 F till the baby chicks are fully feathered. You can use one of those cheap clip on aluminum lamps, and a 10 gallon tank found at most pet stores and Wal-Mart for under $12. Put a screen top over the tank and place the light right on top to keep the chicks from jumping out. Line the bottom of the box with good quality paper towels (not the cheap, smooth kind). If you use several layers at once, it's easy to clean the brooder by just removing the top layer. The paper towels will provide traction for the chicks' developing legs, but if you find that they are still slipping, you can line the bottom with terry-cloth toweling or rubberized shelf-liner. If the baby birds legs slip alot they will grow to the side, known as straddle leg.

Food must be of a sort that they can eat easily; seeds are not appropriate this early on. Non-medicated game bird starter is best, you can find this at feed store and pet stores as well as eBay. As an alternative, at your local pet store, you should be able to get something like "Kaytee" or "Neonate" hand feeding formula. (about 22% protein). This is a brown, powdery substance that you simply sprinkle, *dry* (not moistened as the instructions say) on the paper towel. They'll gobble it up. You may want to supplement this with some hardboiled egg as well. Not only is it rich in protein, it also contains many nutrients that are important for growing chicks. Hard boil a regular chicken egg. Remove the shell, and mash the egg very finely. Put a bit of it on the paper towel with the hand feeding formula, and tap your fingernail in it until they get the idea that this is "eating". It shouldn't take them long to catch on at all. Just put a bit of the egg in at a time, as it spoils quickly. You can keep the rest of the egg in a little container in the fridge and use it as you need it. Make sure they cannot get wet in their water dispenser. Many people use a shallow jar lid, and put aquarium stones in it so the chicks can drink around the stones but not climb (or fall) in. I prefer a tube type waterier, that has a very small reservoir at the bottom; they can dip their beaks in, but won't get wet. They are highly subject to hypothermia and drowning at this young age, so this part is important.

Lastly, don't introduce chicks to adults (even hens) if the chicks were hatched in an incubator. Adults see them as intruders and will very often attack and kill them. I've successfully raised a number of chicks this way, so I hope the information is of some help to you as well.

Please hold your chicks daily and do not group them more then two at a time unless you breed them, as pets they need lots of attention. once they are over 2 inches i would introduce them to a parakeet flight cage. there they can live as adults. Do not free these birds, they are hybrid quails and not wild quails they will die. They are non-flying birds and can only fly in bursts about 10 feet max.

Please email or call with any questions, The chicks are healthy when we adopt them out, They are not Guaranteed, but if your baby chick dies, we are willing to replace them one time if they die within a week from adopted date if we have the type of chick on hand.

However we must sit down and find the cause so the chick is going into a healthy home, if your chick dies again we will not adopt even paid adoptions to the buyer.