Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
green salad, or serve them as petite appetizers with spicy greens, herbed mayonnaise,
and crackers.
Meat and Eggs
If you take care of them, quail will reward you with fast growth, and at roughly five
weeks, a reliable cache of eggs from the females and a tasty meat meal of the extra
cocks.
Although the eggs are small — it takes about three to equal a small bantam egg —
they are perfectly delicious and can be used in any way that you use chicken eggs. You
can fry them, boil them, or make a quail-eggs soufflé. I hard-boil them and use them as
a garnish on the top of potato salad. Frequently they are pickled and served that way.
Use your creativity and I think you will be impressed with the practicality of these small
birds.
Butchering
You always have extra males when you raise your own flock, and you simply cannot
keep them housed with the females. If you do, the females will be run ragged by the
males' constant desire for sexual activity. This, in turn, will reduce egg production. If
your males are raised on a lower-protein ration or are sickly, it may take six weeks
to reach maturity, but most quail males are full-sized and ready for butchering at five
weeks old. Although the butchering process below is somewhat primitive, these males
can be butchered easily without any fancy equipment. The technique is not for the faint-
hearted, though.
Color Varieties
There are several color varieties of these Coturnix quail. The standard color variety is
the Pharaoh (or wild type). It has been domesticated and improved upon over the years.
The other colors are the British Black, White, Manchurian Golden, and Tuxedo. The
Tuxedo quail are a black-and-white pattern. All of the varieties are similarly sized and
lay equally well.
Coturnix quail surged in popularity in the 1970s and early 1980s as an alternative
food source because there was a strong desire at the time to be independent and raise
your own food. Quail gave folks the ability to raise their own meat and eggs in limited
spaces such as inner-city garages and basements. You could easily find all the different
color varieties then. Gradually, however, the array of color varieties has slipped away
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