(cont’d from here)

Few things are friendlier to an urban chicken farmer than the chicken tractor, a coop-on-wheels that gives you the freedom to move your chickens from one part of the yard to another. Granted, it’s an unusual name, but the tractor comes with a fenced-in run that allows your chickens to move around and exercise, helpful if your yard isn’t enclosed.

Chicken tractors come in a variety of sizes and are relatively easy to construct from raw materials, however, if you’re like me, you want the assurance that your chicken tractor coop is sturdy, well-constructed and as predator-proof as possible. Enter GardenEggs.com.

In early July, GardenEggs.com shipped the Big Egg Chicken Tractor, which came in four boxes, each labeled and ready to piece together. We spent two hours assembling the chicken tractor coop, and it was ready immediately for the chicken’s transition.

When they were about seven weeks old, I felt comfortable that the birds were large enough to transfer to the coop. Within a week, I opened the door from the chicken tractor coop to the run so the birds could fly around but were still protected (and contained). 

The chicken tractor coop has several features that are ideal for an urban setting. For instance, you can open the roof of the coop to collect eggs, the run has a gate in case you’d like to allow your chickens to move freely through your yard, and there are three roosting bars suitable for about eight hens (roosters not recommended). And, perhaps most importantly, it moves!

At 12 weeks, I clipped the pullets’ wings, opened the gate to the run and allowed my girls to caper freely during the day. They enjoy being able to skip around the yard, frequently returning to the coop when it’s too hot or the weather is too intense. They seem to have no difficulty identifying the coop as home, even as it travels around the backyard. And every night, when I make sure they have returned safely, I smile and think to myself that, quite literally, the chickens have come home to roost.

Photos by Taylor Miller

In my previous post, you were introduced to my new adventures in quail raising. To catch you up, I now have three coturnix (also known as Japanese) quails, one male and two females (Bebee, Doug and Skeeter, respectively).

Unlike chickens, which can take as long as six months to begin laying, quails will lay, at the earliest, at six weeks of age. One of my females, Skeeter, began laying at six weeks one day and has steadily produced an egg a day since. The other female, Doug, has not yet begun, but this isn’t unusual for seven weeks.

This fast-laying nature, and the normally calm disposition of the quail coupled with its relatively small need for space, makes it ideal for raising in an urban environment. Plus, they produce more eggs per/amount of feed than any chicken.

Quails are also a great urban addition, because it's easy to quickly determine their sex, which is helpful if you want fertile eggs to hatch, or if you want as many layers (females) as possible. While chicken roosters would be a nuisance (and maybe a citation) in any urban environment, quail roosters are much calmer and, outside of some coloring variations and a unique “call,” are relatively similar to the females.

These images show the differences in coloration between the male and the female, the females being the birds on either end in the photo above (Left image, left quail: female), (right image, right quail: female). Females have spotted, light-colored breasts, while the male's breast lacks spots (for the most part) and has a rusty color, similar to a robin. The males also have a darker, rusty coloration to their face, around the eyes.

To read more about my quail-raising adventures, visit part one in my series, "Meet my Pet Quails."

Photos by Taylor Miller 

Meet Porkchop the coturnix quail (also known as Japanese quail). At the time this photo was taken, she was two weeks old. I think I should tell you, I have a colorful personality, a heart of gold when it comes to my animals and a knack for listing priorities others might call … off. So, when the team at MOTHER EARTH NEWS entrusted me with the care of four baby quails to participate in the Community Chickens project, the first thing I did was to name them: Doug, Beebe, Skeeter and Porkchop — all characters in the ’90s Nick cartoon, Doug (whose superhero alter-ego was, Quailman).

Each is identifiable by characteristic markings and personalities: Doug is the outcast who likes to be held. Skeeter is the squeeky one who hates being held. Beebe is the non-descript one who is afraid of being without Skeeter. And Porkchop is the fat, lazy one who plops down in the center of the food to eat and falls asleep on her back.

Having said all that, let’s not front: I know nothing about raising poultry; I never even had a cockatiel. But that’s the beauty of this project: People of all skill levels can come together to "new-fashion" sustainability and learn from each other. And for me, that starts with eggs. Tiny, speckled eggs.

Of 24 such quail hatching eggs sent by Purely Poultry, only four cracked open, and so they all came home with me. The night before they hatched, I set up a circular brooder with an infrared heat lamp, newspaper shreds, a water dish filled with rocks (so they wouldn’t drown), and game-bird starter food.

I had heard that quails are the wildest birds this side of Hitchcock, so my greatest determination was to have the calmest quails known to man. And because I take photos for a living, I was afraid these quails would be camera-shy. So, you can imagine my surprise when they were not only tame during the photo shoot, but downright "posey." Again, these shots were taken when they were two weeks old.

Can’t you just read their personalities through the pictures? Try to guess which is which, and find the answers by clicking the "comments" link below. And while you’re there, let me know what you think!

Click here for Part II in my series, Quail Keeping: Gender Differentiation.

Update: I lost poor Porkchop three weeks into the project when her leg was caught on the brooder cage and snapped. It was a great tragedy, a terrible accident, and I was devastated, to say the least. As I held my bleeding bird, wrapped in a warm towel, a few of my friends tried to find me a vet, and although I live in a somewhat metropolitan area, no clinics were prepared to handle a quail, and Porkchop had to suffer because of it. I did not want Porkchop to be in pain, however, and so my vet offered to put her down. She died on the way to the clinic. 

Shake your quail feathers, she will be missed. <3

Photos by Taylor Miller