Learn the basics of button quail size, button quail care, and different button quail varieties for breeding and raising.
Quail come in about 130 different species, with about 70 of those species raised domestically around the world, and about a half-dozen of those favored in the U.S. Nearly all species are feathered in browns, tans, grays, and whites, and are ground dwellers that prefer to walk or scurry rather than fly. When they fly, it’s a “flush,” almost always straight upward. Because of the boxy shape of their bodies and squared-off tails, they aren’t good fliers but will use flight as a quick means of necessary escape from predators.
Button Quail Varieties
Among the more novel quail are ones referred to as “button quail,” so named for being exceedingly small compared with other quail species. Although the “quail” part of their name sounds like they’re part of the Phasianidae group of pheasants and partridges to which quail belong, they’re actually hemipodes in the Turnicidae family. In nature, they live in warm climates in Asia, Australia, Africa, and parts of Europe. Their feathers are effective camouflage for hiding among twigs, bushes, and rocks to escape from the mammals, birds, and reptiles that are their natural predators.
Button quail have 17 of their species in the Turnix (or Coturnix) genus, also known as “common” button quail, but one species is in the Ortyxelos genus that makes it what’s referred to as a “quail-plover,” more plover than quail! While at first glance button quail look like other quail species, except for being smaller, they lack a crop and hind toe (hence the “hemipodes” name, which translates to “half-foot”).
Button Quail Size
Their vocalizations and calls are chirps, murmurs, and clicks, but female button quail can also “boom” their throats, thanks to an enlarged trachea and inflatable bulb that produces the unique call.
Physicality
Because they’re ground dwellers and small, easy targets for predators, their feathers are made to match the ground. But the males have brighter colors than the females, including blue-gray chest feathers, russet feathers on their stomachs, and black and white markings on their faces and necks. The females are larger than the males but are colored only in bland browns.
Button quail are small, about the size of a sparrow, and rarely over 4 inches high. That means if you’re thinking ahead to marketing meat or eggs, choose a larger quail species. Button quail are more like pets or ornamental birds, such as finches, parakeets, and others kept by aviculturists. Yes, there’s a market for ornamentals, but perhaps not as lucrative as the market for meat or eggs.
Breeding
Button quail aren’t monogamous. After mating, the hen makes a scraped-off area on which to lay her clutch of four or five eggs, and then she leaves the work of hatching to the male while she moves on to find another male.
The male left in charge cares for the chicks. They’ll hatch in about 12 days, and grow quickly. Button quail are ready to fly at about 2 weeks old, independent at about 1 month old, and sexually mature at about 3 months.
Males without females will call for females. That call is often constant. So, if noise tolerance is a problem for your home, shed, barnyard, or zoning regulations, you may need to stock only females, or have enough room for a few males and many females.
Button Quail Care
In nature, button quail live where the weather is warm, so you’ll need indoor housing during colder weather. Males will fight one another and must be housed separately if in cages, or with plenty of room if you have a run.
If caged, button quail need solid flooring because their small feet are sensitive to walking on wire or mesh. Sand and soil outdoors will be fine, but if the quail are kept indoors or in cages, you’ll need pine shavings, sawdust, or other bedding for their delicate feet.
Provide nooks, branches, hollow logs, and other “hiding places” because quail enjoy them not only for hiding, but also for “entertainment” in climbing, scurrying, and avoiding boredom.
Their diet must consist of game-bird feed, not chicken feed. Supplement with seeds, vegetables, fruits, grains, mealworms, crickets, fly larvae, and crushed oyster shell for calcium. Avoid avocado, chocolate, and fatty or sugary foods. Keep clean, fresh water available at all times.
As with any poultry, watch for changes in bowel movements, feather picking, excessive scratching, lethargy, restlessness, labored breathing, coughing, nasal discharge, straining to pass an egg, laying thin-shelled eggs (or eggs with no shell), or changes in appetite. These can signal health problems that need attending from your veterinarian.
Clean quarters are vital – keep the bedding clean of droppings, check the waterers for cleanliness (add pebbles or marbles in the waterer to prevent the tiny birds from drowning), and wash down the cages weekly to rinse off dried droppings. Ventilation in your housing is important, because quail droppings are high in ammonia, and that smell can actually cause respiratory problems.
Button quail can become easily accustomed to you and are more receptive to gentle handling than other quail species. In other words, they do make fun pets!
Originally published as “Cute as a Button” in the November/December 2024 issue of GRIT magazine and regularly vetted for accuracy.
Dr. Stephenie Slahor’s farm and ranch veterinary background includes cattle, equines, pets, small ruminants, rabbits, poultry, and tortoises. She’d be one of the first to agree that, indeed, “Variety is the spice of life!”