Look who was just born!

Ok...maybe "hatched" is more accurate, but I'm so happy! I don't know if I've ever mentioned my button quails before...but I had three of them. Two males and a female, Willow, Tabitha and Blackie. From what I've read it's quite uncommon for captive hens to lay on their eggs...but Tabitha was feeling quite broody and decided to sit on 5 eggs...4 of which hatched the night before last!

And it seems we have a black sheep in the family! I'm pretty sure that one is going to be a male (he's already got the telltale "bib" coloration) and he's very spunky!

And did I mention that button quails are TINY! They are the smallest poultry bird on earth and the full grown quails are barely bigger than just hatched chickens...meaning the quail babies are the size of large bumble bees! And fluffy too. Their parent's live in a large fish tank in our living room.

I've wanted to post about my quails for some time now (I've had them for a year and a half) but they are so hard to photograph. They move all the time and even the babies prove this to be true (plus my camera is kinda junky). This is the non-blurriest photo of a single baby I managed to take.

Mom is peeking her head out from behind her cardboard "lean-to". She's a very good mom.

Here are the best photos of mom and dad I managed to snap. You can see mom is a brownish blur in the photo of dad. Blackie is very pretty with chocolate brown feathers on his underside and black toenails, a "fancy" variety. Tabitha is more run of the mill.

These are some of Tabitha's eggs sitting in a container next to regular quail eggs, which are small themselves. I often use them in the spun cotton and wool nests I make.

I am so pleased that Blackie and Tabitha decided to have a family! If you happen to live in the Boston area and would like some pet quails...the babies will be full grown in just a few weeks!

And in other animal news...I have a caterpillar in my studio who just spun himself a cocoon. I wonder when he will emerge as a butterfly?!