Bapak Arif Wijayanto
Malang-East Java
I have been raising laying quails for about 1 year, but I am still confused to distinguish between male and female quails at the age of 1 day. What I want to ask, Is there a method that can identify the sex of quail at the age of 1 day? Because I could only identify the sex of the quail at 3 weeks of age. Please explain.
Answer:
Dear. Mr. Arif, thank you for the question. As a preliminary explanation, the purpose sexing on commercial quail is to determine the sex of Quail. After that, a separation can be made between male and female quails. Male quails will be used as broiler quails, while female quails are kept for laying purposes.
Sexing in commercial quail is usually done at the age of 1 day (DOQ), in Phase starter (age 10 days), or in Phase grower (age 20-30 days). While quail breeder, sexing done before moving the cage layer to separate between male and female quails.
Sexing in quail is generally done in phases grower (3 weeks), where at that age the breeder can easily distinguish male quail and female Quail just by looking at the color of the feathers around the chest. The pectoral plumage of female quails is brown with Gray to gray-brown gradations. Sometimes there are white spots or lines. The pectoral plumage of male quails is light brown without any white tint.
Do sexing by looking at the difference in the color of quail breast feathers at the age of under 3 weeks is quite difficult to do. There are several methods sexing what can be done when quails are 1 day old, including :
- Seeing the color of the fur above the eyes
If the feathers above the eyes are dark in color and form curved lines, the quail is androgynous. But if the color of the plumage is not dark or does not form curved lines, then the quail is a female androgynous.
- See cloaca
Methods sexing the most accurate is to look at the Quail's genitals through the cloaca. Many farmers are able to sexing against 1-day-old Quail through the cloaca. To sexing through the cloaca, the breeder must hold the quail with his left hand. Both quail legs are placed between the ring and little fingers. The index finger and thumb of the right hand hold the rump of the Quail, then massage the abdomen towards the cloaca. If there is dirt in the cloaca, it must first be cleaned. If the cloaca has been cleaned, then the naked eye will see a white foam from the inside of the cloaca, which indicates that the quail is a male. If there is no white foam, it means that the quail is female. In addition, for female quails, the cloaca is in the form of an elongated stripe, while for male quails it is oval.
When performing sexing, in addition to paying attention to the method used, it would be nice for the father to also pay attention to the condition of the quail and the handling is done more carefully. Moreover, when sexing at the age of 1 day is very risky to cause stress Quail children.
