My pet quails

I hear you thinking "pet quails?? Why??".
Well I'll tell you why, My neigbors had little chinese quails when I was about six years old. When they moved the quails whent with them and I'd started to really like those silly little birdys.
I got 4 harlequin quails when I was seven but they weren't the cuddly type (nor where those chinese ones from my neighbors, by the way) , they were skiddish and didn't come when feeding them.

 (harlequin quails)  
                                                                           (chinese quails)
Now almost two years ago I bought 3 japenese quails when the other four had died.
They weren't domesticated either but one of them (Darya) became more domesticated when I tried to pet her. I got 5 little chicks from those 3 quails (from an incubator, they don't breed, sadly). I had to give one male away but the other 4 became very tame and love to cuddle ;)

These are all of my quails (I currently have 12) with their name an the origin of their name;

Darya -- Floortje -- Tim

(Origin of their names; I watched a TV program called "sterren dansen op het ijs" (skating with celebrities) at that time and there were 3 skaters with those names that I liked)

                                               See his feet? They are curled up under him.

 

 

Humpy

(Origin of his name; Humpy was born with two misshaped legs, his toes didn't want to uncurl, and for the first two days we were a little affraid that we had to put him down, of which I thought "over my dead body" ;). The third day he was miraculously healed, how the hell that happened is still a mystery, but I'm very glad it did. Take in mind that I'm dutch and Humpy in dutch doesn't have anything to do with "humping" or things like that, it's just an endearment like "cutie"or "sweetie". And that's how he got his name, because he is just an "humpy", and to me he's the tamest and sweetest of them all (don't tell the others I said that ;) )

Pia

(Origin of her name; The origin of Pia's name is a rather funny story. Pia is also the name of my Grandmother, she loves my quails but that wasn't the main reason why I named my quail after my Grandmother. Pia had the weird habit as chick of cleaning, she liked to clean the woodchips from the waterbowl, and my Grandmother is a zealous cleaner, everything has to be very neat and clean. So that is why I called het Pia. Funny right?)

Chilly

(Origin of her name; The origin op Chilly's name is also a rather funny story. Chilly was a sweet little chick, and even sweeter as full grown quail. But she always has cold feet, so I called her Chilly, because of  her Chilly feet)

Chalky

(Origin of her name; Chalky is Chilly's twin sister, they hatched out of their eggs at the same time and act very much like sister. Chalky was as chick the whitest of the bunch, it looked a little "chalky". So that became her name. Nowadays Chilly and Chalky look a lot alike, so much even that only I can see the difference from a distance)

Piet

Origin of his name; Piet was the only other male in our first bunch of chicks. They were born on July the 15th (right before my math exam, which I passed BTW) and my Grandmothers father who's name was Piet (which is a very common name for dutch people, well older people) so we named this little fellow Piet. Sadly enouh we had to give him away because he acted quite aggressively.

On the left we have Pia as chick, in the middle Piet and on the right Chalky, Humpy is on the right behind Piet and Chilly is not quite visible)

My second litter of quails I got for my graduation from highschool this year (2012) in May. We hadn't planned on getting five chicks, 2 or 3 was the limit, but when standing in front of a whole group of those cute little things it was like a child in a candystore, the man who had them said "if you have to many males you can bring them back", which ,if I'm totally honest, I wasn't planning to do.

Pippa

Origin of her name; Pippa is named after the sister of Princess Catherine of England, I just liked the name.

Nyx

Origin of his name; Yes, yes, I did name him after the goddess Nyx from the house of night series, but I couldn't help myself. He was very dark as chick with on his tummy a white circle (which is not very visible on the pictures) that looks like a moon. Dutch people find it a strange name when I say Nyx (because when you pronounce it, it sounds exactly like the dutch word "niks" which means "nothing") but when explained they get the idea.

Lizzy

Origin of her name; First I wanted to call her Izzy (after the character Izzy on grey's anatomy) but my family found that a little odd, so it became Lizzy. Lizzy is a very very active quail (and that's the understatement of the year ;) ) ,and very sweet natured.

                                                       See the ↑ sock markings ↑ on his feet/legs
                                                

Socks

Origin of his name; I named him Socks because he had those cute markings on his feet/legs that looked to me like socks. It faded away when he grew up, but with a closer look you can still see them.

Ga-ya

Origin of her name; I was thinking about calling her A-ya (yes also from th HoN series, because of the white dress A-ya wears in the mythe/legend of the raven mockers and Kalona), but I also liked the name Gaea/Gaia so I made a compromise and went for Ga-ya.