Introduction 

Funnily enough, some of the best care information on button quail actually comes from the earliest records of pairs here in the UK, including observations written by owners of some of the early private avicultural collections, although in reality this amounts to only a couple of pages published in the Avicultural Magazine during the late 1800s and early 1900s. 

At that point hardly anyone had kept them before, so they were learning husbandry directly from observing the birds and understanding how they behaved in their natural habitat. Many of the observations made during this period still hold true today and are often surprisingly detailed considering how little was known about the species at the time.

One particularly interesting example comes from Volume V, No. 49 of the Avicultural Magazine, published in November 1898, where E. G. B. Meade-Waldo, a British naturalist, ornithologist and aviculturist, described successfully rearing Chinese Painted Quail chicks on ant larvae supplied twice daily. He also noted that by around a week old the chicks were readily eating mawseed (opium poppy seed), which at the time was a very common ingredient used by bird keepers and, when fed in moderation, is considered perfectly safe for many species. 

As seen above, these observations are particularly fascinating because they closely mirror what we now understand about the species in the wild. Chinese Painted Quail typically breed as the rainy season begins across much of their natural range. This period coincides with the emergence of huge numbers of insects, including the nuptial flights of ants, termites and countless other invertebrates. 

These mass emergences occur because the rainy season provides ideal breeding conditions. Increased humidity protects insects from dehydration, whilst softened soils allow newly mated queens to establish nests more easily. For ants, termites and many other invertebrates, these flights are a critical part of their lifecycle and can result in enormous numbers of protein-rich insects becoming available over a very short period. 

Adult birds will spend much of their time scratching through leaf litter, probing soft ground and investigating ant and termite nests in search of insects and larvae. Newly hatched chicks grow at an astonishing rate and require a very high-protein diet during their first few weeks of life, often in the region of 26–30% protein. In the wild, much of this nutrition comes from the abundance of insect life available during the breeding season. 

The hen also plays an active role in feeding her chicks. She will often pick up insects in her beak and drop them in front of the chicks, sometimes repeating the process several times if they do not immediately take the food. We regularly observe similar behaviour in our own birds, with hens picking up and further breaking down crumb feed before dropping it in front of their chicks, making it easier for them to consume. This behaviour not only helps ensure the chicks receive the high levels of protein needed during their rapid early growth, but also teaches them how and where to forage for food themselves. 

Although Meade-Waldo would not have had access to modern nutritional research, his observations suggest he had already recognised the importance of insect protein for growing chicks in the wild. In many respects, feeding ant larvae twice daily was remarkably close to replicating the natural diet of young button quail, decades before commercially produced gamebird and quail feeds became widely available and, when combined with a varied range of seeds, grains and plant material, arguably provided a diet closer to what the species would naturally encounter in the wild. 

It serves as a useful reminder that some of the earliest keepers were not relying on manufactured feeds or established husbandry manuals. Instead, they were carefully observing the birds themselves and attempting to recreate the conditions and foods they would naturally encounter in the wild. 

As button quail became easier to source and more affordable here in the UK, in many ways some of that husbandry seems to have gone backwards a little, with people understandably treating them more like other common heavily domesticated poultry, when really they behave quite differently. 

They are still very instinct-driven little birds, and because of that they often communicate how they are feeling through behaviour long before anything obvious appears. A calm, natural setup and daily observation usually tells you more than anything else. 

The aim of this guide is therefore not simply to list illnesses and treatments, but to help owners understand why problems occur, how they can be prevented and, most importantly, how these remarkable little birds behave both in captivity and in the wild.