#Not a fun time I will admit!

[wayfinderships]

Very funny how at the beginning of the year I would tell myself stuff like I'm gonna post here more often! With no shame!

And in reality I get scared and immediately crawl onto my little cave-ajdnsdjdn

[kedreeva]

Hi Ked! Having chickens when I finally get my own place has been something I've wanted for a while (am currently putting it on hold despite in the near future acquiring said own place due to H5N1). However, I have become a little enamored of quail recently in comparison. My goal would be to have eggs and fluffy yard buddies, do you recommend either one over the other?

If you want birds that can free roam your yard, it can't be quail. They are game birds, like pheasants, and will just leave (or get immediately eaten by.... everything, but especially hawks and domestic cats.

If you don't mind having them contained, then 100% quail are a better option right now.

Quail don't take up nearly the same space; an average sized quail tower takes up approximately a 2x3 foot space, and depending on how many levels you have and how densely you populate them can hold anywhere from 15-40 quail. That amount of space cannot even house 1 chicken long term.

Quail are not NEARLY the same initial investment; on average people end up investing around $200-500 in quail equipment/caging/birds depending on how into it you want to get, and $2k+ in appropriate chicken equipment/caging/birds. These costs can vary greatly depending on how handy you are and what connections you have to acquire scrap materials, or how fancy you want to get.

Since quail are not kept on raw ground, they have MUCH fewer health problems on average- they rarely get parasites, they rarely pick up bacterial infections, they rarely pick up anything viral (and if their caging is kept in a more enclosed/covered space there is almost no chance of them picking up HPAI). Since they're contained, there's not very much chance for them to injure themselves (although like any bird, if there's a way they have the will to find it).

Their eggs are more nutritionally dense than chickens. You can compare nutrition per gram anywhere online.

They're (in my experience) more consistent layers than chickens; give them light and feed, and they will lay daily year round, only taking a break to molt in the fall.

Quail's full lifespan is shorter than chickens. This may seem like a downside, but the productive years for a chicken are generally 2-5 years, with a lifespan that should be 7-12 years. Quail have the same 2 years of production, but on average only live 3-5 years, so even if you don't want to butcher the spent hens (which most people do), you aren't caring for nonproductive birds for many years.

Quail are easy to butcher at home with almost no equipment- all you need is a hefty, sharp pair of kitchen shears, a 5g bucket (with or without a liner), and some ice water in a big bowl. No plucking, no scalding, no killing cones, nothing special for cleaning. They can be packed for freezing whole in vacuum sealed sleeves.

If you get or build rollout cages, the eggs gently roll to the front of the cage and "out" into the tray, where they can be picked up clean!

If you get or build wire-bottom cages, you don't technically have to buy bedding. Cost efficient! You can provide resting boards or have solid-bottom portions of the cage, and giving them a sand bath bin will be REALLY exciting for them.

Coturnix quail come in such a huge variety of color and patterns that you can surely find some type you like.

Both species can come with aggression issues- it takes FAR less time to breed it out of quail because they hit breeding age in a matter of weeks, not months.

The downside to quail is that most coturnix quail are not terribly cuddly. you might be able to imprint one (I did once, because my pigeons hatched him and then didn't like that, so I took Robert in), but the majority will just be cute look-don't-touch birds. They are FASCINATING to watch though, so it works out imo.

the downside to both species is. the roosters crow. terrible noises in both cases. I couldn't handle chicken roosters.

Anyway, I think that in all honesty, when MOST people are considering getting into chickens, what they ACTUALLY want is the experience of having quail. Small, cute, easy to handle/raise, genetic manipulation through generations of selective breeding easy to hatch, cute eggies. There's a LOT of people getting into chickens right now because they think it will be a solution to the expensive eggs in the supermarket, but it won't be. They'll end up spending more on the chickens than they ever would have on just getting eggs, and throw a stone in a chicken group on fb and you'll hit 17 people who have had horrific health issues related to parasites, illness, injury, predation, etc.

Meanwhile.... quail groups are largely chill and questions are usually about colors and feed/housing (since most of the problems are bad feeding habits or caging, or genetic issues).

[puppppppppy]

trainersona

[rooolt]

ultimately the trait I treasured the most in the s2 teens was that they barely fucking liked each other and yet were each others closest friends. Realism

[fridgrave2-0]

hehe ghost-turbo haunting felix au

turbo is connected to the last piece of his code in the whole arcade - a trophy he gifted to felix in mid 80s as a symbol of him genuinely caring about their relationships on par with being the best racer. felix also gave him one of his medals and both kept their gifts next to other rewards, but when roadblasters and turbotime were unplugged, the medal was gone with everything else

now, after burning in cola-lava turbo is basically dead, but scraps of his code still were intertwined with the trophy (after all, it was his first winner's cup, but felix never knew about it), giving turbo an opportunity to exist as a shadow incapable of interacting with anything and anyone besides felix, who kept the trophy even after the roadblasters incident

also I went crazy in tags, feel free to check them out

[jaggybot3000]

^quite literally about to fall for the oldest trick in the book

pt 2 to this

[anakindoodles]

Always a dance with you

I just think they're neat 🥹

[starlight-eclipsed]

Candid photos never turn out well.

It's happening, everyone! We've made it to the end :D...kind of.

Legato's new outfit (+ annotations) under the cut ^-^

[rinboking]

Fred

Draw Fred Bonaparte please

I need this silly silly man

Sorry for the delay. Here you go, Fred Bonaparte!

[pealingpetals]

he's just a little chilly

[mysteryshack-hrt-liveblog]

Death. Stanford would fix it. Fix this, for Stanley.  “I can do it.” He whispers.  Stanley does not reply. 

what is up gaymers, abandon my eulogy by @aroace-get-out-of-my-face has taken over my mind so i drew something for it!! (you 🫵 should read this fic it's so super good)

[astriiformes]

Threw together another one of these lists because as it turns out, I personally have always read more book that I have watched movies or TV shows, so as far as personal picks go, this was definitely the better option.

There is very little rhyme or reason to this one -- some are books that left an impression on me as a kid, some are current favorites, and some are academic reading related to my future PhD hopes. For longer series of books, I generally included either my particular favorites or let the first one stand in for the whole series.

Curious how many on here people recognize!

[noornight]

Sewn into each other's soul?

[piosplayhouse]

Wwx is the only mxtx main protagonist who would not be a my little pony fan. But he does own a 20% cooler shirt

[purplepenntapus]

I have no beef with people who don’t ship Zoro and Sanji I LOVE their platonic relationship in canon and I completely understand when people say they see them as having a sibling-esc “I can fuck with you but no one else can” relationship, but I HATE when someone talks about shipping them and someone else comes in like “um no they hate each other” or “it’s the same boring dynamic we always see where they hate each other and people ship them” NO THEY DON’T!!!! THEY VERY MUCH DONT ACTUALLY HATE EACH OTHER!!!!!! They get on each others nerves and they enjoy fighting each other but they are genuinely friends and explicitly care about each other.

I don’t care if you don’t see it as romantic but don’t come in here saying their dynamic is boring because you don’t care enough to dig deeper into it.

[machrealgirl]

orochimaru is actually real as hell cuz if i had to grow up transgender in the fucking naruto universe of all places? i would be weird as fuck too. i would snap