Quail diary

Quail eggs - half a week's worth

The quail are doing magnificently: five eggs today, six yesterday, seven the day before. Every morning is Easter as I peek into pots, and grope through litter, listening for the rustle of a very small egg dropping through the straw. Yesterday, they’d hidden one under the cuttlefish bone in a hollow left by the dustbathers. I’d already done my sweep and was stumbling for the door with my hands full when I nearly stepped on it. One day I’ll find eight … which shouldn’t even be possible from seven quail.

And it’s all because of the light. Glorious daylight, barely noted by those of us ruled by mechanical clocks. But the quail know. They began laying just before the spring equinox (March 20th this year), as the sun approached the equator and day was no longer shorter than night. Today (May 20th) London had 15 hours and 51 minutes of daylight. Will the eggs start to peter out in September, after the autumn equinox, when nights in the northern hemisphere start drawing in again, as the axis on which the earth spins in orbit tilts away from the sun? The quail will know. Meanwhile, until the solstice, dreamy mid-summer’s day, they can count on an extra two minutes of light each day – to doss about with their eyes shut, filling the fridge with tiny freckled eggs. The ancient Briton in me might even pickle some for winter. Stonehenge suddenly makes a lot of sense.

Homegrown: beans, herbs and raspberry canes - plus baby lettuce in a wooden drawer found on street

For the present, the runner beans are snaking up their poles, the blueberries are swelling on their bush, and the cherry three is covered with pea-sized green fruit. Production and reproduction in full swing. Soon it will be time to get out the step ladder and put bread-bag ‘sleeves’ on the lower branches. It’s the only way to ensure we get to taste at least some of the cherries. I don’t begrudge the thrushes, but the gormless (and, later, incontinent) pigeons seem to be colour blind and peck at the cherries before they are ripe – serves ‘em right.

Quail towers, tucked away behind the foxgloves

By now the egg tally stands at 156, or 13 dozen. They still look a bit dusty but I’ve cut down on the dandelions and there have been no more warty knobbles. Instead, the quail now have dried maggots (yurghh, but I ran out of worms). They look like some crispy oriental delicacy off a takeaway menu – and they are evidently a great treat, as we now have half a dozen little bodies jumping excitedly up and down behind the wire whenever anyone opens the back door. My wellies get mobbed. The quail shriek and lift off like budgies. They want them so badly they’ll eat out of my hands and Harass will even submit to being stroked if she thinks I’ve got some left.

But nothing is ever easy. Up at the house, Senior Teen will no longer eat eggs – revolted by her brush with nature in the raw, hot from a quail’s vent – and even Junior Teen has come over determinedly veggie. So, the only members of the household still getting meat are the cats. And the quail. Hmm.