Baby quails eat seeds, nuts, fruit, grains, berries and other plant materials. They also eat lizards, snails, worms, beetles, caterpillars and spiders. Chicks of some species, such as the mountain quail, eat more insects than the adults.
Unlike some other newborn chicks, quail chicks are precocial, or born in an advanced state. They hatch covered with down, and some already have their first true feathers. Soon after, they can run around and find their own food in the company of their parents and other adults. They are often ready to fly within a fortnight of their birth, and they leave their natal families after about four months.
