Spock's sad saga

Sometimes raising quail can be slightly traumatic - especially if you are soft-hearted and prone to worrying about hatchlings as if they were your own kids...
Spock finally hatched three little babies - one of which was all white (pale yellow). This one, naturally, was the kids' favourite - and the first to die. It lasted about four days, looking healthy - until one day it just wasn't healthy any more, and faded away. We don't know why. Natural selection - but the grief was strong as we all really wanted some variation in colour - all bar two of our birds are the standard Coturnix light brown patterning (Pharoah markings, I think) and well nigh impossible to tell apart! The remaining two seemed strong and happy - one was much bigger than the other, and we feared for the smaller one. Spock was a slightly indifferent mother, and refused to share her mealworms - whenever we gave her some she would scoff them immediately and never offer them to her chicks. Every other mother quail has given most of the mealworms to her babies...
Snowpea's four chicks - now about 8 weeks old  - formed a gang of four and terrorised Spock's two little ones. On one occasion I rescued the smaller hatchling which had been grabbed by the neck by one of the older gang, who was shaking it violently, while the others pecked at it. Horrid. None of the adult birds took much notice of the two babies - only the immature birds seemed to hunt them. The little one really struggled - whenever it got cold it collapsed on the ground, unable to move. Spock never seemed particularly concerned, and we kept finding it, cold and feebly chirping. We'd put it in a small cage with Spock overnight, and it would recover. This happened twice. Eventually Spock seemed to abandon any pretense at mothering. 

Spock - a beautiful girl, but lacking the mothering instinct!

 A few days later the smaller chick died, very suddenly - after having survived numerous near-death experiences. More grief.
Sadly, we have no photos of either of the two little ones...but there is one chick remaining - of which more will be told later!

The kids had a funeral for the little chick...