Guinea Keets Coming Soon...Have Arrived!

   It's true that 15 to 30 is the minimum number of guineas you can buy from hatcheries. Guinea keets are very tiny and it takes that many for them to keep warm during shipment. Even then a few of them may not survive. A better option is to buy them locally. Most people who have guineas will soon have more than they need. Since I have 8 female guineas I usually have more than 100 babies a year to sell. I usually like to sell a minimum of 5 or 6. I also will sell them as fully feathered young birds which is a better option for those who don't want to fool with heat lamps.  No, I am not saying this to advertise.  But it should be fairly easy to find guineas in your area during the summer hatching months.


Don't feel bad if you can't find them locally. I was hooked up with a local person I found on this message well in advance of Early summer to get 18 day old keets. Turned out her Guineas weren't laying when she thought they would (possibly due to our wet weather this year), and she recommended I try elsewhere. I found a hatchery online to place a shared order of Guineas and chicks and was able to get them in mid-June. I kept my eye on Craig's list and only saw a few keets starting to be advertised in late August, which was too late in the year for me. I wanted the fowl to be out free ranging and filling up with bugs before it got too cold out.
 
Really sad news today. One of my lavs was hit by a car on my road this morning. Now I am down to 12.

It's not like losing a dog. Heck, I can't really tell one lav from the next, but it's still takes the wind out of your sails for a little while.

My road is not busy, but there is a little more traffic on the weekends. The rest of the flock were hanging around him in the road (mass suidide pact? :) ) until I went to get him. Since it happened within minutes of my husband being inside than outside again, I saved it for my dad and he will pluck and butcher the bird.

Before getting the Guineas I spoke to a woman near by who has them. She lives on a much, much busier main road. She told me she lost a few to the road, but eventually the flock got it and stopped trying to hang around the road. Hopefully this will get through to mine too.
 
I'm sorry to hear you lost one. A little over a week ago one of my purples was missing when I went to round them up. I don't know what happened but I figured it was either a hawk or a fox, the later more likely since they were hanging out in the Milo field across the street. Then on Saturday I heard a bunch of ruckus and my dogs were chasing of a fox, running away from where the birds were (once again) across the street. This was at 4 in the afternoon. So, now I'm at 13 pigs and 4 chicks, as a day or two before the guinea was lost my dog got a hold of my favorite chicken.

It's easy to tell yourself to prepare for losses but it still stinks when it happens. I am really surprised I have not lost any to cars as people like to use country roads as NASCAR practice strips, at least where I live. Actually, I think the regulars are starting to get more cautious about the birds and aren't driving quite as fast by the house.
 
Still holding strong at 12 Guineas!

We have some construction going on in the yard, so I had to unplug the auto light to the coop for a few days. Almost every night I had to go out and shake one or two Guineas out of the trees and escort them into the coop. Two were so high up I had to get my husband's help. We backed his truck under the tree and he stood in the bed and used the poking stick to get them down.

I found out the Guineas enjoy traveling through the next door neighbor's yard into the next next door neighbor's yard to eat the bird seed dropped from his bird feeders.

It's an ill wind that blows no good...turns out Guinea fowl is a delicious meat.

I switched the birds to pellet feed. I hope it lasts longer than the crumbles and leaves less crumbs that the Guineas won't eat.
 
It's easy to tell yourself to prepare for losses but it still stinks when it happens. I am really surprised I have not lost any to cars as people like to use country roads as NASCAR practice strips, at least where I live. Actually, I think the regulars are starting to get more cautious about the birds and aren't driving quite as fast by the house.


You are so right about the NASCAR drivers!

I haven't noticed the flock hanging around the road, but I am considering putting up a couple of Guinea crossing signs. :)
 
Thank you for the inquiry, SunHwaKwon ! I know I have been remiss in updating, but non-guinea fowl life has been busy and the guineas have, but for two incidents, been well-behaved. In fact, I even took some pics of the guineas on Christmas Eve Day to post on here, but never got around to it.

Lucky for the guineas, we had a very green Christmas this year, and unseasonably mild winter so far. I found them outside our house pecking through the flower borders that I had torn up earlier in the year on Christmas Eve Day.





The guineas are now 7 months old. I have twelve and think that 3-4 are males and the rest are females based on observations of how they carry themselves.

I am feeding them Game Bird pellets, which leave less crumbs than the crumbles did.

Since the weather has been so mild, the guineas continue to free range. They have expanded their range territory to include the yards of neighbors several houses down our street. I live in a semi-rural area, so the houses are fairly spread out. Knock on wood, no one has come to complain. I even saw them joining a neighbor's free range chicken flock! I usually find them when I go out for my afternoon walk, and then we form a parade as we head back to my house, where they get treated to millet.

Despite hitting freezing temps at night, my heat taped water bucket has kept their water free from ice. The bucket has a top on it that keeps out all the dust, etc., so the water stays clean. I top it off every 4-5 days when I top off their feed bucket. The only other winterizing I did was to close the two windows in the co-op.

When there is snow on the ground, the guineas don't seem fazed by it. Initially, when it first arrived, they were hesitant to come out of the coop for a few minutes, but once outside seemed fine. It's funny seeing all the guinea prints around the yard!

The first incident happened at the beginning of December. I went to lock up the guineas for the night and noticed that one was missing. Being winter, it was pitch dark at 6 pm, so I got a flashlight and looked in the trees and around the property and called for the guinea, but nothing. The next day I drove down the roads to see if someone had hit it, but didn't find any body. I was also concerned that possibly some animal had snuck into the coop between the time the sun went down and I got outside to shut the door, but that didn't seem possible, since we have a motion light.

The next day, I went into the coop to do something while the flock of guineas was out in the yard, and was shocked to see my missing guinea in the coop! I was relieved to find it, but noticed it was acting funny. It just seemed to be a little off. To this day, it still trails behind the flock, several guinea steps behind and just seems kind of slow. The other guineas don't pick on it, but it just seems a little off. I have wondered if some kind of animal had gotten a hold of it, or if someone had hit it with a car and stunned it.

The second incident was worse. It was the middle of December. The day started off normally, but in the afternoon snow flurries began. The snow was swirling around and started to accumulate. This was the most snow we had gotten to that point, and it had continued into the evening. When I went out to shut the coop door, there were no guineas! It was cold, lightly snowing, and I was worried! I checked the trees around the coop and the property and no birds. So I changed into more heavy duty clothing, got a flashlight, and started walking down the road past all the neighbors houses. I found them next door, roosting in a few pine trees! The house next door is pending sale, so no one lives there yet. I flashed my light at the birds, tried calling them, tried bribing them with millet...nothing! I turned to go, and noticed that Slow (my guinea from the first incident) was sitting on the ground near the porch lattice. So I picked Slow up, and brought her back to the coop. I figured she had a better chance in there than as a tasty treat for some animal.

I felt so bad that night. All I could picture was an owl feasting on the birds. The next day, the silly birds were back and I was happy. I am convinced they got confused by the snow flurries and couldn't find their way home.

Since the ground is covered with snow, the guineas seem to fly more often. Twice I have observed the flock fly across the yard to get to the coop. It's really neat to be able to see them when they are flying.
 
On my way out to shut the coop up for the night I found one Guinea stuck in the kids yard. It took me three tries, but I finally cornered it, picked it up, and deposited it in the coop. You would think it would be grateful, but all I got was a bunch of chi-chi's as I chased it around.

I think one of my kids left the gate open so the whole flock came into the yard. They are so silly. The fence is certainly low enough to fly over, but they all only come in when the gate is open. And inevetibly one or two will get 'stuck' inside while the rest of the flock moves on, even though the gate is still open! :/
 

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