2 Brief quinea questions.

[cupman]

Hello, I plan to try and buy assorted guinea eggs in the Spring and I don't want them to conflict much with my chickens or each other. so my questions are:

1) Will male guineas and my rooster fight? Will they be any threat to my hens? I only have one coop and wanted to raise them together but wasn't sure about aggression in guineas.

2) What is the ideal male to female ratio amongst guineas? I wanted to have 5 or 6 guineas, how many males should I have? Note that I also have a flock of 27 chickens.

Thank you.

 

[Fenika]

1) Will you be letting your guineas free range? They can fly over your fence if it's not covered and free range themselves. The trick is training them to come in every night. But as long as there is enough square foot space in the run, and they can free range, you shouldn't have too much trouble. Occasionally a mean rooster will attack the guineas. If you get several males you can pick the nicest and keep him (and either slaughter or give to someone to slaughter, the rest)

2) 1 male for 5 to 6 hens is fine. Perfect even, iirc.

 

[GuineaLady93]

Quote:
1-My roosters never bother any of the guineas. They are use to them and don't even pay attention to them.

2-I started with 4 male and 4 female and they just paired up and were fine. The only time they fought was when I lost one of the hens and there were more males than females. As long as there aren't more males they should be fine.

 

[tomingreeneco]

You should really consider geting a few more quines. They do better and will have less conflicts with your chickens if you have 10 or more. Mine get along just fine with my chickens and ducks, but they have a separate coop they go into at night.