Broody chicken on guinea egg question

[lazytrucker]

Hi! I have a Jersey Giant hen that hatched and raised 12 Jersey Giant chicks. Is there any reason this same chicken can't hatch and raise 18 guinea keets?

 

[R2elk]

Hi! I have a Jersey Giant hen that hatched and raised 12 Jersey Giant chicks. Is there any reason this same chicken can't hatch and raise 18 guinea keets?

It probably can but I don't recommend letting her raise them. Hatching is fine but the problems that can come from the keets being imprinted by a chicken are not worth it. When I let a chicken hatch guinea eggs, I move the keets to the brooder as soon as they are dry.

 

[lazytrucker]

It probably can but I don't recommend letting her raise them. Hatching is fine but the problems that can come from the keets being imprinted by a chicken are not worth it. When I let a chicken hatch guinea eggs, I move the keets to the brooder as soon as they are dry.

Ok. I'm seriously curious as the issues of the keets being imprinted by the chicken. I've had one hen raise 6 guinea keets before and maybe I didn't recognize the issues.??

 

[R2elk]

Ok. I'm seriously curious as the issues of the keets being imprinted by the chicken. I've had one hen raise 6 guinea keets before and maybe I didn't recognize the issues.??

Everything can seem fine until the first breeding season. At that time the guinea instincts kick in and they begin the running, chases, attacks from behind along with the feather pulling and breaking. Guineas understand this behavior, chickens do not understand it. Because imprinting causes the guineas to lose the ability to understand that (in this case) the chickens are different from them, they treat the chickens the same way as they would treat other guineas.

The chickens can become very stressed out from the guinea's behavior.

 

[lazytrucker]

Everything can seem fine until the first breeding season. At that time the guinea instincts kick in and they begin the running, chases, attacks from behind along with the feather pulling and breaking. Guineas understand this behavior, chickens do not understand it. Because imprinting causes the guineas to lose the ability to understand that (in this case) the chickens are different from them, they treat the chickens the same way as they would treat other guineas.

The chickens can become very stressed out from the guinea's behavior.

Very interesting! I don't think I saw this in the 6 that this hen raised before but it might be a different story if it was 30 of them. I do remember this hen was kind of a loner and when it's keet babies were mostly grown she hung out with the guinea flock a lot. That's about all I remember seeing.

Sooo, if I let them hatch the keets and then I take them will that break the hen of being broody?? How quick would I have to take them away?

 

[R2elk]

Very interesting! I don't think I saw this in the 6 that this hen raised before but it might be a different story if it was 30 of them. I do remember this hen was kind of a loner and when it's keet babies were mostly grown she hung out with the guinea flock a lot. That's about all I remember seeing.

Sooo, if I let them hatch the keets and then I take them will that break the hen of being broody?? How quick would I have to take them away?

I take them away as soon as they are dry and move them to the brooder.

 

[lazytrucker]

I take them away as soon as they are dry and move them to the brooder.

So does that break the broody or do you still have to do crazy stuff to break it's broody?

 

[R2elk]

So does that break the broody or do you still have to do crazy stuff to break it's broody?

It has always broken my broodies. Each hen is her own individual and may or may not act differently.