free range chickens and penned peafowl

[peacockfarmer1]

I free range about 20 chickens and 10 guineas i am getting 4 peafowl to put in a pen around the area the chickens like to forage could the peafowl get sick from the chickens through the fence

also what do you look for in a healthy peacock like at an auction (how do you tell its not sick by looking)
thanks

 

[bdfive]

It's my understanding you need to keep peafowl seperated from chickens from a time so they can build up an immunity to the chicken diseases. Regarding purchasing healthy peafowl I guess just use some common sense. If they look ill or injured don't purchase them. Swollen faces or running noses isn't good either. Much of the time the feathers look out of place or missing from being caught with nets, put into cages, etc; That's not a concern, they will grow back. Always worm them after purchasing.

 

[MinxFox]

Look for clear eyed birds is what a lot of people say.

 

[bdfive]

What do you mean by "clear eyes". Would they otherwise be foggy looking? bloodshot? etc; I just thought of something. I think my India Blue peas have light colored eyes but my Java male's are real dark brown or black? Hmmm, I think those are the colors, guess I better take a good look tomorrow. Thanks for that information. I'm now curious.

 

[MinxFox]

Clear eyes would just mean the eyes look normal like there is nothing wrong with them like what you said not foggy ect. I have never really seen bad eyed birds though, but I am sure it would be easy to notice if you do infact see one.

Peafowl have different eye colors just like people. White peafowl tend to have blue eyes, my pied male has light grey-blue eyes and my pied hen has blue eyes, then my other three peafowl have chocolate brown eyes, which vary slightly some are a bit lighter colored, some are a bit darker ect, so there isn't one standard color for eyes so don't worry about your blues having different color eyes compared to your Javas.

Here is an example of different colored eyes:

Hope this answers your question.