Guinea Hens beating up my Chickens!!!

[sbates]

I have about 20 chickens and 2 guinea hens I keep all together in an 8X8 coop. They have about 750 sq feet of outdoor run with a "roof" of netting attached (this is my high security anti-hawk area). Also during the nice weather I have over an acre of fenced paddock that I let them out to scratch around in. So they seem to have plenty of space and pretty good living conditions... However, my guinea hens still "attack" my chickens constantly. Basically they chase them around and try to pull out their tail feathers. Is there any way to prevent this besides getting rid of my guinea hens??? Thanks for any info you may have.

 

[Big Chicken Little]

You need to move the guinea hens... they are frantic birds and will not mix well. They will continue to beat on your chickens as they want to be dominate.

 

[gsim]

The guineas have to go for sure. I wanted to have one or two for eating chiggers, but decided they were not worth the trouble. You could try two more and see if you can find a keeper tho. They are excellent for sounding an alarm if preds around. Mi chooks already learned to head for the henhouse when crows start in with their racket.

 

[Akane]

Several people have found having a few guineas with their chickens doesn't work well. Sometimes they do fine but sometimes the guineas try to take over the chicken flock. If you have more guineas they actually often bother the chickens less because they make their own flock and don't try to become part of the pecking order of the chicken flock. The guinea cocks still sometimes cause trouble with the chicken roosters though.