Guinea Pecking Order?

[arent87]

I'm assuming Guineas do have a pecking order, but they are clearly more social than my chickens who, now three years old still get into it quite often... meanwhile, my little keets just hang out with each other, scratch around the brooder and share their food, climb on each other, sleep all over each other... they seem much more sophisticated than my spazzy diva hens. Do they go through the pecking order process like chickens? or is it just much more subtle.

 

[SunHwaKwon]

Sort of. Generally it is just the males, once mating season starts. Some days a male will change another male for a good 30 minutes or so nonstop. There are some fights but usually nothing too serious. Most of the pairing up and such is uneventful. I can definitely see a pecking order amongst my males but not really with my females, or the flock as a whole.

 

[R2elk]

Sort of. Generally it is just the males, once mating season starts. Some days a male will change another male for a good 30 minutes or so nonstop. There are some fights but usually nothing too serious. Most of the pairing up and such is uneventful. I can definitely see a pecking order amongst my males but not really with my females, or the flock as a whole.

You may only be noticing a pecking order among your males but there is definitely a pecking order among the hens also. The female pecking order is established without the fanfare of the males and is usually settled pretty quickly with hard meaningful pecking at the head of the lower hen. It rarely uses the feather pulling like the males do.

 

[SunHwaKwon]

Yes, perhaps. Mainly they just wander about the property in their pairs. Most of the interaction amongst the males is at bed time when they congregate before going up on the roost. When they slept in the coop, there was definitely squabbling, but that's mainly because they're a-holes.

 

[SunHwaKwon]

Ah and that reminds me, I did have a lower hen who was a fifth wheel last summer. She was completely ostracized from the flock and would hang out where she could see everyone but was not allowed to join until the mate of one of the males was killed so he took her as a replacement.