Guinea problems

[RDchicken99]

Hi everyone! I have a couple guinea questions. First of all, we have our keets in a temporary chicken house while we build their outdoor coop. They are in a very large space with cross ventilation, but the flies in there are INSANE. Is this normal? Any tips on dealing with the flies? Second question. This morning, I found one of the keets as dead as a doornail on the floor of the coop. No visible broken bones or injuries. My keets are healthy birds, I have no clue why one of them would have just dropped dead like that. Any ideas??? Thanks.

 

[Mixed flock enthusiast]

Hi everyone! I have a couple guinea questions. First of all, we have our keets in a temporary chicken house while we build their outdoor coop. They are in a very large space with cross ventilation, but the flies in there are INSANE. Is this normal? Any tips on dealing with the flies? Second question. This morning, I found one of the keets as dead as a doornail on the floor of the coop. No visible broken bones or injuries. My keets are healthy birds, I have no clue why one of them would have just dropped dead like that. Any ideas??? Thanks.

Sorry that you lost a keet. As for trying to figure out what happened with it: How old are your keets? Do you have them on shavings or something else? Are they still on supplemental heat? What are you feeding them? The main things I’d be wondering about are impaction from eating shavings or other substrate, or coccidiosis.

As for flies: yes, we have way too many flies too! I have some fltape up but I definitely need to look into doing more for fly control!

 

[Bar72176]

Hi everyone! I have a couple guinea questions. First of all, we have our keets in a temporary chicken house while we build their outdoor coop. They are in a very large space with cross ventilation, but the flies in there are INSANE. Is this normal? Any tips on dealing with the flies? Second question. This morning, I found one of the keets as dead as a doornail on the floor of the coop. No visible broken bones or injuries. My keets are healthy birds, I have no clue why one of them would have just dropped dead like that. Any ideas??? Thanks.

I have a flock of about 30 guinea fowl, 3 peafowl, and a handful of chickens and the best thing I have found to keep flies down is a product called Horse Stall Refresher by Sweet PDZ. You get it at feed stores in 30-40 lb bags in either granules or powder. It also comes as Coop Refresher in smaller bags for alot more money. It is a miracle mineral like baking soda. It's a desiccant and absorbs the moisture in the poo keeping it nice and dry and easy to clean. It also breaks down the ammonia and nitrogen which keeps the odor almost negligible. Just sprinkle it around like sand and then rake poo out as it dries, adding more PDZ as needed. I keep a dusting on top of anything my birds poo on and then just go in and shake dry poop off onto floor and out the door. And then you can put your bedding and poo doesn't have to be composted before adding to garden. It's already broken down and doesn't burn cron crops. I gave up on hay/straw completely and laid down rubber pond liner on coop floor and keep a thin layer of PDZ on floor and it has cut down the clean up time for me by atleast half. It really is amazing stuff. And I am absolutely in no way advertising or talking up their product for money or anything else. It is an honest opinion from an actual user. I buy it at a feedstock in S.E. Missouri for about $16 a bag. There is also a chopped hay bedding that contains the same mineral sold in feed stores. I only get a few flies now on occasion.