Guinea talk.

[MartinsPoultry]

Know what i find totally cute?
My keets nuzzle under week old chicken peeps even though their brooder temps are 95f, they cuddle with them for nap time, hide under the chicks stomachs or wings.

No one is shivering and the box is covered. the chickens seem to love the attention from the peanut flock. Both bantam and guineas are about the same size with larger mixed breed chicken peeps and a turkey poult. I will post a group sleep photo tomorrow morning sometime.

 

[DossFunnyFarm]

Guinas killing young chicks /chickens
we have 4 ducks, 2 guineas, (all bantums) 1 roo ,5 hens, (1 silky left, & 4 batums all about 5 mo. olds so still small) All free range on 3 acres , Our male guinea chases our "babys " , has pecked to death 2 of them. He also picks on chickens but not the ducks. Ok question I have is what can I do to get him to stop? why is he suddenly killing the young chicks??
any thought would be great hate to get rid of him as I really like the female guina (white one) she seems good . Thanks

 

[MartinsPoultry]

Separate the chicks from the adults until they can fend for themselves, or risk loosing all of them.

I'd even go as far as soak him with a water hose when you see him starting to chase them, I know my Guinea's hate being sprayed when in my garden where they don't belong.

 

[DossFunnyFarm]

Guinas killing young chicks /chickens
we have 4 ducks, 2 guineas, (all bantums) 1 roo ,5 hens, (1 silky left, & 4 batums all about 5 mo. olds so still small) All free range on 3 acres , Our male guinea chases our "babys " , has pecked to death 2 of them. He also picks on chickens but not the ducks. Ok question I have is what can I do to get him to stop? why is he suddenly killing the young chicks??
any thought would be great hate to get rid of him as I really like the female guina (white one) she seems good . Thanks

Separate the chicks from the adults until they can fend for themselves, or risk loosing all of them.

I'd even go as far as soak him with a water hose when you see him starting to chase them, I know my Guinea's hate being sprayed when in my garden where they don't belong.

I have spent the morning shooting him with a bb gun (no air in it) so far he stays away,right now I dont have a way of keeping him out of the chicken yard as it open on top, & no were else to put the young ones, he was picking on my full grown bantums this morning & ripped out duck feathers today. He grew up with the rest of them so not sure why the sudden meaness

 

[R2elk]

I have spent the morning shooting him with a bb gun (no air in it) so far he stays away,right now I dont have a way of keeping him out of the chicken yard as it open on top, & no were else to put the young ones, he was picking on my full grown bantums this morning & ripped out duck feathers today. He grew up with the rest of them so not sure why the sudden meaness

Because he grew up with the chickens and ducks he cannot see any difference between him and them. Having only 2 guineas doesn't give him enough guineas to take out his guinea behaviors on and the rest of the flock doesn't understand guinea behavior.

Guineas should be raised with guineas so that they don't imprint on other poultry. No other kind of poultry exhibits the same kind of behavior as guineas do. Your guinea is just demonstrating his natural tendencies. In a flock of guineas he would either be put in his place or he would end up being the alpha male.

He is not going to change his behavior so your best option is to either process him or rehome him to somewhere that has lots of guineas.

 

[MartinsPoultry]

@R2elk is right as well, he does need more Guinea's to live with. I have raised all of mine with Turkeys and Chickens but have had 4 or more at a time. I would keep a close eye on him or prepare for the worse and sell or process.

I have a hen that does the same thing to my younger Guinea male and I have had about enough with her. I will be sending her into the finishing pen here shortly once my turkey and Muscovy drake are freezer ready.

Maybe what else you could do is make a see no touch box for him as a time out spot, capture him and put him in there until the chicks are older.

 

[MartinsPoultry]

Ok so I noticed just a bit ago one of my keets was not acting right. She was lethargic. Everyone was staying away from her. And now I am holding her to try and possibly warm her up and get her to drink. I am fearing the worse with this one. She was our last hatched, still has the egg tooth.

I did have them with young peeps and poults and everyone is fine. I moved the bigger peeps and banties to a different box. And kept the smaller banties with them. What else should I do?

Edit: We just lost her. The entire young flock had her bowl surround and were all crying out in loud peeps, I had it to where she could get out if she wanted to, but she gave up the fight. It's sad as all the keets even this young are crying, smallest bantams are and so are the turkey poults.

I have 11 Chicken peeps in a different box away from everyone I think they might have jumped on her while playing and that's what happened. Those 11 are up for sale in the local trader paper.

 

[GlennLee]

Oh very sorry to hear.... They are vulnerable to so many things as keets. It sounds as though you did all that you could to keep her safe and gave her the best chance for recovery. She may have just been weak from the start and not much you could have done to prevent it from happening, but it's still sad when it does. Good luck with your sale on the 11. They are so stinkin' cute!

 

[MartinsPoultry]

Thanks @GlennLee

Out of the ones we have for sale there are 2 extra we are keeping. 1 is totally blind and the other is her seeing eye chicken. I cannot separate those two.

It is hard, at least she isn't suffering and everyone else is doing fine.

 

[itsasmallfarm]

hello sorry if i sound really dumb but i have a few guinea questions.
okay so i have raised chickens for about 8 months now (and around 100 chicks 40 of them where meat birds) and have had very few loses maybe 7 dead birds (6 where Cornish cross meat chicks), and have raised two ducklings. would i have enough experience to raise guinea fowl? okay so here are my questions

#1 what do they taste like? if i do get them, the males are going to be supper. what age do i butcher them and is it true they taste like pheasant?

#2 can they be raised with chickens? in my book it says you can only not during breeding season. i plan on only raising females (more for fun and some eggs) would this affect them during there breeding season?

#3 how cold is too cold for them? i live in Canada more exactly the prairie provinces, so are summers are +30C and winter are -40C i have a heated chickens coop (where they would live) in the winter it would stay above freezing all year.

#4 and how many eggs does the hen lay a year? i read that some say less then 100 others say up to 250 eggs a year, what would the rough number (or guess) if i collected the eggs every day?

thanks itsamallfarm out