Help my guinea's are picking on my RIR rooster

[swampyacrefarms]

I have 5 guinea's that are 3 months old. I got them the same time I bought some chickens all were day olds, I have been raising all of them together and now my guinea's are picking on my RIR roo. I have tried separtating them, but as soon as the guinea's see him 3 of them run to attack, they will pick on my RIRhen and Buff Orpingtons too. I think I have 2 guinea hens and 3 males and I think it is just the males that are attacking them. NEED HELP... they have my chickens scared to go into bed at night and I do not have room to move them..

 

[sourland]

In my experience once guineas start this behavior ( not at all an unusual behavior for guineas) it is impossible to correct. Once they target a particular bird, they will continue until they kill it - then they will move on to another target.

 

[swampyacrefarms]

if I got rid of 2 of the guinea's will that help?

 

[sourland]

Getting rid of two of the males might help. They tend to egg one another on much like dogs in a pack. I have nevr had problems with them this timeof year (mine were always free ranged), but in spring they can go 'nuts'.

 

[swampyacrefarms]

mine are free ranged too, but the minute they see he's out they run right over and attack. I was thinking of getting rid of 2 in the spring, but may have to now. The guinea's follow my PBR rooster around all day like he's one of them.
Have you ever tried guinea meat? I have heard it's good.

 

[sourland]

Guinea fowl ,to me, taste a lot like ringneck pheasant. The breast meat is not as 'white' as chicken and to me is far more flavorful.

 

[swampyacrefarms]

well they are 3 months old do you think they would be big enough to put in the freezer??

 

[JLeigh]

PeepsCA says they are ready to process at 12-14 weeks. She also says there is less meat on them than chickens, but at 12-14 weeks the meat is tender and tasty.

 

[PeepsCA]

Depending on what they've been fed while you raised them, there's really not much substantial size increase/weight gain after they are 14-16 wks old, at least not enough to justify the cost of feed until they are much older than that and hoping to get more weight/meat mass. And the older the bird, the tougher the meat... sorta like roosters I guess. All that running around picking on everybody makes the birds less tender. I just recently processed a few young bullies (16-18 wks old), who when standing up tall and being cocky in the flock looked the same size as my older males. I did not weigh them before processing, but they were all a little under 3 lbs after processing. Not much meat on them... and 2 of them with a bunch of rosemary, garlic and cut up onion fit fine nicely in my crock pot. They were definitely tasty

and were a lot more tender than a couple of older males that we ate last year were (cooked the same way). I let them all rest in the fridge 48 hrs before I cooked them, but the younger birds were noticeably more tender.

Make sure you get rid of or process the 2 worst bullies tho... or the chickens will still be targets for the Guineas. You could even try putting the 2 you plan to get rid of or process in a large dog crate first for a while, and see if the other 3 birds leave the chickens alone. If they don't, then getting rid of or processing 2 males is not the answer to your problem... IMO you'll need to add more Guineas Hens to your flock to keep the males busy (Guineas do better in larger flocks of their own kind), or you will need to house and free range the Guineas separately from your chickens. Aggression within my flocks here (I do not keep chickens with my Guineas) always decreases once the breeding season comes to an end, the daylight hours shorten and the weather gets colder/wetter, so if separating the worst 2 bullies helps then you may be able to wait it out until colder weather sets in. Come Springtime the males may start targeting the chickens again once the hormones start raging again tho. It really all depends on the individual group of birds...some get over it and work it out, some are relentless bullies/aggressors.