I cannot find where my guineas are laying!!!

[shelleyd2008]

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Totally agree with that. Look for the biggest, meanest briar patch on or near your place. Poke around under it with a stick, and most likely there is where your nest is. Make sure if you do find the nest that you DON'T REMOVE THE EGGS WITH YOUR HAND!!!! Guineas can sense or smell when you have been around the nest, and they will move it! I have a spaghetti spoon taped onto a long cane rod to get the eggs out of the nest. So long as I don't take a whole lot of eggs at once, they'll stay in the same spot.

My males stand guard when the hen is on the nest, chitting and chatting the whole time (guess they want to make sure that every predator within 2 miles knows what they are doing!). Just watch them for a day or so, and you should be able to find it.

And I think it's easier to find the eggs. I went one night to take eggs off the nest, only to find that BOTH my hens were on it! I had almost poked them with the spoon before I noticed, they blended in so well!

 

[Marlinchaser]

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Great in the middle of doing thier business, and along comes the crazy lady poking us with the spoon.

 

[hollyk]

It would seem, to an uneducated person, that the guinea owner behavior is just as odd as the guineas themselves.

Just hatched my first guineas, I have 11 of the cutest puffballs ever. So, I guess nest spring I will be engaging in the same odd behavior.

 

[sweetshoplady]

Here's where mine are laying:

Shelly, I like that spoon idea.

 

[saddina]

Would laytex gloves work to mask scent?

 

[kinnip]

We've been using our hands and they don't seem to mind. Heck, we walk up and grab those eggs while they're still warm!

 

[maine chicks]

Mine did not mind when I took the eggs. I would leave a marked egg in the nest so they would go back to the same spot. Finally a critter got my marked egg and the girls have not been laying out of the coop since. I think that will change after a while but I don't think it will be as easy to find as the last nest.

 

[shelleyd2008]

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Probably not. You would have to get too close to the nest, so your scent would be all around it. A friend of mine told me to do that, said she had taken hers by hand and every time the hen would move the nest. I guess if your guineas are more people friendly it wouldn't matter. Mine have gotten to where they don't run away as fast as they did, but they still don't like me. I'll keep up using the spoon

 

[Sunny Side Up]

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I don't think guineas have a sense of smell, I don't think most birds do. Wouldn't you need moist fleshy membranes around your sinuses to have a sense of smell? I don't think that beaked birds can smell. But there could be lots of other things to trigger their concern if you remove eggs from their nests.

I did like Maine Chicks, mark & leave a few eggs in the nest, or leave egg-shaped rocks, and collect the rest each day. They'd continue to use the nest until one of them decided to go broody on it. The only way I could break the broody is to cover the nest.

 

[shelleyd2008]

Yeah, like I said, this is just what a friend told me, I don't know for sure. She just said that if you take the eggs from the nest with your hand the guineas will move the nest. I think it is more of a disturbance of the nest area, or maybe waiting till there are a lot of eggs in nest before taking them. The spoon works for me, since mine like to hide in a big briar patch. It's less painful that way