Numida Meleagris chart (helmeted Guinea fowl)

[erthymom2]

LOL..whoever thought guinneas could get uglier!! i will now forever think my regular ones are gorgeous!!

 

[Guinea Goonie]

If you are wondering what the heck my avatar is now ....

It is a skull of a domestic Guinea fowl. Note that the bone structure INCLUDES the helmet. This I did not know !!

AND YES, I CHANGED MY NAME FROM RIMSHOES TO GUINEA GOONIE..........

 

[chseeads]

I didn't know that either....I always just figured it was a fleshy cartilege type thing.

Veddy interesting.

 

[barefootchef]

Thanks for all of the info and pics. I just LOVE the 3 that I have!!!

 

[Guinea Goonie]

What is really interesting is that this thread in only for the "helmeted" Guinea fowl.

There are actually THREE more main groups with subspecies to these.

Crested Guineafowl (Guttera pucherani)

Plumed Guineafowl (Guttera plumifera)

Vulturine Guineafowl ( Acryllium vulturinum)

have not been discussed here.

There are two other groups that are reconized within scientific groups:

White-breasted Guineafowl (Agelastes meleagrides)

Black Guineafowl (Agelastes niger)

Here is a pic of the white breasted, probably will not see this again.

You can do a google search on the three other groups.

 

[chickenwhisperer123]

Quote:
Very Good Information there!!

I actually have pictures of White Breasted Guineafowl on my Website.

http://quail-forum.webs.com/guineafowl.htm
They were donated by a very nice man from a different country. Photographed in the wild.

 

[Guinea Goonie]

Thanks chickenwhisperer123 for the great INFO and PICS.

Wonderful site you have there.

Spectrum ranch sure does a lot of work with some great animals.

I am now up to about 32 Guineas. They seem to get wackier and wackier with the more you get !!!!

 

[Resolution]

Guineafowl are truly amazing creatures.

Imagine a long, single-file line of stilt-legged sharp-edged mummy headed Acryllium, keeping such a pace as to seem as if they might be running in place- on the worn weathered paths of hartebeast and zebra. Their forms seem to vanish within the mirage- that vagary- those shimmering sheets of bending light one sees on a hot day- as moisture escapes from the earth and returns to the sky. Their forms are invisible now as they trot a bit brisker over a grassy knoll and towards some blur of acacia thorn forest in the distance.

They are following herds of hoofstock -foraging in this arid scorched grassland on insects and other invertebrates-small animals disturbed by the locomotion of the mammals - or attracted as is perhaps more usually the case. They subsist on fly larvae, ticks and blood feasting insects. Vulturine Guineafowl may draw all or most of their water during dry seasons from their prey.

Guineafowl are wonderful ground vultures. Sister phylogeny of the Cracid; and the Toothed (New World) Quail, there is nothing on earth just like them but its not difficult to appreciate how ancient they are in the larger scheme of things.