Questions about Guineas. Coop is finished! Keets were moved out today.

[StevenW.]

perchie.girl :

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I just wanted others opinions about pinioning. I've already lost plenty of birds to strays around here. Those dogs are smart and will scare a chicken to where it will stick its head out through the fenceing.......
We finally put chicken wire across the bottom part since we found out what the strays were doing.

Boy I do know that problem. I had a pack of feral dogs come through and terrorize my goats. Crazy lady that owned the place that adjoins my property, let em run because she thought they kept the illegals out. Thank goodness I have high places for them to get and dog kennel panels that surround the yard.
I would love to run field fence and hotwire all around my property. Then I would feel my critters would be a little safer. Then I could get a Great Pyranese or an Anatolian or Kengal to protect the "flock". then follow up with Mr Shotgun. I finally ran a no sight fence around the base of the Goat enclosure. Dogs couldnt see em Goats couldnt see the dogs. (recycled the plastic wall from an above ground swimming pool Bout sixty feet long and three feet high) Running the field fence is the cheapest way to go but even then I cant afford it. I have eighteen acres with an easement road that crosses through it So the job of surveying is really important before I put in a fence. Sigh.... and if I win the lotto I will add a Barn for the horse and goats a real chicken coop and build a new house.... LOL.​

Feral dogs are vicious! I'm suprised they haven't killed the old lady yet.
Yeah, fenceing is getting quite expensive.
The bad thing about winning the Lotto is you have to pay major taxes on it! Dumb government!

 

[perchie.girl]

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Problem with her is she was just nutz..... I am older than she is. We called her the 5150 lady (5150 is police code for crazy). She eventually lost her place to foreclosure (her own conniving did her in) She left those dogs in a kennel on the property when she moved out. The real estate woman had to call animal control to remove them before she could clean the place up to sell it. Those dogs were ruined they had been allowed to form a pack and attack every car that passed by their property. My Geo Metro had tooth prints as high as the gas cap. Too bad they were Queenslands and from the looks of it very well bred.

Yeah 18 acres with a road through was almost three miles of fencing.... what with cross fencing for the horse and goats. The fencing company wanted five bucks a linear foot. Heck I could do it for that with Pipe corral.... sheesh... I may still.

But for the Guineas I am turning the back yard into an aviary. We have mountain lion bobcat and coyote and roaming dogs (not quite feral). Not to mention couple of kinds of hawks and owls. My place was never farm land, never will be. Too hilly Too rocky too hot and dry... and not enough water for all that anyway. LOL.

 

[StevenW.]

perchie.girl :

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Problem with her is she was just nutz..... I am older than she is. We called her the 5150 lady (5150 is police code for crazy). She eventually lost her place to foreclosure (her own conniving did her in) She left those dogs in a kennel on the property when she moved out. The real estate woman had to call animal control to remove them before she could clean the place up to sell it. Those dogs were ruined they had been allowed to form a pack and attack every car that passed by their property. My Geo Metro had tooth prints as high as the gas cap. Too bad they were Queenslands and from the looks of it very well bred.

Yeah 18 acres with a road through was almost three miles of fencing.... what with cross fencing for the horse and goats. The fencing company wanted five bucks a linear foot. Heck I could do it for that with Pipe corral.... sheesh... I may still.

But for the Guineas I am turning the back yard into an aviary. We have mountain lion bobcat and coyote and roaming dogs (not quite feral). Not to mention couple of kinds of hawks and owls. My place was never farm land, never will be. Too hilly Too rocky too hot and dry... and not enough water for all that anyway. LOL.

That's sad she left those dogs to die.

She could at least have to took them to the pound or at least called someone to euthanize them.
If I had tooth marks in my car I would be calling the police and make the old lady pay for damages.
$5 a foot?

That would be way more than what I would want to pay for 18 Acres.

I could never live where Bobcats and Mountain Lions live! No way! (I've watched to much MonsterQuest on the History Channel!

)
That aviary sounds like a very neat project! I love your Percheron! I would like to have a Percheron one day.​

 

[perchie.girl]

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Hopefully the shelter contacted a Queensland rescue group. 90 percent of our shelters here are no kill.

Yep a few years back I had bobcat take thirty chickens over the course of a month and a half. I have actually heard a Mountain Lion screaming in the canyon behind the house. Sounds like a cross between a woman and a peacock screaming with a dog bark at the end. This all happened during the year that we had some terrible fires here in San Diego County. Lots of wild life got displaced and moved in to our neck of the mountains. Thankfully its now back to normal.

But they are still there. Just not so many. Hopefully the Guineas will be a first alert for anything suspicious like that. That's why I want them to be able to fly. My first ten are now in the coop up there I still have 33 here in a brooder..... (I'm living two places right now

) Home is 60 miles away up in the high desert.

 

[StevenW.]

If I heard a Mountain Lion screaming around my house I would be scared sh*t less.

Our Basset Hound scares all the Coyotes away and even killed this HUGE possum trying to get in the Chicken Run.
You would think the guineas would pester a predator if theres a bunch of them.

They spotted a Mountain Lion around here a year or two ago, wouldn't suprise me if it was someones pet that they let loose.
Someone ran over a Armidillo (sp?) last week and it was in the paper. That sucker was HUGE!

 

[StevenW.]

I have everything ready to go except I'm waiting for my check in the mail to get here.
(That will be my Guinea Keet Money!

)

Now the long part is waiting for them to get here!

 

[1MrsMagoo]

One reason guineas are so special.....

This is our bachelor rooster ChiChi with his new "nephew" introducing him to the wonderful world of looking at the pretty bird in the mirror. Uncle ChiChi spends countless hours every day gazing at himself in "His" mirror and does not like sharing with non-guinea folk.

Our pearl hen and her French guinea mate hatched out 18 keets (nest was in a protected area of our horse pasture so I let her sit it) a week and a half ago. Since I really didn't need way over 20 bossy guineas running around we "keetnapped" 16 of them and let them raise two. The 16 were sold to a really nice lady who will give them a good home. Next time, I think I will guinea nap her and take her and the nest into custody rather than my husband and I chasing them around for two hours like idiots trying not to be killed by the parents or their friends and family. Thank goodness we finished before my teenage daughter figured out what was going on, or we would have ended up on Youtube.


Another great thing about guineas is how they run: They puff up their feathers and look like they are wearing either a skirt or long coat that billows as they go. It makes me smile every time.

Also, they are like ants when they come to an obstacle they may have crossed a million times before like a fence: It stops them dead in their tracks. Umm, let's see....stop.... think....panic. Run back and forth for an hour adjusting the level of our eyes so we can look high, then low, then high again. Then when you think they'll never get it...just decide to fly over the darned thing like they should have the first time. Silly guineas.

 

[Okie Amazon]

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Might have picked up some $$$ on America's Funniest Videos



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I love this too!

 

[1MrsMagoo]

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Might have picked up some $$$ on America's Funniest Videos



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I love this too!

Well, it was certainly funny enough to have won. Just imagine a woman with a box of keets cheeping away...a man dodging air and ground assaults grabbing keets pretty much one at a time and three very angry adult guineas determined to stop the keet-nappers.

It got really interesting after he stole the last of them (we originally took all of them). The momma realized that ALL her babies were gone, heard the box cheeping and I was running for my life

Now, I never liked running...I ended up throwing the shot put and discus when I got bamboozled into joining the track team all those years ago in high school (they thought I would be good at hurdles since I am 6' tall....no, but it turned out I was pretty darned good at falling over them). Thanks to my husband bravely using himself as a decoy and running interference, we made it into the garage. The guineas were so ticked off that our golden retrievers wouldn't even go out into their dog yard: They just stood with their heads poking out the doggy door carefully watching.

Then after we reached safety, she sounded and looked so pitiful we decided to let her keep two and see how she did. So, my husband got two babies and we carefully sneaked out the front door and took them to the horse barn in a safe spot. However, we had to figure out a way to get HER into the stall with them. So to help her to find them he had to show them to her and let her hear them...so he got to run for his life this time: My job was to shut the door once she got in.

Much safer and far more entertaining let me tell you......

 

[StevenW.]

1MrsMagoo- That picture is more than cute!

Well my plain on getting those Buff Dundotte Keets backfired...

Either I'll locate some eggs to hatch or will just order some keets from Cackle Hatchery.
I'm thinking Lavendar or Royal Purple?