Ready to free range, but....

[Akane]

Someone tell my guineas why they should be afraid of the outdoors. Whenever I let a new group out I spend the whole time following them around cause they immediately run for the wild blue yonder. Once they are turned around they wander back to the coop and then strike off a new direction. If left alone they will just keep going and fail to return. Even if I raise them from eggs mostly in the coop and keep them there for months. Even if they are raised with other poultry that stick around and always return to the coop. I also have a very high incidence of dead guineas for obvious reasons. Only about 1/4th of my first batch survived to the next year and we seem to have doubled that to 1/2 now that we are clipping wings to keep them from roosting in trees.

A redtail can kill a large chicken. They can kill an adult guinea. I'm not saying they can haul it off but those talons can pierce vital organs or rip off heads of poultry and they'll eat them where they land if nothing interrupts them. I've seen them strike and then land to eat bigger game than that in the fields. Technically your guineas are never big enough to be safe. However guineas are pretty observant of hawks. Many use them to alert their chickens and all the poultry will run for the trees or other shelter as soon as the guineas start yelling.

 

[robin416]

Akane, do you use an outside pen? Even if its nothing more than welded wire four feet high set up for the day. It allows them acclimation time for being outdoors. I've always used an outside pen for my keets as they explore the outside world.

 

[cackler]

I have my first batch of keets that I've raised myself that are 4 weeks old. When I'm ready for them to go out should I try to figure out a pen that will enclose them so they can go in and out of the coop during the day - such as how I did for the chickens when they were little? That'll be tough to figure out due to their flying abilities. I'm hoping to figure SOMEthing out so I don't run into the same problems that Akane has experienced.

 

[Akane]

It would be impossible to fence just the keets without fencing in everyone unless they were moved by hand to a pen and back again which risks lots of escapees and still doesn't get them used to wandering outside near the coop on their own. Plus I'm not allowed to put up fences that can't be pulled down in an instant. That's the reason I no longer have chickens. They were getting killed off too often by predators and I can't put up a pen for them. All I have are the guineas because I can keep the breeders in a large building and let the rest wander with less losses than chickens so long as their wings are clipped.

 

[Valley quail breeder]

I keep my Guinea's with my Chickens the coop is a chain link fence and has chicken wire and bird netting on top. I need to build a coop just for the Guineas just havent gotten around to it yet so they can be let out to free range....

 

[featherz]

my guineas free range during the day now, but when they were little (4-10 weeks) I had them in an outside run (and inside coop) with just a net on top so they couldn't fly out. Took the net off when they were allowed to range through the property.

 

[cackler]

I just have a coop with an outside area that can be closed that's about 5 feet high - that was enough to keep the little chickens in while they figured out how to come and go from the coop but not high enough for guineas. Would it work to just bring them out in an outside portable pen (that's around 3ft by 2ft by 2 ft high) a couple of times during the day for a couple of weeks while they're getting used to the coop at night in that same pen? They couldn't learn how to walk in and out of the coop but at least would see where it was?

 

[robin416]

Cackler, what I found with the keets is that when they thought they needed to do a bit more exploring then they would fly over the four foot pen. Once all of them had decided they felt secure enough to fly over and explore then I removed the temp fence.

There is always two or three that are not brave enough to give it a try right away but usually within two days they make the move too.

And since its nothing more than four foot wire in a curve in front of their exit door I can pull one side open to allow the escapees to get back in easily. Hard to explain but it works fairly well for me.

 

[cackler]

Quote:
That sounds pretty much like what I do. That makes me feel better about it all and makes sense. Thanks.

 

[Foghorn Mike]

Since my original post, mine are now free ranging and go in at night. I took Robins advice and let them go in and out the run door and that seems to be working out. However, I ended up also taking off the netting I had on top of the run area. They were flying up from outside onto the boards at top and I didn't want them trying to fly back down into the run with that net up there.