Should I clip their wings?

[Paula McCormick]

We have some guinea keets being raised by our chickens. They are about 4 weeks old and are really developing their wings. Our back yard has 6 ft privacy fences on 2 sides, and one side has a standard chain-link fence. All our neighbors have backyard dogs. We have clipped our chicken's wings before, but don't know if it is something we should consider for guinea fowl. Should we clip their wings to keep them from flying into a neighbors yard?

 

[R2elk]

We have some guinea keets being raised by our chickens. They are about 4 weeks old and are really developing their wings. Our back yard has 6 ft privacy fences on 2 sides, and one side has a standard chain-link fence. All our neighbors have backyard dogs. We have clipped our chicken's wings before, but don't know if it is something we should consider for guinea fowl. Should we clip their wings to keep them from flying into a neighbors yard?

Either that or keep them in a totally enclosed run. The guineas will find the fences to be an appealing perch and will invariably get down on the wrong side of the fence. Once they do this, they will immediately forget how they got there.

 

[EarlJ]

They are adept at forgetting how they got anywhere. Ours routinely walk through cattle panel and then spend a half hour trying to get back out.

 

[BennieAnTheJets]

I am principally very much against wing clipping except in cases of protecting their lives with that with no other options and that seems to apply in your case, unless you keep them in a covered run, like R2elk said.

Sounds like the dogs will kill them if they fly over and, like others have said, they will fly over and be helplessly stuck there at times if they can fly.

I would say, if you decide to clip their wings be careful to do it correctly since I heard you can kill them if you cut too far up and make them bleed through the quill (?) and be sure you can protect them on your side so they don't need to fly up ever to protect themselves. This includes pecking order disputes. Our males will fly up into a tree to get away from a chase if they are exhausted. You will need to be there and watch them and make sure they don't get too exhausted or beat up since you took away their ability to get off the ground. To me it is a bit like tying a person's arms and legs together: if you do that you need to protect them with extra care since they cannot protect themselves anymore in a way that would come naturally to them.

I am not sure if they would ever be able to walk up onto something and then try to fly down without realizing they don't have their flight feathers - I would worry about stuff like that if I needed to clip wings.

 

[yakitori]

Mine are also at 4 weeks, and seeing what amazing flyers they are right now (They are dumb though, and often crash into things, lol!) I have my suspicions that they will scale a 6ft fence easily, even with clipped wings...

Edit: When they feel like it, my 4 wk guineas can fly well above my head...I'm surprised they haven't scaled your fence yet.

 

[KirbyH]

How long after clipping does it take for the feathers to grow completely out? Is the bird’s ability to fly affected by wing clipping (that is after the wings have grown out). It hasn’t seemed to make a difference with chickens or parrots but guineas are their own ball of wax.

 

[R2elk]

How long after clipping does it take for the feathers to grow completely out? Is the bird’s ability to fly affected by wing clipping (that is after the wings have grown out). It hasn’t seemed to make a difference with chickens or parrots but guineas are their own ball of wax.

The feathers will grow back at the next molt.

In my experience, the lighter the bird is, the less of an effect that clipping wings has. Someone else pointed out that guineas can essentially climb a fence while flapping their clipped wings.