Um, I'm thinking I'd rather have the ticks...

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You can have less! I had 3 for a year solid. They were perfectly fine and a whole lot quieter! Now I have...ummm, 11? 13? 16? something like that! lol
 
I hear ya. My first batch of 8 never did really make much noise. Then last year, I bought 6 more for new blood. One lil girl in there screeched from day one, all the time. Day and night. She still screeches but the last few days she has lost her voice. I had visions that in the night the other guineas took their lil wings and strangled her voice box.
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She does annoy even the others. I will see her carrying on for nothing and then one of the othen hens will get fed up with her noise and boink her on the head with their beak.

I never have heard of a guinea losing their voice before so you can imagine. Its kinda funny, all she can muster now is a faint b'geep.

I enjoy them for the most part, just this one. I told her if she lived ANYWHERE else she would have been dinner a long time ago. Even folks with guineas comment on her. She has recently stopped screeching all night tho. thank goodness.

They have managed my chigger population tho. That is wonderful. My chickens dont eat the chiggers at all. Once they got the ticks under control they started after the chiggers. What a relief, I tell ya. I was wondering how they did it, as i know chiggers arent really big enuff to see. Well one day I was watching them, and as they got hungry and there were less and less bugs in the yard, they would take a long leaf of grass and run their beaks all the down from the root to the end of the grass stalk. They didnt eat the grass, just slide their beaks along the blade like someone eatin corn off a cob. I dont know if all guineas have or know this trick but mine sure do and I love them for it. I imagine its a learned behavior, but it has really got the chiggers under control in my yard. Have to love it.
 
Well I don't know about guineas, but my chickens took my tick population out. I lived in a rural area. We moved in in september. The chicks came in March. By April the ticks were everywhere! I would routinely find about 5 IN MY BED each night because the flea/tick drops on the dogs would make them drop off. In May we began letting the young chickens out, in June they were free ranged by day, penned at night. There were NO MORE ticks in July. Or the following year. That was 16-30 on an acre lot. We now have 13 fenced in the back half of more land and we still don't have ticks.
Chickens are good.
 
I baught my first keets last year. We have a flock of six, three girls three boys. They are moderately noisy. If your keeping guineas for tick control, and are having noise problems ... start by down sizing the whole flock and GET RID of the GIRLS. The girls are the ones that makes the most of the noise.

I was told by the long time guinea keeper i got my keets from that It's really better to keep them in a group of at least 5.

Hope this can help.
 
Personally I don't think chickens do eat ticks as well as guineas, the chickens seem to go after the 'bigger' bugs and the 'digger' bugs more than ticks. I know the first year I had chickens we had ticks so bad that I bought some pesticide to spray on the lawn. Later that same year I bought 5 guineas and the next season there were hardly any ticks. The first few weeks of spring we saw some ticks but nothing like it had been the year before. Now, with 15 or more guineas, we hardly ever see any ticks. 90% of a guineas diet is insects, my chickens, even with full-time free ranging, are always first in line when I put feed in their pans.
 

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