Visiting Guinea

[jkulp00]

Hi all
Last night a guinea randomly showed up in our yard. It went into our chicken run and ate out of their feeder and tried to mingle with our girls however, it was short lived and quickly turned into lots of fighting. We ended up putting our girls in the run and locking the guinea out. The guinea circled the coop the rest of the day until bedtime, then when we woke up this morning she was out there again circling like she wants to get in and making our girls very nervous.

I wouldn't mind having her around, but I am wondering if guineas ever really hurt or kill hens. I'd hate for our flock to be compromised by this visitor but I also am not sure how to make her go away if she doesn't behave. I don't want to have to shoot her

Ideas to promote happiness?
Jess

 

[Bulldogma]

We have four guineas that pick on our chickens a bit. They think one of our roosters is their mother and follow him everywhere, but they don't care for the other chickens. They'll chase our other chickens, but haven't really hurt them. They all free range together, and our chickens are fine as long as they can escape from the guineas.

Any time a new bird is introduced to a flock, there will be some pecking and fighting. If you don't mind having a guinea around, just introduce them while you're around and see what happens. Let them have some squabbles and don't intercede unless someone gets cornered and it really looks like the other is in "attack" mode.

Otherwise, let them figure out who is going to be "the Boss" and things should settle down in a day or so.

If things don't settle down, try capturing the guinea and take it to a swap or something if you can't find the owner.