Guinea fowl

[badgoat]

Hello!

Does anyone here allow guinea fowl to run free in the garden on mobile pest control duty? I have read some good things about them, and would consider them in my garden if others reported that they are great for the garden. My worries would be that they eat beneficial bugs as much as the bad, that they may eat pollinators, and that they may shred the newly sprouting plants. Anyone have experience with these birds?

[Emeline]

I've never kept them myself but some of the farms and small blocks around here have some guinea fowl which free range.  They seem to need quite a lot of room as they're good flyers and will roost in trees, but if you wanted to keep them in a smaller, more confined area and have them go into some kind of housing you could clip one wing.

A friend of mine who has a small flock calls them her watch birds because they kick up quite a commotion if someone comes into her yard and let her know all about it - she says she finds it quite handy. They eat worms, lice and all sorts of bugs - I doubt they can differentiate a good bug from a bad bug though!  I don't think they scratch the ground up as much as chickens do.  Guinea fowl seem to roam and walk more, just pecking, not scratching and digging like hens do. 

Here's quite a good little article I found:

http://www.guineafowl.com/fritsfarm/guineas/

[April]

I have a friend who swears by them. I LOVE the way they look - so odd.

[Crazy Gardener]

I have had a flock of 6 guineas since mid-June.  I let them run free during the day to eat my ticks.  They travel around a LOT, often several hundred feet every hour or two.  They eat a wide variety of insects, and will lightly graze on grass and clover.  They ate a lot of my strawberries and blueberries in my garden, so next year I will need to protect my plants.  I didn't notice them particularly helping to eat the pests on my vegetables, though.

They love to take dust baths, and I have bird-sized holes anywhere they could find dry soil, including in my garden.  They do scratch up the soil looking for insects and weed seeds, but I'm not sure if it's as bad as chickens.  It's very important to lock them up in a secure coop overnight, as they are very susceptible to predators.  I lost my first guinea last weekend, just before sunset.  Probably a coyote, fox, or bobcat.  Found four piles of feathers scattered over 400 feet of my bottomland.

My birds unfortunately don't sound the alarm at strangers.  I wish they would!  I like eating guinea eggs, and may someday eat the birds, too, if I can get them to hatch extra eggs next year.  The Frits Farm web site is an excellent resource.

[Xenopus]

I have only one left (out of 6 this year). 1 died, 2 were eaten by predators because I could very seldom get them to go in the duck barn at night, 2 were eaten by people (delicious). I can't catch the other one, so it is probably bound for a predator too.

I got them for their bug-hunting prowess, and I think it is a myth. Both the dogs got ticks this summer, several times.

They are horribly noisy. But my main complaint about them is that they terrorize the chickens. I have a flock of well-behaved chickens who are laying masses of eggs, and the guineas would just rush in among them and pull feathers out. The chickens would scatter in panic. (The ducks are bigger and don't care.) There was no reason for this miserable behavior because they had access to the chickens' food, anyway.

[Emeline]

Interesting posts everyone.

Xenopus, that's interesting because guinea fowl always traditionally had a reputation as very bad tempered birds so it's intriguing to hear of them attacking your hens!  Not so good for the hens!

Personally I am wary of geese.  I still have vivid memories of being a small child on my uncle's farm being attacked and pursued by a small flock of his geese and being absolutely terrified!

Geese are so beautiful though and guinea fowl are incredibly handsome.

[Suspect Zero]

Interesting posts everyone.

Xenopus, that's interesting because guinea fowl always traditionally had a reputation as very bad tempered birds so it's intriguing to hear of them attacking your hens!  Not so good for the hens!

Personally I am wary of geese.  I still have vivid memories of being a small child on my uncle's farm being attacked and pursued by a small flock of his geese and being absolutely terrified!

Geese are so beautiful though and guinea fowl are incredibly handsome.

Now that brings back memories of getting the crap kicked out of me by a swan when I was young...

[Xenopus]

Now that brings back memories of getting the crap kicked out of me by a swan when I was young...

I was always scared of swans.

The guineas are/were perfectly friendly to humans. They are the only ones of my poultry that I could get near enough to stroke. (Except this last one, which is thoroughly freaked out since his pals have been caught.)

[babushka]

we currently have seven guineas that roam freely around our home. they chase the chickens when we let the chickens out of their pen, but do not pull their feathers or menance them in any way. They are very social, family-like birds. The males take good care of the broody females and the young from day one. They like to climb up on our roof and are very noisy but endearing. They make dust bath holes in the garden, but are not destructive to plants, like the chickens are.

[Emeline]

babushka, that is what the ones I know around here are like.  They seem pretty quiet, docile birds. I think they are very striking.

Re the swans I live near Lake Ellesmere in NZ which is a swan breeding sanctuary.  The swans are just georgous.  When I was a child they weren't protected and I remember going with my grandmother to buy swan eggs off this farm sometimes.  I remember they were huge.  One swan egg took up a whole pan - and they were delicious.

I'm told by those who knows that it is the black swans who are the good tempered ones and the white ones who can be quite mean and vicious.  I've never noticed any difference between them myself.  I go down to the lake sometimes and they are quite friendly.  They'll swim within a few metres of me.

I don't imagine being attacked by a swan would be the least bit fun though Zero.   They're big, powerful birds.  Glad you made it!