Guinea question

[pcrowder]

This is the first year my guineas are laying. And BOY, are they laying! An egg a day without stopping.

Now my question -- do they lay year-round like chickens do, or do they lay for a specific period of time, like ducks and geese do, and then stop?

[bee_pipes]

Depends on what you mean by year round. They'll take a break and moult in the winter. Here that's from about late October/early November to end of December/early January. They also breed like rats - they will find a way to stash a clutch of eggs somewhere and a hen will disappear when the nest gets full enough. She will leave once or twice a day, but pretty much stay gone until she reappears with keets. Ours are lousy mothers. The first year we had a yard hatched clutch, she lost them one by one. Now when we see keets we snatch them up and throw them into a brooder. She does get aggressive when you're snatching her brood, but they forget about them in no time and get back to laying. Right now we have two hens sitting on the pot. The eggs and keets are hardy and have an excellent hatch rate.

The guinneas were the bullys of the playground and pretty much ran things in the poultry yard until we got ducks. The dominant duck spends a lot of time chasing guinneas. He'll never catch one, but that doesn't seem to stop him from trying. He seems to have favorites to chase and will run by other guinneas pursuing the one that has his attention.

We tried locking them up at night and have had some success with it, but for the last year they have been roosting in the tree over the chicken pen. Every now and then an owl will get one, but they don't seem to feed here regularly.

Regards

[momma_to_seven_chi]

Mine seemed to lay better than the chickens, but the ducks beat all of them in egg production.

[Deberosa]

I handle guineas exactly the same way Pat does. My experience has been the same except my mother guineas whack me when I scoop up the keets!

Debbie

[OzawkieKsBantams]

I have noticed with mine that there are more then one hen that will lay an egg in the nest it seem to be more of a community nest. Must of the keets that do hatch that is if I dont find the nest first. Most of them end up dying because the hen will take them through the tall wet grass. I try to find the nest and hatch them myself because as a few have said they are lousy mothers.

Daren

[land steward]

my neighbor just got a couple. Are they always so loud. I swear they never shut up. Is this normal. I feel like going over their and giving them a home in a pot of boiling water.