Post by Deleted on Aug 9, 2007 14:42:05 GMT -5
We have had a couple of missing guineas for a couple of weeks. With all the problems Mitra has been having, I was getting a bad feeling about these two. No signs of anything but just not getting a good feeling. Well today we found out why. We now have baby guineas for the first time. I am so thankful that a predator did not get them while they have been egg-sitting. The woman that wrote the guinea book "Gardening with guineas" said that you are supposed to find them and their nest and move them to a safe location because apparently they refuse to get off the nest even if a predator approaches them. They laid a lot of eggs last year and there was a huge nest of eggs but none of them hatched. We are very glad to have some new ones as we started out with 30 and some of them flew off as soon as they were released but we have had 18 for quite a while now. We have had quite a few people stop by our place and ask if we had any babies for sale. I would like us to get back to 30 and then we can start sharing with our neighbors. It'll be interesting to see if we can "herd" them into their house tonight. Apparently guineas don't make very good parents so we are supposed to intervene.
I'll try to post a picture of them later.
Janet
Update: First of all sorry that I haven't posted the picture yet. I will get to it this weekend. In the meantime, some interesting things have happened. A few days after we first saw the babies, their number had gone from an original 7 to 5. We were pretty bummed. We figured it would just be a matter of time until they were all picked off. A couple days later we had 7 again. We just scratched our heads. The parents are very good and they appear to have the support of the rest of the adult guineas. So today......there are 13. The weird thing is is that they all look to be the same age. I thought maybe more had hatched but it doesn't look that way. There was a nest we found but it has been abandoned for a few days now. The parents did have them inside their big house during the day but for some reason have not taken them inside at night yet. She hunkers down near a hay bale and under shrubs next to their house.
And about the "noise". They only go "off" when they feel there is danger. They and the roosters are very good at warnings. They still aren't crazy about bicyclists going down our road. Freaks them out. I keep guineas because they are enjoyable and because I know they are keeping the ticks and Japanese beetles from our yards. I also just like giving them a good home.
Janet
I'll try to post a picture of them later.
Janet
Update: First of all sorry that I haven't posted the picture yet. I will get to it this weekend. In the meantime, some interesting things have happened. A few days after we first saw the babies, their number had gone from an original 7 to 5. We were pretty bummed. We figured it would just be a matter of time until they were all picked off. A couple days later we had 7 again. We just scratched our heads. The parents are very good and they appear to have the support of the rest of the adult guineas. So today......there are 13. The weird thing is is that they all look to be the same age. I thought maybe more had hatched but it doesn't look that way. There was a nest we found but it has been abandoned for a few days now. The parents did have them inside their big house during the day but for some reason have not taken them inside at night yet. She hunkers down near a hay bale and under shrubs next to their house.
And about the "noise". They only go "off" when they feel there is danger. They and the roosters are very good at warnings. They still aren't crazy about bicyclists going down our road. Freaks them out. I keep guineas because they are enjoyable and because I know they are keeping the ticks and Japanese beetles from our yards. I also just like giving them a good home.
Janet