Guinea advice needed please

[Leigh]

Greetings everyone - I joined this community specifically to ask this question - I really hope someone can help.

We live in Africa, Namibia to be specific, and have been raising a guinea fowl that we found at a day old, abandoned.

He's now 8 months, and definitely lonely, despite being around us a lot. We plan to release him on a friends farm when he is mature - they have domestic chickens and wild guinea fowl there, but we feel that as a juvenile he is just not ready to be out there on his own yet.

My question is - to relieve his current loneliness, should we get some chicken hens? In our idealistic minds it would teach him to socialise, and then we could take them all to the farm together and he would have some built in friends and be able to choose whether he joins a wild flock, or stays with the humans and the chickens.

We're quite besotted with this little guy (we're fairly certain he's a male). Trying to give him the best chance for a good life
Any suggestions? What would you do?

MANY thanks, Leigh

 

[chrismahon]

That's a tough one Leigh. I have no practical experience of Guinea Fowl, or Pintard as they are known here, but have asked a lot of questions myself about the practicalities of rearing them before deciding against it for the time being. Our neighbour is from Kenya, where the Guinea Fowl live completely wild and roost in very tall trees.

I have seen a small flock in the UK with chickens, but they didn't mix at all. They wandered about as a flock constantly talking to each other very loudly. So I would say they must be in a flock environment with their own kind. They imprint their surroundings very early on, so to get them to roost in a coop has to be done before 4 weeks old. I don't think getting chickens would help. Can you get two more younger Guinea hens to keep him company from the farm where he will ultimately go? My worry is predators -a constant threat here. Where does he roost at night and would two hens be safe with him?

 

[Leigh]

Thank you so much - I think that might just be the answer - getting some younger females, letting them form a family unit and then release them all together in the hopes that they will breed and form their own flock.

We've netted in our entire back yard so he has lots of freedom but is protected from predators, and he's been roosting on a branch we fixed high up on a wall - he seems to behave quite naturally and contentedly - not displaying signs of stress, not trying to escape. We see a lot of wild guinea fowl where we live - massive flocks, but we're reluctant to just dump him in the bush and hope for the best.

Aaaah - it's a tough thing when you rescue a wild bird. Had we left him alone he certainly would not have survived his first night, and now we have to try and make the best decisions for him. Thanks a million for your input - we're now searching for hand reared guinea hens

 

[Poultryman]

Rather than buying some chickens, it would be better if you buy another guinea.