Tricks to Raising Guinea Keets

Guinea fowl were the very first addition to my farm four years ago. I was complaining one day to my aunt that I couldn't even step out the door without getting ticks on me. She told me that guinea fowl were known for eating ticks. At that point, I had never heard of a guinea before so I checked them out on the Internet. They seemed easy enough to raise and care for so I called the local feed store. He gave me the name of a woman that raised guineas nearby and I called her. She was a very kind elderly woman and told me to stop by at my leisure.

My husband and I decided to go visit her the next day. As we pulled into driveway we saw guineas and chickens scattered everywhere! She gave us a tour of about an acre that had some old barns and lots of small nesting boxes set up everywhere. As we walked, my husband and I asked a lot of questions about feed, grit, housing, and other necessities. When it came time to purchase she told us she sells them for $2.50 a keet. I asked if it was possible to buy adult guineas and she said they would probably fly away and return to their original home. So I asked for just 3-4 keets and she said that I should get at least 10-12 due to the rate at which they get lost to predators. I agreed and we quickly boxed up 12 keets. The ride home was a noisy one!

The keets I bought were only about a week old so I set them up in the house with a heat lamp and regualr starter feed. They were so cute and fuzzy. My young daughter loved them! The next few weeks were full of lessons. First, once the keets get old enough to jump around, regular chick feeders and waterers will not work. Inevitably there was always a keet on top pooping into the feed or water. After a few unsuccessful attempts, we finally fashioned cardboard cones to duck tape to the top so they could not sit.

Second lesson, birds poop a lot! Changing the paper in the bottom of the box everyday was no small feat when you have 12 birds trying to escape. We finally figures out to put LOTS of paper in as layers. Then all we had to do everyday was roll up the top layer.

Third lesson, they always manage to spill their water so cardboard boxes are not the best option. Instead we purchased a $3.00 plastic tote and layered it with lots of paper. The bonus was that when we were done raising them, it could be disinfected and reused for the next batch of birds. This idea was then expanded upon when we taped two totes together in a T shape and cut a hole for them to get through. We then placed the water in one of the totes and the feeder in the other. This solved the problem of the water spilling and getting into the food that had fallen out of the feeder, thus creating much less waste. The keets actually preferred pecking for their food off the newspaper anyway.

Eventually the keets were large enough to be released outside. In the next posting I will give the details of that adventure and how we built a guinea house from pallets.