Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Guinea hens

I was at Rural King over the weekend and they had guinea fowl, male and females mixed. We had one take up residence last year for a few weeks, so since we have a few acreas I thought a few would keep the bugs down. Anyway, they were 6.99 each. That seems expensive for a young peep. Is that a covid price? Amish won't sell chicken eggs locally, I guess they are hording them.

They eat lots of ticks.

My folks had them, all dark meat, better than a watch dog for making a racket when someone drives on the place.

Yep. They do make for good burglar “alarms”.

Guinea eggs are excellent too.

My mother said the hens would take the new chicks through wet grass, and they would die. They had better luck putting the guinea eggs under a setting hen to raise.

I’ve had it. Pretty damn good in a stew.

Had Guineas twice over the years.

Both times, they grew up to maturity, then migrated 1/2 mile down the road to my neighbor’s farm.

7 bucks a chick is about right. Eat tons of tics and bugs, don't tear up gardens, hell on snakes, loud as can be, love setting on your roof and cars, and fun to have around

One of the best things I ever ate on safari was guinea breast sliced thin and grilled and served up in a sweet cream sauce with some sliced baked apples. It was unbelievable.

The problem we had with those stupid birds was they always managed to get themselves killed before tick season.

they are good in a gumbo

We had them when I was young, good watchdogs for sure.

My Dad always has Guinea fowl. One time he was losing them more every day. He caught all the survivors in a large dog kennel. Got dark and all the sudden the guinea fowl started going crazy. He shines a spotlight out there and he said the biggest great horned owl he ever saw was standing on top of the cage.

Obnoxious screaming fuggin things. Not a fan. Probably because we used to live on an acreage and one of the neighbours lost his from his "coop".. a 15 minute waste of time building it. Several years later there were about 50 roaming the area if they roosted within 200 yards you could hardly sleep some times.

Some well placed BB caps and a stew pot would’ve taken care of that problem for me...

They got pretty skittish after a few generations, thick fir and cedar forest all around they'd pull the Houdini pretty quick when they wanted to. The odd one did get taken but the rest would scatter far and wide in a hurry.

My dad always told me they were hard to hunt cause they’re smart as whip. And if you shot or trapped them in a certain spot you’d probably never see them there again.

We have them now and have had them in the past. For a farm they are great and they really do reduce the tick population.

In regard to the "smart as a whip". I sprayed, disced, and sowed 20 acres that surround our house a few years back. We had a fair sized flock of guinea then. They started dust bathing all over the fresh disk ground....it burned me up so I grabbed the M2 and started killing. The first 3 or were easy. The next several were on the wing. I couldn't get within a 100 yards of the last couple that were left. They learned FAST and I never got near them again. They got to live out their days.

They've got some thought process going on all right. I'd see them on our gravel road all the time they'd just step off into the ditch or a little beyond feeding and picking grit as you pass them not a care in the world. If you'd try to stop as soon as you started to slow down.... boom all gone in to the bush some running some flying. They also figured out the couple granola muncher types in the hood who wouldn't shoot them and fed off their gardens and meadows a lot. But they didn't live anywhere just roamed in and out of the bush. That was like 23 years ago it'd be interesting to go back and see if there's any still around.