must be hit by the SS virusI had 13
Last winter I brought in 150 Guinea chicks for tick control at Blue Ridge. I lost 20 to an unknown predator in the brooder. By Early August there were only 6 left.
The guineas had a very strange habit of forming in a flock about 20 ft away from a dog and then sending one out alone to heckle the dog up close. My lab, usually good with poultry, killed one of them. And then he brought it up to me retriever style, thinking, I'm sure, that I'd be pleased.
I enjoyed the racket of the birds. They had a pretty set routine of walking the rows each morning, hitting anything that moved. They started punching ripe tomatoes, a puncture here, a puncture there, ruining a lot of good fruit. We decided they were pecking at moving dew drops. Ever been pecked by guinea? Powerful stuff! Anyway, we ran them out of the tomatoes a couple of times and they started stayig with the beans and brassicas. The DO NOT eat everything that moves, however. But, we did see a fair number of dead harliquins and some other usually inedible beetles laying in the garden and decided that the guineas had killed them and left them lay.
Last time I saw the guineas ws in November. Still 5 of them. Their biggest challenge: the impossibility that anyone at Blue Ridge would think to feed them through the winter (although advised to and 100's of pounds of feed left there)
-Allan
