Rat Control: Review.

   Something I neglected to say in my Prelude to Rats; I will never sell you the things I'm reviewing; or use the blog as a way to make commissions on sales.

   Because?  Inevitably, such reviews will become warped in the direction of sales.  No matter how pure the original intent.  So; I won't go there.  I will give you a link to the manufacturer, who may very well have an internet sales operation; but you should always be aware that the same item is often available at a discount elsewhere.  Up to you.  I will not be getting anything out of it from makers or sellers.

   Not to make you dangle any longer, this Review is mostly of an "electronic" rodent trap; the Rat Zapper; with a fair amount of extra rat biology and rat trapping information.

   Link in a minute.  Pay attention first.

  An "electronic" rodent trap??  Isn't an electric rat trap like snake oil; a silly con?  (Like those "ultrasonic rodent repellers" - which are a con.)  And what the heck for; what's wrong with the classic cheap rat traps that have worked for centuries?  (Search "rat trap", click "images" if you want an education on varieties.)

   They weren't working.  I investigated the electronic frontiers out of desperation.  I read 30 reviews of the Rat Zapper, on 5 sites; finally finding a couple which indicated genuine knowledge- of rats.  They said it worked; so- in hopelessness, despair, distress; anguish, agony, torment, misery, wretchedness; discouragement, disheartenment (the entire thesaurus entry for desperation); I tried it.

   It works.  Day 1; 3 dead rats.  Day 2; 2 dead rats.  Etc.  With every other trap system I had tried (many, including crazy ones) my best success rates were 1 rat per 4 days, for 3 rats total, perhaps, then tapering to 0.  The rats learned; new trap system needed; repeat.  The Rat Zapper seems to prevent rats from learning- a genuinely spectacular achievement.

   Ok; here's the link; and this is the right time to point out - companies/markets/technologies change -always.  This one has changed its name, in the 10 months since I bought one, and has shifted its business practices considerably; they're now "Raticator".  I still tend to call it the Zapper.  I have hopes their quality has not gone downhill.  At the time I first searched for this kind of trap, the Rat Zapper was my top search result.  There are multiple competitors in the electronic rodent trap business; I have not tried any of the others.  Primarily because this one has been working. 

   Oh, and, Sharon, I'm terrifically sorry I suggested you had rats.  It wasn't you.  It's The Crunchy Chicken; of course!  Mea culpa, mea culpa.  Crunchy - let me know if this helps!

   My expertise: I can claim to be an unusually expert mammal trapper.  I've trapped literally dozens of species, for science, both live and kill traps.  Much of my science trapping was tightly targeted; I knew what I was trying to trap, and eventually caught little else.  I'm good at it.  I also, in the early days here on the farm, trapped for fur, meat, and money.  I successfully trapped raccoons (not too hard), grey fox (harder) and red fox (extremely demanding).  We ate a lot of raccoon back then.  Tastes like lamb, done right; I recommend it.

  I know both traps and mammals; there are still people at the U who think I was/am a Mammalogist.  I wasn't- I worked with mammals as tools to study evolution.  I did research on birds, too.

My Rating :

   Ok, I can probably use your suggestions on the rating system.  I went with the 4 out of 5 stars on the theory that this is pretty common, and easily understood.  Yes; I recommend the thing I'm reviewing.  But there are some details you need to know; it's not perfect.  The stars work ok?  And yes; I'm fussy- you won't see 5 stars from me very often; so 4 is really pretty darn good.

   Basics:  I use the larger trap model; which is powered by 4 alkaline D cells.  It does get mice as effectively as it gets rats.  I currently have no rats; but mice keep breeding, and reappear often.  I currently think I have no mice in the house- for the first time in decades.  Heard one last week; got it. The rats can/will reinvade someday, too.  The batteries are good for a very long time; and there is an LED indicator if they're low.  

   It kills by electric shock.  Ergo- it's dangerous to small children, and kittens.  But- it kills so quickly, that (I think!) the rodent has no time to emit alarm pheromones; so the next rodent to approach the trap is not afraid of it.  (Blood, per se, scares very few mammals- it's the alarm chemicals that do it.)  That is a factor particularly with rats- rats are smart; and co-evolved with humans.  Even a powerful snap trap frequently does not kill instantly- then not only the trap, but the immediate area around the trap may warn the next rodent.  With the Rat Zapper (ok, Raticator), a killed rat shuts the trap off (so it doesn't just waste batteries on a zapping a corpse.)  The other rats will just walk over the killed one, to steal the bait.  Dead rat, bait gone = you still have rats.  Useful.

   My Story: I started keeping poultry here on this farm only in 2008.  A 4 year track record with the birds is not that long.  But- we've been growing various tree crops, including a bunch of nuts, for over 2 decades.  Harvesting, storing.  The nuts mean rodents; and that means I've been tracking rodents very carefully for a long time.  

   Our first line of defense against rodents is cats.  We now have 3 separate populations of cats on the farm; widely separated.  They do a pretty good job, and police around the buildings where we provide some food, and water.  But- cats inside the poultry house- not going to work, and that's where the rats were hiding from them.

  In spite of the availability of spilled crops for 20 years, and cats catching what was available, I never saw a single rat on the farm- until we built a poultry house to over-winter the guineas and chickens.  And yes, I had traps out that would have caught one or two if we had; not just mouse traps that they would walk away from.  In some years, we've had 13-lined ground squirrels become problems, and sometimes chipmunks.  Trap setting was done only in response to damage/losses; never a rat appeared; more than 20 years.  I did know my neighbors (nearest 1/2 mile) have always had rats.  They're corn/bean/cow farmers.  Spilled grain.  Farmers around the world have had rats living with them for at  least 10,000 years; always.

    For the first 2 years we had poultry, they were housed outside in chicken tractor type situations; yes, even in the Minnesota winter.  This wasn't by intention.  We started building a sod poultry house... not really knowing what we were doing, but trying to save money...  With the walls about 3 feet high on the highest side, the guineas and chickens started walking on the walls; foraging among the lamb's quarters growing around the disturbed site- and digging.  It became clear - if closed in for the winter, the chickens, in particular, would peck the walls to dust; unless we prevented them with some kind of hard surface.  Not economic.  Back to drawing board, except it was really too late for construction that year.  So; we tried to keep the birds warm all winter with blankets.  Froze the combs off a couple roosters, I'm afraid.

  When we got a real building up; I noticed rodents starting to dig a bit- inside it, coming up through the dirt floor, I thought - within 5 months.  I thought they were pocket gophers; which I'm very familiar with, since we have to control them in the trees, and I could see them working right outside the building.  (Note: if you're building a poultry house; give it a rat-proof floor; somehow.)

  So I set a trap in the tunnels- inside the building- for a pocket gopher.  This required a fair amount of care, because if a chicken stuck a foot in, and tripped it; it would break the leg, or worse.

   I caught a rat.  A big, mature, male rat.  I was astounded, and had my eyes opened.  And I immediately re-set the gopher trap in the same tunnel - which works great for gophers.  Two days later; I caught a wad of rat hair.  Never another rat with that kind of trap or set.  Educated the rats; a bad idea.  Never, never, educate your rats; you will pay for it.

  I'm not sure which rat I have here; likely the brown rat; but be aware there are multiple species, and it may help to know which one you have.  I've seen rats in Hawaii, running along the telephone lines between houses, that would be too big to fit in a Raticator... even though the Raticator can kill a rat only halfway inside quite effectively.   

   How did the rats find the poultry house, which is a 1/2 mile from the nearest farm population?  I think the answer is "all the ways there are".  Remember they're co-evolved with us; and humans have kept chickens literally for thousands of years.  And wherever there are chickens- there's rat food.  I'm pretty sure rats have evolved to be sensitive to sounds (rooster crowing?) and smells (chicken manure is stinky) - and they learn to explore in any direction where chickens might be.  Getting back-yard chickens?  You WILL have rats, someday.  100% guaranteed.  It's been known even to scientists since 2006 that rats "smell in stereo"; and it only takes them 50 milliseconds to know which direction to move in.  

  I set up heavy boxes inside the building, about 18 inches by 2 feet, with a concrete block on top to keep the birds from knocking it over, and either getting hurt or just messing up the rat trap inside.   Regular big mean snap trap.  Caught 3 rats, juveniles, over 3 weeks.  Changed the type of trap; caught 2 more, over 2 weeks.  Not catching any big adults; and obviously there were adults breeding here.

  At this point someone is saying "Why not rat poison?"  The answer is "poultry", and "dogs" and "cats."  All of them can wind up dead if they eat rat poison- and if a poisoned rat dies on the surface, where cats and dogs can get at it- they can die from secondary poisoning.  It's not terribly likely.  But- do you realize how much money is invested in 2 years of feed, vets, and training for a good farm dog?  Thousands, easily.  Not a risk you want to take if you can avoid it.  But- stay tuned on the poison topic.

   Using poison inside a poultry house; where I hoped we'd eventually be rearing chicks; would be a high risk procedure.  One spill of pellets; one dead juvenile rat in a corner, escaping notice until the birds peck and get access to stomach contents; etc; and you wind up losing the thing you're trying to protect.

  In fact I had not exhausted the basic trap repertoire.  I changed baits; from basic peanut butter to bacon; to bacon/peanut butter mixed; to more exotic nuts and nut mixtures; anise.  I shifted from basic mouse/gopher practice where human scent is of no concern whatever, to fancier fox-trapping practices; using de-scented gloves to handle traps.  That's really time consuming.  I tried several of the "modern" rat traps, which I already owned for attempts at red squirrels in nut crops.  I'm not going to present them all here; there are many, and they increase daily.  The type pictured is  

more effective than most, and has some advantages over the age-old snap trap (its action is very fast, for one thing).  But; after catching 3 more juveniles, it too stopped working.

   

   Though they are terribly inhumane, I tried a "glue trap".  (The animals struggle horribly, but usually do not die- you have to kill them.  Desperate measures, and yes, this is literally war.)  I'd had reservations about it working in the first place, and they were quickly proved correct; the glue is rapidly inactivated by dirt and dust in the poultry house environment.  It's also very easy for a rat to put one foot on a glue trap; then escape, becoming educated.  

  This was the point where I started looking for an electronic trap; a good 3 months into the rat war.  The rats were costing me a huge amount of time and money- food consumed, newly hatched chicks murdered, eggs eaten, setting hens rousted.  At least, the rats didn't touch the guinea eggs; apparently they're too hard for them to crack.  But something had to give.

  I was actually considering my trick of last-resort for pocket gophers; a 20 gauge shotgun.  Sounds crazy; trying to shoot a burrowing rodent, right?  But for the occasional un-trappable gopher; it's faster than anything else; likely only takes 30-40 minutes.  You find the active burrow; open it; set up a chair down-wind and out of the sun at least 15 feet away, aim the gun- and wait.  Without moving; at all.  Keep the gun on the hole, safety off, finger on trigger.  When you see the head; pull the trigger.  Not that easy, in fact; but far faster than 3 weeks of tending traps which never catch anything, while the gopher kills another tree every 3 days.

  Using a shotgun inside a poultry house however- was not an attractive idea to me; for so many reasons.

   Specifics: The "Raticator" is not cheap.  First, it cost me 2 hours of online research, looking at models, reading all the reviews, filtering, then looking for somewhere to buy it I could be reasonably sure would actually send me one in a sane amount of time.  Then it cost ~ $50.00, including shipping.  Did I mention how expensive the rats are?

   The maker's and sellers' "product descriptions" are all the same- designed to sell, and to me, uniformly uncommunicative.  I learned a lot of things about the trap - only after I had used it.  Call me silly; but I would love to know what I'm really getting into ahead of time.  Yes, I could re-write their product descriptions so they would do much better at preparing the users, not harm sales, and improve user success and satisfaction.

   Missing Info #1: this thing is not waterproof.  If you're going to use it "outside"; it needs to be in a strict protection device of some kind; getting it wet will destroy the electronic sensors/controls.  Guess what?  Inside a poultry house is pretty much an "outside" kind of world.  The birds will sit on top of anything you put in the house; and poop on it.  They'll knock it over, peck at it, and try to eat it.  I had that figured out; but in trying to use the same protective boxes I'd been using for the other traps, it quickly turned out they were inadequate; the rats would burrow under it; throw dirt in it- tip it over; and getting it placed was too difficult.

  Fact: a major portion of the design criteria for any animal trap consists of getting/allowing/enticing the animal to position itself so the trap will trap it.  Out of the box, the Raticator would work very well for mice (too big for them to knock it over); or for rats in a clean house or warehouse environment.  In the dirty poultry house; no way.  (I don't care how clean your poultry house is; it's too dirty.)

   Yes, I'd seen this when ordering my trap in the first place; hadn't quite comprehended, now I had to go back and buy one; the "Rat's Nest" (now re-named "Gimme Shelter", and I don't want to know why).  It's a plastic box specifically designed to provide water (and dirt) protection.

  Missing Part #1 - that cost an additional $15 (just a tad exorbitant) plus another 4 day wait.  After receiving my $15 + 4 days plastic box, I realized I could have made my own- just as effective, just as waterproof, with a $2 plastic shoe/bread box, and a sharp knife.  The one provided is not very strong; in fact mine is already cracked on the top-bottom junction.  

  It does, however, work.  Inside the box, the trap is safe from most wetness, and the size is such that it can be pretty easily positioned for the convenience of the rodents.

   Missing Info #2 - it doesn't weigh enough to stay put, though, in any environment containing chickens, dogs, cats, or strong winds.  In order to make it function; I had to put a substantial chunk of firewood on top of it, stabilized by blocking it against the building wall, so birds could hop on, off, and investigate, without displacing it.  Without that- they'd have tossed it all across the room in minutes.

   Operating- I believe in at least following the maker's instructions, to start with.  They recommend baiting it with 3 pieces of dry dog food (no more); and leaving it in place, not turned on, for 3 days, before setting it to kill.  Basically; you're establishing a new rat-feeding station, and the rats learn- free dog food.  Check it daily; replace the dog food when they take it.  The rats are used to your scent being connected with free chicken food already; that shouldn't be a factor- yet.  I followed their instructions.

   Missing Info #3 - the gizmo comes with two LED indicators on top.  A green one, which tells you "it's working, batteries ok"; and a red one, which if it's flashing tells you "dead rodent inside."

   The first time I turned it on, I was waiting/looking for that green LED to turn on.  I had my eye right above it- looking - and that turned out to be a mistake.  There's a pause while electronics boot and circuits charge before the light turns on, then - ow.  It's overpowered; and I had a hard green dot burned into my retina for about 20 minutes.  Now I kind of hold it at arm's length, and observe from a distance. The green LED turns itself off after about 10 seconds; why waste the energy?

   I like the LEDs; apart from that.  There's a flashing mode that indicates weak batteries, or some other fault; and in all the 40 some dead rodents so far, the flashing red has only been mistaken twice; in both cases not for a rat, but a deer mouse which somehow tripped it without getting electrocuted.  For the rats; 100%; flashing red LED= dead rat; regardless of size.  The red light is bright enough it's easily visible through the plastic box.

  On Day 1 of operation; having invested so much time and money, I was of course eager to see if/how/when it worked.  I turned it on during my morning feed/water visit, added 3 bits of dog food since they were gone, and checked it on my way in for lunch at noon- dead rat; 1/2 grown juvenile male.  Re-set; checked mid afternoon- dead rat; nestling female.  Re-set; checked at sundown closing up- dead rat; fully mature male.  Big.

  Folks- that's just impressive as all-get-out.  

   Re-set; next morning; dead rat, juvenile female - and the 3 pieces of dog food were gone; meaning her siblings had climbed over, not indulged in any cannibalism this time, and taken the food.  The trap is not capable of multiple catches; you have to reset it.

   In the next week; averaged 1 rat/day.  2nd week; 1 rat/ two days.  3rd week; 1 rat / 3 days.  The rat population was dropping fast, therefore the longer times between kills.

  Though I'm not a rodent rookie, that was roughly 4 times as many rats as I ever imagined I had- all living under and among my poultry, and consuming my poultry feed constantly.  The feed losses had accelerated so slowly I hadn't quite noticed; but now, suddenly - I was needing less than half the feed.  Saving lots of money.  (The feed bags, of course; had always always been stored inside a metal trash can; mouse tight.  Obviously.)

   Missing Info #4: the trap gets dirty after a while.  Ok; that was actually in some of the reviews, and if you look very carefully in the manufacturer's information, you can find this out- but - you really do need to know this, particularly because the need can be unpredictable.

   The thing works by providing a shock, via metal plates on the floor of the trap.  Frequently, during any kind of death, mammals strongly tend to empty their bladder.  If you're unlucky; and hit a big rat with a full bladder; this can mean a lot of urine on your trap plates, which can dry to provide a hard to see film- which is an electrical conductor.  If the plates are shorting - it can't work.  If it's been a while since you cleaned it (process below) and you get a "false positive" indicator; flashing red, no dead rodent; chances are high you need to clean it.

   Remember that it's not water proof?  Oh, and, sticking your hand in it while there are batteries installed - is a big no-no.  This is a tool for adults.  It's not that hard to clean; but you have to pay real attention to the instructions; and it takes about 12 hours before you have a functioning trap again.  Prepare a bath for water not more than 1 inch deep; use luke warm water with a very slight amount of dish soap- and a bit of vinegar.  Soak for an hour, at least; swish a little, then- rinse - not more than 1" deep remember; get the top wet and you'll likely kill it; then carefully air dry overnight.  The construction of the thing is hard plastic; you can't use heat to dry it.  I've done this twice; it works.

  Yes, it's a bit of a pain in the neck; but compared to all other methods of getting rats; it's still the best.

   Disposal - is easy, just dump the dead rat out; make sure there's bait replaced, re-set.  Since there's no poison involved- we fed the dead rodents to the cats.  And quickly discovered who our best rodent-killer mama cats were; one in particular leaped on any newly available rat carcass, and hurried it off into a corner where her kittens attacked it instantly.  The cats who were casual about it- got little; and guess which kittens get a bit of extra care now and then.

  Missing Info #5 - The zapper did not get the last rats in the colony.

   Rats are not only smart; they are authentically co-evolved with Homo sapiens; which means if we could just outsmart them using our big brains, they'd all be dead long ago.  They've evolved ways around our brain; one of them being - extreme suspicion.

  The zapper quickly caught and killed nearly 30 rats.  Being a trained mammalogist, of course I was recording the age, gender, size of all the dead rats; and what was consistently missing was - Big Mamma.  I never captured a big mature female; and there had to be at least 1, because I sure caught a ton of little ones.  I have a strong suspicion that bit of fur I captured in the gopher trap- may have been off Big Mamma's backside- and the experience triggered "maximum suspicion" in her.  For everything in her world.  I hope it gave her nightmares; but it also made her extremely difficult to catch.

  When the trap stopped catching rats, and no big female was on the dead lists, I started paying strict attention again to the signs of activity in the poultry house; yes indeed, the rat burrows were active; dirt moved, new tunnels being dug.  So; I tried all the tricks; moved the zapper to new locations - changed baits - was careful about human scent - and the rats started burying the trap in chicken litter, expressing their contempt.

  So.  Yes; in the end; I used poison.  Very, very, very, very, carefully; and in full accordance with the law, which is a good idea from many perspectives.

   By law, rodent poison used around livestock and children has to be enclosed in a "tamper resistant" "station".  What my farm supply store stocks is the Tom Cat brand; manufacturer here, with many suppliers.  I already had a couple on hand, used in the crop processing area.  Carefully; moved one into the poultry house, and weighted it down so the chickens would not/could not move it.  An advantage here is that you don't have to touch it again for a week- allowing suspicions to go down - particularly if foolish young rats go freely in, and out (and die somewhere else).  

  Results; I did have 2 rats die on the surface; where chickens might eventually have pecked them.  I was watching closely, and removed them before that could happen.  One big rat died with just its head out of the burrow - another male.  Then a week later - the rat holes I closed and burrows I collapsed - remained closed and collapsed.  And the bait in the poison station was no longer disappearing.  (The poisoned rats are disposed of quadruple wrapped in plastic and buried by bulldozer in the public landfill.  Burying them on the farm is not reasonable; the farm dogs dig.)

  Since I had to resort to poison eventually anyway - why bother with the electronic trap?  Because it's still safer, and any way to avoid poison is good.  If I'd had to kill those nearly 30 rats with poison; the probability that a few of them would have wandered outside the poultry house; and wound up poisoning a dog or cat - gets to be seriously high.  Bad risk; to be avoided if at all possible.  I think it's possible the zapper might have gotten all the rats; if I hadn't already educated some of them to be in "exceptionally suspicious" mode.  And- next time I'm in this situation; I think after 5 rat kills; I'll turn the trap off, and make it a rat feeder again, for 4 days.  Then turn it back on.  Several days of free food should alleviate some suspicion.

  Options not resorted to: gas, and "water traps" that drown the catch.  Sulfur dioxide bombs are available for use on pocket gophers - but in fact they don't work very well, and I would have had to evacuate the poultry for a week; an extreme option.  Drowning traps for rats are large- require a lot of maintenance really, are disgusting to empty, and also give no guarantee of getting the suspicious ones.

  Business opportunities/improvements - Getting into the rat trap business is not recommended; the competition is fierce, and driven more by "cheap" than by "value".  The improvements/options I would love to see, and would pay for, in an electronic mouse trap are primarily water related.  It would help enormously if the electronics could be waterproof.  Encased in epoxy, maybe?  And; if the bottom, which will always need to be cleaned - could just come off for cleaning.  I know; electrical connections need to be maintained.  Still; not impossible.  And third; if a serious weight could be added to the bottom, to make the whole thing a bit less movable.  Those could be options; the trap as it exists is extremely well suited for use indoors, in attics and warehouses; where rain is not a concern, nor puppies etc.

  One last reminder- not at all compatible with small children.  The shock kills big rats; instantly; what it would do to a curious toddler we do not want to find out.  Likewise, any small curious kitten (or kitten-sized pet) is at risk.

  So - there ya go.  Review #1.  What did I forget?  I know you'll tell me.  : -)

  And; policy - I'll insert your fixes into this review, rather than post updates.  Better if we keep all the rats in one trap, I think.  Like the refrigerator posts - there are about 8 so far.  Messy!

  Ok, next post, likely to be a good short rant, on something not reviewable.  This is hard work- but - I hope - worth your time.

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Addendum: 6/23/13.  Our poultry house is still rat-free.  For now.  But the rats remain my mind, and likely yours, if you've had the problem ever.  Today's Washington Post has an article about the rat problems in Baltimore.  I have to admit- it ends primarily noting the broad adaptability of - humans.  We may be more adaptable than the rats.

Parenting is hazardous to your health.

I was mortified to see that my "previous post" on poultry was - over a month ago.  I'd been intending some updates on our guineas, etc, right?  Hey, it was hot.

But, also; about 2 days after that post - chickens started to disappear from the two "tractors" we have going.  So I got preoccupied with tracking down causes, before updating; then... hey, it got hot.  : - )

It was particularly painful/frustrating/infuriating to lose birds because I hadn't lost any; not one, for months.  And zero chicken losses from the tractors, since moving birds out of winter quarters.  We did lose a few guineas immediately after the winter to tractor transition.  That happens.  The guineas are just a little too likely to take off on their own, and simply not come back.  We're hoping to select guineas that are better about that, eventually.  But the numbers had been stable for a long time.  Then, suddenly- 1 or 2 hens a day; failing to come in at night.  Long searches of their range usually failed to show either birds sitting on eggs or piles of feathers.

There were a couple piles of feathers, however; unequivocal proof of predation.  Both guineas and chickens have a "shed feathers" reflex, in response to fear of predation; suddenly their feathers become very loosely attached, and fly everywhere.  In normal predation circumstances, that might be expected to save their lives, once in a while- leaving the predator distracted, or with only a mouthful of feathers.

It can also help the forensics on the farm.  Got a big central poof, with a few feathers in all directions out to 10 feet- then nothing?  Probably a hawk or owl.  Big poof, then another poof 5 feet away, then a trail going in one direction for 30 feet?  Probably a mammalian predator.  Note the "probably"; lots of variations will happen.

But when the thief took my big Cochin rooster, Thor- with the 40' trail; that let out not only avian thieves but most wild mammals, and focused suspicion on - the farm dogs.  Sigh.

Daisy, alas, was looking guilty when I asked her "Have you been after the chickens?"  You think they don't understand?  I think they do.  We're down to two dogs, these days; Daisy's sister Schatze fell victim quite some time ago to her unbreakable desire to chase cars.  And Theodore, now far from this puppy.  Both have been trained, intensively, to behave themselves around poultry.  And both had been allowed totally free access for many months; with no indications of problems; on the contrary, both dogs accompanied me as I tended the tractors and birds- both dogs and birds behaving as if there were no tensions here at all.  But.  Daisy was now looking... shifty.  And we were down 7 hens at this point.

So; both dogs went on chains.  During the day.  Thankfully, and sadly, the birds stopped disappearing immediately.  Dogs were set free as soon as the birds were shut in for the night (our standard practice to prevent them from quickly become owl-chow), then put back on before letting birds out in the morning.  They weren't happy during the day; but are well trained enough that putting them on chain in the morning was easy- just call, they come right to the chain, not looking cheerful, but unquestioning.

After 10 days with no poultry disappearing- I let Theodore stay off-chain all day, trepidatiously .  Of the two dogs, he's the stay-at-home, oddly; usually males roam more than females, but our current two work the other way round.  And - no birds disappeared.  Sigh.

That would seem to be pretty convincing evidence. And I'm pretty convinced.  But.

Alas, there is more than one threat to free-range poultry.  This was a guinea.  And the cause in this case was- newly hatched babies.  Spice was out early, and found 5 newly hatched baby guineas (keets) running about.  She captured them, of course.  We have about 10 farm cats at this point, and while the adult poultry are cat proof; baby birds are irresistible cat morsels.  They have to be protected, at least until they can fly.

Only 5 keets were in evidence.  After catching them (no small feat) and bringing them in, she went back to see if there were more keets, previously hiding (or perhaps not hatched yet) - 5 is a very small number for a guinea clutch ... and found instead, this poof.

Almost certainly, a Cooper's Hawk.  We see them pretty often; and generally like to; they catch mice and bluejays.  Usually the poultry are too big for them to attempt; but if they're really hungry; they may try.  If they try, they'll pretty certainly succeed in killing the chicken, even if they can't carry it off.  The guineas rarely are caught, they're too wary.

Unless- they're new parents, or protecting a nest, and distracted.

A few days ago- we had 2 more poofs show up, in the woods.  Poof 1 was- an Araucana hen who'd been missing for weeks- presumed eaten by Daisy.  But, nope.  She'd evidently gone broody, and started sitting on a clutch of eggs, in the woods.  The timing of the poof- just right for the eggs to have hatched.  And the hen to have become hawk food, while watching the new chicks.  Poof 2 was- the Araucana hen who had been proven our best foster mom.  Probably- when the original mom disappeared, the chicks started calling; and the 2nd hen's maternal instincts called her into the woods, to also encounter the hawk.

Pretty sad.  No way around that.  These were birds I'd known for years, as individuals.  I miss them.  And I feel guilty that I somehow let them down- I wasn't able to provide them with a safe place, or a safe way, to be parents.  They'd survived just fine- for 3 years of free range - until there were unprotected chicks in the picture.

Still working on figuring out how to protect them in the future.  It'll be work.  But the benefits the birds provide are pretty clear.  (I'll make a list, one of these posts).

Meanwhile.  At least, the 5 keets are protected, and being tended by an adult guinea.  I'm pretty sure this bird was NOT one of the birds that hatched the eggs, but she responded strongly to the keets calling, went into the cage I set up, and now broods them when they get a little cool.

They're thriving.  With no heat lamp.  Life goes on.  For some.

Daisy is now resigned about being on chain all day.  But the reality is, we need her free, 24 hours, guarding the farm.  Particularly since we've now got reports of bears, nearby.  More work ahead, one way or another.

Chickens And Guineas And Eggs, Oh, My.

I  do have a life outside of fretting about Fukushima, really I do.  Older readers here will remember I started a series of posts way back there when I launched a guinea fowl keeping project in 2008, the Guinea Saga; with a Part 2, and a Part Trois a year later.  I think that was about the last update.  Sorry about that!

I've been intending to take up the topic again for months now; the primary reason I haven't being - it's turned into a big topic.  I've learned a lot.  And as always happens, much of what I've learned is how much there is to learn, and how much of it not only I don't know; but nobody knows.  Tackling all that has kind of intimidated me.

Today has provided the key bit to kick me over edge though; I mentioned my chickens over on the NYT, and thought you might enjoy seeing that.  It's in a Green Blogs post on water.  Do take a look; it'll bring you up to date on what we're doing here just a bit; besides being highly educational on the water thing.

The article states that "It takes 52 gallons of water to produce one egg" - and that stimulated my response. Sure, I'll easily believe industrial eggs use that much; but - any version of home/local/free range certainly won't be even close to that.  I'm guessing I pump and carry about a tablespoon of water per egg.  Putting those calculations on an honest comparison basis is beyond me, of course; but the basic facts have to be pretty obvious; industrial production is going to use way more.

To re-launch the topic, I think it will make sense for me to just list and outline where we are now.  We started with 30+ guinea keets, in 2008.  Six of those birds are still alive.  They're our wise old survivors.  All together, we now have about 55 birds; about 34 of them guineas.  Three roosters, and about 16 hens of 3 breeds.  I have a database.  Most of the birds have numbered aluminum leg bands; and about twice a year they get weighed, as a measure of basic health.  The uncertainty in the numbers comes because a few are "missing in action" at the moment; I suspect they are sitting on stolen eggs somewhere.

The majority of the birds are "out", divided between two chicken tractors which are about 1/4 mile apart.  Every morning, they are let out of the tractor, and are absolutely free to roam.  Boy, do they roam.  We see them 200 yards away, and more, daily.  Just before sunset; I go out and call them to me- using a half cup of white millet and about a quart of layer crumble per tractor as training bait, to get them back into the tractors for the night.  The main reason for that is - foxes etc. for the chickens, some of whom don't fly much; and owls for the guineas, which will roost high in the trees if you're 10 minutes too late.  A few birds remain in the big permanent chicken coop, built to winter the birds.  The idea of building a soddy coop definitely did not work out; but at least it's semi-earth sheltered; making it cooler in the warming summers, and warmer in the winter.

We do collect the eggs.  We have way more than we can eat, but not really enough to make sense to try to sell.  And of course, both chickens and guineas frequently hide their eggs, and I definitely don't find them all.  Working on that; I'd rather harvest that resource, and the hidden eggs are also an encouragement to predators to hang around.

The bottom line- it's worth while; we intend to continue, and even expand.  The details on why and how though, are complex.  I'll be writing more, very soon.

Plugging away; and, Guinea fowl...

Hi, folks.

Hopefully, I'll be writing more regularly again. We just had a big pile of "stuff" all at the same time, over the past weeks; leaving me with very little energy.

I come back here though, because of you guys. Some of the "stuff" was hard and depressing (of course- it's life) but it cheers me up to check back here and see that my readers stick- and in fact even slowly increase, even when I'm not writing actively. It's nice to be listened to.

One of the things slowing down my return to regular writing is the huge number of things that need writing about. Way too many. Too many of which are downer type things that I don't just want to dump on you. (Like, for example, the really great news from Japan this week; that they will be starting to actually try to tap deep ocean methane clathrates, opening up an entirely new, and huge, can of fossil fuel worms for the world.) Not going there, at the moment, you'll have to fret on your own.

I've got brain overload; and I've been reluctant to just pass it casually on. Not helpful. But then, in comments on my last post, Tickmeister asked for "useful guinea fowl information" - and that triggered my avalanche.

First of all, Ticky, do search the blog here for "guinea"; there will be quite a few posts, with a bunch of information. Start there. What I wrote is still valid. (Well, except for the part where I said "we've solved all these problems..." oooh, embarrassing, that one.)

But; I did leave the entire enterprise hanging; promising "more soon", and failing to deliver. The problem was the "more". There's too much "more"; and most of it is murky. I hate putting out non-information, it's a pet peeve of mine when I have to sift through other people's crap: "We just got guineas last week, and they're the greatest! You need to get some now!" Yeah? How'd that look at 2 years? Silence.

Quick summary on guinea fowl: We've had them since 2008. I think 4 of the original birds are still alive and well, and I value them highly. We've got a total of around 30 now. We're intending to try to hatch a lot more this year. But then; we tried to hatch a lot more last year- and failed completely.

They're a good animal to have. They are, however, not chickens; something people insist on and persist in forgetting, constantly. If you want to keep guineas, and benefit from their company- you have to pay attention. Every day- just like all other livestock.

There are a lot of ways in which they are less trouble than chickens- when they are out free range, they find about 90% of their own food. They're good at surviving predators; both mammals and hawks. We still think they're promising.

But...

Ok, see; way too many "buts". Not for the guineas; for me. If you're thinking about keeping guineas- I'd encourage you to try them. They can be worth it. But. A great amount of the information on exactly how/when/what etc. that's available - is iffy. At best. "Guineas behave thusly..." is likely only half true. My own version of the various aphorisms regarding half-truths: "A half-truth is the most durable of lies."

And. Do I have time to write the monograph on keeping guineas? Not today. Besides; at this point in my relationship with them- I'm mostly aware of how much I don't know.

Which at the moment is my feeling in regard to the entire Universe.

So, cheer up. You're not alone.

:-)

I have issues.

Smidgen, who is in kindergarten now,  came home a day ago and announced that "Troy still has talking issues."

Which cracked me up.  I love the way our language changes.  "To have issues" is not that old a phrase; goes back only to the 80's, I think, and was unknown before then.  Now it's become this powerful and universal explanatory.  I love imagining exactly how it bounces around in the kindergarten room.

I have issues, at the moment.  We've had this momentary karma crash, apparently.

While my health is currently not an issue, everything else is.  Our poultry, both guineas and chickens, are disappearing, at a really alarming rate.  Something is eating them (the piles of feathers attest) but we can't figure what.  Have to figure it out.

Our tree crops are dropping like crazy; and we can't pick them up fast enough.  And- we got clobbered by the flooding rains a couple days ago; with more on the way.  We only got 4 inches out of it, not the 10 some neighbors did.  But when you're picking stuff up off the ground, and the ground is mud- it's not good.

The storm was what our grandparents would all have called "the equinoctial storm".  Smack on the equinox, this time.  They all new/believed that you can expect a major rainstorm event every year, close to the equinox.  Lots of mysticism about why; but for our location, my 30+ years of watching tends to affirm their opinion.  The balance of sunlight has shifted from light to dark; the weather shifts too.

Besides pounding crops into mud, we got hit by a karmic lightning bolt.  Well, the surge, anyway.

For decades, it's been my rigid practice to unplug everything during lightning storms.  After frying 8 (no exaggeration) answering machines, it seemed the best practice.  But.  This time, the DSL connection was left on; and my computer was connected.

We heard a very loud POP from the direction of the DSL, and every circuit breaker in the house tripped. The thunder roll came a couple seconds later; this wasn't a hit on the house.

Took a while to figure out what and where.  After resetting all the breakers; the DSL modem; and my computer, were stone dead.  The surge evidently got into the DSL line, evaded all their protections, then via ethernet wire into my computer, then into the power lines, and "poof".  Lighting does anything it wants to, is the actual physical law.

I was really pretty dismayed to discover how dependent I've become on the computer and the web.  It's a chunk of my life; and when it's not available, things get out of kilter.  How the hell am I supposed to plan what to do when I can't look at the radar loop?  Or when that urgent email conversation is disrupted?

I used to, of course.  Changing back is strangely difficult, though.

Meanwhile.  More rain on way.  Gotta get crops in.

No, it's Summer.

  75°F yesterday, today, and warmer tomorrow.  Last night, for the first time since late October, I let the fire in the woodstove go out.  We'll need it again, I know- but not for a week or so.  I'm glad we're not making maple syrup this year, and very sorry for friends who were counting on it for income; I think there have been around 3 days with the necessary temperature arrangements for full flow (25° at night, 45° day.)

  Just like that, poof.  Not terribly unusual here, actually, but a shock to the system  A week ago I was walking with the YakTrax, on 1" of mud over ice; now I have to remember to widen my stride- no ice anywhere.

  And- we've had no rain in March; so it's unusually dry; farmers getting worried; and there's a desperate shortage of rainy days, in which to do rainy day chores.  Like blogging, of course.

  One of the incessant chores- training the two puppies.  Which I promised pics of long ago- here are a couple:

  This is Schatze (click for bigger).  Back in the first post on these puppies, Belinda referred to the German Shepherd part of these pups as "German Shedder" - and I freudianly misread that as "German Shredder".

  I think I was accidentally correct.  And Belinda was  too, of course.  Here's the other of these sisters:

This is Daisy.  Daisy looks exactly like one would expect a Collie x GS to look.  They're from the same litter, but Schatze is different- she looks more like her dad was a Doberman.  We keep intending to ask the shelter lady if there was a Doberman hanging around at the right time.  It's possible for pups in one litter to have different dads, yes?  You can't see it in the pic, but Schatze has a tail that curls tighter than a husky's; cute, but I'm constantly wondering where it came from.

  They're both very promising; very affectionate and wanting to please, and as obedient as they know how to be.  They're still on chains when the birds are loose; not quite willing yet to trust them entirely when they have the chance to romp and chase and "play" with the birds.  Daisy has needed very little correction around the birds; seemingly willing to just look on, once it was explained she was not to chase.  Schatze needs a little more, but not all that much.

   The training is something you can't shirk, of course; has to be done, now, if they are ever to fit in and do what we hired them for.  And the sooner they're off the chains, the better all around.  They tolerate it fine; usually just lie down in the sun and sleep- but- they are shredding everything they can reach.

  off to work.

The Guinea Saga 3.1

SEX!

That, incidentally, is what you ask your subjects to say when you are photographing people; not "cheese".

Works every time.  And some of the resulting photos are good for blackmail.

So far as I have been able to tell, all the guinea experts out there keep saying that distinguishing male from female guinea fowl is just plain hard.

What they come down to is; the males "tend" to be a little bigger than the females.  The males' wattle "tends" to be bigger than the females.  And only the female makes the distinctive "two-note" call, variously described as "buck-wheat!"  "good luck!"  or "come back!"  I'm afraid it sounds to me like "ba- gawwk!"

All of those things seem to be true- but rarely will they let you look at a bird for 10 seconds, at 20 feet, and say "that's a male."  Or female- since they definitely are not ba-gawwking all the time.

There are multiple reasons why you would like to know the sex of your birds; if you're keeping them primarily for eggs, it's simple- the males don't lay any.

:-)

Or if you're keeping them for meat- you want to know which are the young males, so you can regulate the sex ratio in the permanent flock.  Etc.

They don't grow a noticeable difference in size of wattle or size of bird, until after you may be wanting to choose some for meat.  And the ba-gawwk is very temporary.  "That one is female!"  you know.  Until you turn your back, and she mixes into the flock, and stops calling.  Plus, the fact that this one is female, does not mean that one is male.

It would just be really nice to be able to tell.

I once did a summer-long formal ethological study of black terns- a circumboreal freshwater marsh nesting species.  I'm also the only person I know who has ever raised common terns to adulthood from the egg; or who has fledged, raised, and released a clutch of chimney swifts.  Point being- I've spent a lot of hours looking intensely at birds.

The more I watch the guineas, and read up on them; the more convinced I am that - nobody has ever spent much time looking at the behavior of these birds.

Lots of people call them "dumb"- and I see no evidence of that whatsoever.  They aren't people- or chickens.  They're guineas, and pretty darn good at it.  Probably better at being guineas than chickens are at being chickens.  If you can follow that.

So- I was saying this to Spice, and discussing what we know and don't, and got her looking for new clues to the guineas too.

And probably because she is NOT a trained bird person- she saw one.  She described it in a silly, unprofessional, girly way- "I think the females have this hump on their back!" - which made no sense at all, to me.

After some weeks of trained, professional observation, I can state- the females have this kinda hump, on their back.  :-)

Here is a bunch of guineas - and as you can see, there's not much to differentiate.

Below is a male.

And here, below, (Fanfare noises)  is a female; showing the "hump".

There is, of course, no "hump" (silly girl, birds don't have humps!)  What you are seeing is that the male folds his wings high; on top of the rump feathers (that's their technical name), so the the rump feathers are concealed;  and the female tucks her wings under the edge of the rump feathers; so the rump feathers fluff up and are - if you're looking- emphasized.

Above is a lavender male, and his purple female mate;

And above here is a pearl male, and his lavender female.  Obvious as all hell, ain't it!  Except, as far as I can tell, nobody has ever noticed it before.  Until Spice did.  I was busy looking at their heads- because that's commonly where gender differences appear.  Spice didn't know any better so the damn fool just looked at the whole bird.

Hm.

:-)  Smart girl, my Spice.

Next question- yeah?  And how consistent is this?

The answer seems to be- pretty darn consistent.  Depending.  In the morning, when the birds are first let out of the coop- it's 100%.  Really.  At noon, it's around 90%- a few males are holding their wings lower.  And in later afternoon, it starts to look like all the birds may be female.  But if you watch; you'll see some birds shifting their wing position from female to male- and some birds that keep their wings in the female position.

Once you're used to seeing it- it's really obvious; and extremely useful.  Take a look at photo number one up there now- 3 females; 3 males; really obvious; interesting formation.  You can learn to automatically factor in the time of day, state of the birds.  Since seeing this; I'm now of the opinion that when the birds are first released, they do not form pairs immediately, but rather spread out kind of chaotically, with a huge amount of male-male chasing going on.  A few hours later, I see all the birds in male-female pairs.  Female in front when calm; male in front when agitated.  A couple hours later- I see a lot of single sex small groups - 3 females foraging together; 4 males and one female off in a different direction; no chasing or fussing.

I'm kind of longing for a day when I could just take my binoculars, and notebook, and watch them all day; seriously.

Looking at some older movies of the guineas, it seems that before the helmet and wattles appear, they're not showing this sexual variation in wing position; so how useful it is for sexing young birds remains to be seen.

It varies with the time of day.  And age.  I'll bet it varies with the season, too.  We'll see.

------------------------------

Update on the eggs; we're still getting 3-4 new eggs a day; and it seems they are spending more and more time sitting on the nest; today, the eggs have been quite warm when checked, all day.  Yesterday- not so much.  As soon as they are sitting seriously, we're going to swap in a set of fresh eggs; all guineas; and all laid in the coop after the sitting started.  Doing a little selection for laying where it's convenient.  I'm pretty sure some of them are laying in another nest- not in the coop.

It's possible it's our fault they started going "broody".  Somehow I didn't get it that one of the reasons for collecting eggs multiple times a day can be to help interrupt broodiness.  We did, when they first started to lay, collect 3 and 4 times a day.  It was such fun!  Then- of course it got to be a chore.  And we wound up collecting once a day, a couple days in a row.  Why not?

Because- visual cues are known to cause hormonal shifts in birds.  When we collected 3 times a day; mostly the birds were looking at 3 to 6 eggs.  When we collected once a day- for most of the day they were looking at 8-12 eggs.  And that might quite easily be enough to trigger broodiness.  "Full clutch; time to sit!"

A Guinea Wench In The Works.

Oh, Mama Nature can get ticked, once you open you mouth and say "I kinda think I understand this..."

Our avalanche of guinea eggs is down to- a trickle.  Maybe.

Here's the actual daily numbers for the last 12 days; 8,6,9,7,9,7,8,9,7,7,4,4...?

Because.  We've got a guinea hen, "setting".  Right on top of the one and only nest they were laying in.

Now what?  Well, two things; I've set up two other possible nest tub type thingies in the coop, though it makes it crowded; and put nest eggs in there.  So far, no luck; and the nest eggs are often found 1 or 2 feet away from where I put them.  And; it seems the other guineas are continuing to successfully add eggs to the clutch in the nest- though not the 7-9 we were seeing before.

I'm afraid I have reason to suspect the other eggs are going into "stolen" nests- hidden somewhere.

The female doing the real "setting" so far seems to always be a "royal purple" (what we have now are 6 lavender, 5 pearl, 4 purple).  She is NOT on the nest all the time; but she has come back and started setting a couple times, after we found her off the nest.  Maybe she's warming up?

(click for bigger)

This is a really crappy photo, through the wire, so as not to get too close and spook her.  She sometimes sits tight, and sometimes spooks, right now.

And I just saw a lavender; and the pearl below- hanging around the nest looking very suspicious.   Or auspicious, perhaps.  Yesterday when we first saw purple setting, I found she was only on 7 eggs; so I added 3 more fresh ones to make 10, which looked to me like enough to sit on.  Our guinea eggs are really not that small.

10 eggs above-

(click for bigger)

If you look really carefully under the pearl momma, you can count 9; (again, crummy photo- didn't want to use flash, so wound up with slow shutter) and in another, even worse photo, you can count 11; and it's pretty clear there are more hiding behind the bird.

All of which means- we have more to learn about managing guinea egg production- over the entire season, and integrating hatching some into it all.

I guess I'm not really surprised, or disappointed.  But dang, it was nice when it all looked so simple.  

:-)

The Guinea Saga, Part Trois.

In order to understand this post, it might be a good idea to go back and read the earlier bits;  The Guinea Saga, Part One and Part Two.  And maybe the bit about where have all the chickens gone.

In a quail's eggshell; we've been experimenting in a modest way to see if we can integrate guineafowl into our other operations here.  The potential benefits: they may eat a lot of ticks (which we were having huge problems with), they can eat weevils, once grown they need little care, they nearly feed themselves, they serve as watch-dogs for all others on the farm, they can lay useful eggs, and might provide meat; potentially enough for serious sale, if we really scale up.  Like to running a couple flocks of over 100 birds each.  No problem marketing, we've already had pleas from top white-tablecloth restaurants.  Everybody who eats them says they taste like you wish chicken tasted.

The known downsides to guineas: they strongly tend to hide their nests, so you can't gather eggs without a lot of work; you can barely tell the sexes apart for flock management; they can be difficult to catch when you want to; they can be NOISY- i.e., think a flock of 40 geese.  And I'd add; there's a dearth of local experience to draw on; lots of old farmers kept a few guineas around here, but they never bothered to look for eggs, and are shocked that anyone would eat them.  Originally they were kept as hawk watchers for the chickens, but gradually they just became ornamentals and pets, in a way.

Cutting to the chase- we've solved all these "problems."

(click for larger)

We've got 100% of our guinea hens (which would be 7) laying daily- all in one nest- in the coop.  Our two chicken hens lay in the same nest, somewhat less reliably.  There are three hens eggs in the photo above; the white one is from the last commercial eggs we'll be buying for a long time; and was graded "Extra-Large".  The egg from our one remaining Dominique is plain to see; the egg from our Banty Brahman is less easy to pick out; virtually the same size as the guinea eggs, but less pointy.

And this is our situation, a week later.  We've got more eggs than we can eat.  This is 3 dozen guinea eggs, our current arrears.  For the last weeks, the birds have been totally consistent.  Every day; every egg; in one nest; in the coop.

If you know anything about guineas, you should be a little surprised about that- we sure were.  Most guinea operations which collect eggs work with birds that are totally confined to coops or fenced runs.  Our 15 birds are turned loose every morning- and are completely free range all day; plenty of opportunity to lay eggs far away- yet they come back to the coop to do it; mostly between 9 AM and 4 PM.  They wander freely over about 25 acres; grass, brush, and forest; and could wander further if they wanted to.  Yet they come back to lay.

When they first started laying this spring, they did not all lay in the coop.  I enticed them; using that most powerful tool- homework.

Ok, I'm kind of stretching on the homework, since I'm including all the work I did for my PhD(idn't) minor in Ethology- but basically, I took what I knew, and put it together with what other people knew, about other birds, and tried it out- and it worked.

There are hints about most of what you have to know kicking around; but they're really sparse hints, and not all in one place.  Basically- a nestbox built for a hen does not suit a guinea.  They want more cover.  Some recommend a triangular box, and creative placement.  I went a little further, and dug out information on what wild guinea nests look like.  No photos I could find of true wild birds; and scanty descriptions- and contradictory ones.  Normal.

Taking everything I knew about guinea nests, and general info about how animals view "security", I gave them something simple- and lucked out.  But it was an informed lucked out.  :-)  I gave them a propped up, inverted tub.  They have to duck to get in- but once in, there's a lot more room- and, there's a second exit, which I think is a big deal, security-wise.  Chips and mulch for the floor, a minor depression for the eggs.  The straw I've put in won't stay there.

The first egg we got was in this box.  Chicken.  Then, a couple guinea eggs a day; certainly not all we should have had.  And we found an egg outside the coop, under a door lying propped up on the permanent coop construction site.  We knew there were more eggs being laid, and we weren't getting them.  The idea that we'd have to hunt for them- even for a few to provide hatching eggs to build the guinea flock, was not appealing; we have way too many places to hide nests around here.

Thinking cap back on.  Back when I was studying ethology, I read a huge amount of Niko Tinbergen's work on nesting in terns and gulls, and his dissections of how birds perceive eggs.  He did spectacular work, incidentally.

So.  I've got a social nester here; a species known to lay eggs promiscuously in many nests... hm... any nest with other eggs already there...

We'd been leaving one egg in the nest.  Then two.  Not much change.  Then I mandated we leave three eggs.  I had to have a long discussion, and cite Tinbergen extensively to get Spice to go along- why should we waste another egg; leave it exposed to spoilage, etc.

Bingo.  Three is the magic number- next day; 8 new eggs added to the nest.  And 100% since then.

Another aspect to it is that we've trained our birds to come back at sundown, to be closed in the coop at night; they do see the coop as "home".  Yes, guineas will cheerfully roost in trees; but we've got owls out the wazoo here, and I know we lost a guinea or two that way last summer.

How did we train these "half wild" birds this way?  Two tricks, gleaned from the information already available.  Feed them only once a day- at the time you're closing them in.  And manage the feed so there is none left by mid afternoon.  The guineas are fantastic foragers (our feed use is down to 1/2 scoop a day from 1.5 a day in winter); but they do love a little easy regular chicken feed.  And- a cup of white millet, inside the coop, at closing time.

Only one site recommended white millet; and we tried it a few times on our adolescent birds, who were totally unimpressed with it.  But, we tried it again in spring- and the older birds now did indeed clean it up very rapidly when it was offered.  It has definitely made it easier to get them all in and happy; for quite a while there, it took two people to herd them inside; now it's a one person job, "getting the birds in."  White millet seems to be guinea candy; and the chickens dive for it too.  We had to search around for it- finally found it at a local elevator.

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What are we going to do with all these eggs?  Eat quite a few- and hatch quite a few.  Somehow.  Someday, if we really wind up with hundreds of birds- we'll sell them, too; both as hatching eggs and to eat.  Hey, the feed is better than free- a lot of it is bugs we want eaten.

They're mostly fertile, as we can see when we crack them.  We've cooked them daily now for a couple weeks- the euphemistic term for how they taste is "more delicate than a hen's egg".  Which means- they don't have a pronounced "eggy" flavor; they're quite mild.  They're not bland, though; they taste- and feel like- food.  Very satisfying on tongue, and in tummy.  Cooking behavior is indistinguishable from chicken eggs; since they're smaller they tend to cook a tad faster.  The shell is indeed much stronger than a chicken egg, you have to get used to whacking them to get them cracked.  On the other hand, you can drop them on a hard floor, with no consequences... usually.  And I now recall my father telling me about boys playing catch with guinea eggs.  And eventually swapping a chicken egg into the game.  Sometimes a really old chicken egg.

Like other free-range eggs, the yolk is bright yellow; and one good aspect of the mild taste is that Smidgen now eats the yolk of her "egg-in-a-basket" as well as the white; with chicken eggs, she'll usually refuse to eat the yolk.  Lots of egg and cheese breakfast quesadillas; lots of egg salad sandwiches, something we never had before.  Intending to make our own mayonnaise before long.  And cakes- whenever we have an oven available.

We're seriously wondering about the real nutritional content of these eggs.  Digging on the web hasn't produced much hard info- and what there is is hard to compare.  The really good news is- one site measured guinea eggs as having the lowest cholesterol number of all eggs tested - and they tested everything from geese to doves.  Guineas had 12.77 mg/g of yolk; doves were the worst, with 21.99 mg/g.  

Anybody out there have the ability (and desire) to do a thorough analysis of our free-range guinea eggs?  We'll cheerfully ship you the eggs to work with- and publish the results, both here and elsewhere.  Would be great to know.

More on guineas- like, the sex stuff- next time.

Hang in there.  

First Fruits!

(click for larger)

I gotta tell ya, it's really really exciting, when you find your first eggs.  These eggs are even more exciting- all but one of these are guinea eggs!

Guinea eggs are pullet sized (those are Spice's hands); they run about 3 guinea to 2 hen eggs, size-wise.  They're a bit pointed, usually; and likely to have faint spots on the pointed end.

We haven't actually eaten any yet- it's too exciting just to look at them!  :-)

But we will; and we'll let you know how they cook and all.  

The info available says a guinea hen can lay 100 eggs a year.  We've got 7 or 8 hens (we think- they're tricky to sex, and even trickier to keep track of).  So- if we could keep them collected- that's a mess of eggs.

And- no kidding- they feed themselves to a great extent.  A month ago, with snow cover still in place, we were feeding our whole batch of birds about 1 and a half scoops of feed a day.  Now that the birds are out, finding seeds, grass, and early bugs- we're down to half a scoop a day.

The guineas, alas, tend to lay all over the farm- not in the coop.  Finding the nests can be really time consuming.  But- these eggs were all laid in the coop.  Hm.  Maybe we could breed a strain that lays eggs at home? 

It's been done, many times, folks- but not with guineas yet.  We'll have to see what we can do.

Oh, yeah- and the ticks.  Our tick season has started- and so far, they seem to be down.  But it's early.  Instead of 20 ticks per dog per day- we're down to 1; and ticks on us- once in 3 days or so.  Instead of 5 a day.  Is it the guineas?  Of course we have no control- so- can't say.  

But we've got less ticks- and eggs.  

So; that's my little bit of cheer for an otherwise rather gloomy Earth Day.  All that lousy news is getting to be a bummer.

If you're looking for a little cheer; dig out a copy of The Land Remembers, and read the chapters on eggs, and Easter.