Guinea Fowl Free Ranging Routine
As of tomorrow, our flock of 30 pearl grey Guinea fowl will have been free ranging for a full week – this year, that is. Last year, our Guinea fowl were free ranging right up until the worst of winter struck. At that time, we were compelled to confine the Guinea fowl to the coop and coop yard. They spent the worst of winter (about 4 months) in the relative safety and warmth of the coop and coop yard.
We get daylight here right now at about 6:00 AM. That will change this weekend when we reset the clocks for Daylight Savings. Before summer is over, we’ll have daylight well before 5:00 AM. Once the Guinea fowl see the sunshine, they awaken and want to be let out of their coop. In fact, they really want to be allowed out of the coop and coop yard to start free ranging, but that’s not going to be this year’s routine.
This year, we will not allow the Guinea fowl out of the coop yard to start free ranging until between 9-10:00 AM. We will open the small poultry door leading between the coop and coop yard at daylight, or shortly thereafter. We’ll return the Guinea fowl to their coop yard about 3-4 hours before nightfall. Right now, we return the Guinea fowl to the coop yard at about 3:30 PM, but later in the year it will be more like 7:00 PM. This means that, depending on the time of year, the Guinea fowl will get 6-10 hours of free ranging time every day.
There is one reason and one reason only that we are not allowing the Guinea fowl out of the coop yard to start free ranging until several hours after we allow them out of their coop: eggs! The Guinea fowl will lay their eggs early in the morning, as a rule. By containing them in the coop yard, which has access to the coop, we will have the highest probability of collecting the most eggs. This year, we expect that some Guinea fowl eggs will get laid and hatched without our knowledge, which is fine. We would also like to incubate some eggs. But mostly, we count on the eggs as a food source. Our Guinea fowl eggs are important to us – hence the free ranging schedule.
If you haven’t watched any of our Guinea fowl videos, tune into Guinea Fowl TV at http://www.youtube.com/user/GuineaFowlTV.
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