Homestead mailing list

["Marie McHarry" <mmcharry AT gmail.com>]

 On Tue, May 20, 2008 at 5:24 AM, Gene GeRue <genegerue AT ruralize.com> wrote:
>

> I am currently experimenting. Now withholding
> grain and trying to train them to come into the Taj Mahen at night
> when I call and rattle a small container with egg pellets in it...

A hundred percent fool-proof way to get hens to come in at night is to
have a light that comes on at dusk and goes off at full dark. Hens
will congregate where it's still light. Once they get used to going
somewhere at night, they'll go there. If you want to shut them up
before it's completely dark even after they know where to roost, the
light is handy.

Okay, so it burns a little electricity. It works. Or use a kerosene
lamp (but not if you have deep, dry bedding).

On guineas: I like 'em. I raised a bunch who liked to roost in the
hackberry tree. Every few nights, one of them would become an owl main
course. In later years, I've raised the keats with the chicks. They
all hang out together and roost together in the chicken house.

The one thing I particularly like about guineas is that if there is a
fox or the like in the grass stalking the birds, the guineas go
completely ballistic so that any creature not deaf knows there's a
problem.

Guineas do tend to have a high attrition rate, alas, but you might do
so good if your brain was the size of a pea.

Marie